Adaptation of English complex words into Korean

Abstract

Most previous studies related to loanword adaptation have centered on segmental mappings between source and loanword sounds in morphologically simplex words (LaCharite and Paradis, Ling Inq 36:223–258, 2005; Kang, Phonology 20:1–56, 2003). However, few have considered the adaptation of complex words, specifically words made of multiple free morphemes. Examining the adaptation of complex English words into Korean, the present study makes four claims. First, it proposes that each component of a complex word is a unit for loanword adaptation in calculating sound mappings. Second, it suggests that each component word is a stem, whereas a loanword as a whole is categorized as a nominal word in Korean. Third, apparent single-unit adaptation is possible only when the first component allows variable final vowel epenthesis at the end of the first component word; this is analyzed in terms of split-base effects. Fourth, the allophonic realization of phonemes plays a crucial role in loanword adaptation. These claims are empirically supported by loanwords found via the National Academy of Korean Language (NAKL 1991) and Google searching (March–June 2011). Furthermore, this study provides an explicit formalization of the analysis of complex loanwords within Optimality Theory (Prince and Smolensky, Opimality Theory: Constraint interaction in generative grammar, 1993). The present study contributes to the literature of loanword phonology by shedding light on several issues. First, the study proposes a model for the adaptation of complex loanwords wherein both morphological structure and the phonetic information of the source language play important roles. There has been intense debate about the effect of input information on loanword adaptation, broadly split between a phonological view (LaCharite and Paradis, Ling Inq 36:223–258, 2005) and a perceptual view (Silverman, Phonology 9:289–328, 1992; Steriade, in: Hume and Johnson (eds.) The role of speech perception in phonology, 2001; Peperkamp and Dupoux, Proceedings of the 15th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 2003). The adaptation of complex English words in Korean supports the perceptual approach, in that the allophone realized in a complex word determines the loanword sound. It also reveals that sound mappings in loanwords are determined by the morphological structure of source words. There has been a discussion about whether the morphosyntactic base is isomorphic to the phonological base (Steriade, Lexical conservatism and the notion base of affixation, 2000). Component-by-component analysis of the apparent single-unit adaptation provides support for the existence of a split-base effect as well as for the lexical conservatism proposed by Steriade (Lexical conservatism and the notion base of affixation, 2000). Finally, it makes a contribution to evaluation of the internal structure and morphological category of complex loanwords, which has been rarely considered in the literature on loanword phonology.