Effects of uvular consonants on vowel quality in Lushootseed

Abstract

Although the influence of uvular consonants on vowel quality has been studied in Interior Salish languages (Bessell, 1992; 1998; Flemming et al., 2008), it has not been studied in Coast Salish languages. This study investigates the effect of uvular consonants on vowel quality in Lushootseed, a Coast Salish language spoken in the Puget Sound region of the Pacific Northwest, which has uvular stops and fricatives. Archival recordings (Burke Museum, 2015) of a native speaker were examined. A study was performed to analyze the effects of uvular consonants on formants of adjacent vowels. F1 and F2 were measured for vowels adjacent to uvular consonants that were positioned pre- and post-vocalically. These measures were compared with vowels adjacent to non-uvular consonants. The results reveal that there was an increase in F1 and a decrease in F2 for all vowels. The effects were greater for F1 than F2. These results are in contrast with those of Bessell (1992; 1998), who observed two effects: (i) only non-low vowels were affected, and (ii) F2 showed a greater effect than F1. These findings provide further implications on acoustic phonetic research for Coast Salish languages.