Coarticulatory assimilation of velar consonants on vowels in the Southern Dialect of America English

Abstract

Previous studies have shown dialectal differences in assimilatory coarticulation patterns. For example, Southern American English (i.e., SAE) speakers have more nasalized vowels in pre-nasal contexts than non-SAE speakers (e.g., Awan et al., 2015). This study asks whether SAE and non-SAE speakers differ in another assimilatory coarticulation process, namely, the “velar pinch,” or the convergence of F2 and F3 in pre-velar vowels. To answer this question, a production study is conducted: 5 SAE speakers and 5 non-SAE speakers are recruited to produce 24 words embedded in sentences. The target words include three types of assimilatory contexts: pre-/k,g/, pre-/η/, and pre-/n/ vowels. The degree of vowel nasalization and the formant transitions before the consonant are analyzed based on Kaiser (1997). Preliminary results show that SAE speakers have stronger vowel nasalization in the pre-/n/ and pre-/η/ contexts, and smaller F3-F2 differences in the pre-/k,g/ contexts, suggesting that SAE speakers show not only stronger vowel nasalization but also stronger “velar pinch” than non-SAE speakers. Interestingly, in the pre-/η/ contexts in which both types of coarticulatory assimilation are possible, SAE speakers have weaker “velar pinch” than non-SAE speakers. Sociolinguistic implications of the results will be discussed.