Abstract
AbstractSound change in the form of plosive mergers has been reported for a variety of languages and is the result of a reduction of phonetic distance between two (or more) sounds. The present study is concerned with the opposite development of phonetic differentiation in plosives (akin to a phonetic split), a less commonly reported phenomenon that is taking place in Austrian German at the moment. A previously small (or null) phonetic distinction between fortis and lenis plosives – a presumed near-merger – is gradually developing into a clear phonetic contrast in younger speakers. In the present study, voice onset time of word-initial plosives was measured in two generations of Austrian speakers (born in the middle and at the end of the 20th century), yielding an ongoing phonetic differentiation where the voice onset time of lenis consonants is shortened while, at the same time, that of fortis consonants is lengthened. These results present an insight into the recent diachronic development of Austrian German and the changes in plosive production that are currently taking place.
Highlights
Different processes underlie sound change, depending on the exact selective pressures that are at work in a particular language at a certain time, and two prominent phonological mechanisms, namely merging and splitting of sounds are central concepts in the study of sound change (Labov 1994)
voice onset time (VOT) proportions were generally longer before high vowels than before mid or low vowels in both generations, which is consistent with previous reports on Austrian German (Grassegger 1996; Moosmüller and Ringen 2004)
The present study investigated the development of voice onset time in an ongoing phonetic split of word-initial plosives in Austrian German
Summary
Different processes underlie sound change, depending on the exact selective pressures that are at work in a particular language at a certain time, and two prominent phonological mechanisms, namely merging and splitting of sounds are central concepts in the study of sound change (Labov 1994). Mergers are instances where distinctive features between sounds disappear, resulting in two (or more) phonemes approximating the same acoustical realization (Hickey 2004). On the other hand, are representations of increases in phonetic discriminability and describe the process of one sound starting to develop two (or more) acoustically distinct variants (Piercy 2011; Smith 2007). Research has shown that certain phonemes seem to be more prone to linguistic variation (Wedel et al 2013), and among the consonants, plosives feature prominently in the literature on sound change Research has shown that certain phonemes seem to be more prone to linguistic variation (Wedel et al 2013), and among the consonants, plosives feature prominently in the literature on sound change (e. g., Coetzee et al 2018; Kang 2014; Kanwal and Ritchart 2015; Kuang and Oh 2011; Martin et al 2016)
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