Ejective production mechanisms in English

Abstract

Ejective realization of stops seems to be increasing in many varieties of English, which has triggered a new debate on the basic mechanism of ejective production. While traditionally the glottalic initiation mechanism of ejectives is thought to require a closed glottis and active larynx raising, this has been questioned for the emergent English ejectives, and a pulmonic airstream mechanism has been suggested. In order to shed light on the possible production mechanism of English ejectives, we present rtMRI data acquired at 50fps from a corpus of 27 native British English and 18 native American English speakers. Auditory analysis of 20 BE-speakers from the corpus confirms that 26% of all word-final stops in target words are realized as ejectives. Our results so far agree with previous observations about the conditioning factors favoring ejective production. Ejectives occur predominantly in stressed position as allophones of word-final velar, less frequently of labial and coronal stops. Surprisingly, also phonemically voiced stops may be realized as ejectives. Importantly, the rtMRI data will allow us to measure larynx height and to observe the extent of active larynx movement involved in the initiation process in English ejectives. [Work supported by ERC Horizon 2020 grant Interaccent to J. Harrington.]