Compiling sonority scales with obstruent vowels

Abstract

<p>It has been argued that languages systematically license syllabicity to all segment classes more sonorous than the least sonorous syllabic segment in that language (Blevins 1995).1 The syllabic segments found in American English exemplify this arrangement, which results in a contiguous zone of segment classes that can be licensed syllabicity (the permitted nuclei). Since sonority scales have been argued to be ranked with input from acoustic parameters such as intensity (Parker 2008), this could be taken to mean that all languages permit syllabicity in segments falling within a given range for an acoustic parameter. In this paper, I introduce obstruent vowels, phonetic obstruents that behave phonologically as permitted nuclei, and argue that they form a major exception to these generalizations, given their frequent separation from the contiguous range of other permitted nuclei in a given language.</p>