Moraic coda sonority in Chilean Spanish

Nate Shaftoe

doi:10.33137/twpl.v41i1.32761

Abstract

This paper discusses coda lenition phenomena in Chilean Spanish, seeking to create a unified analysis for coda obstruent gliding and /s/-reduction. The paper invokes Moraic Theory to motivate lenition of certain segments in coda position. Using Harmonic Serialism, a serial variant of Optimality Theory, Chilean Spanish is shown to have a minimum sonority requirement on coda segments, and lenites insufficiently sonorous segments. /s/ is shown to place-delete to [h] to avoid sonority restrictions. The lack of /ʔ/ causes obstruents to diverge their derivation from that of /s/. Lenition to glottal segments is preferred, but gliding occurs if this is impossible.

Highlights

Coda lenition is a common phenomenon cross-linguistically, manifesting in such varied forms as final devoicing and even sometimes vocalization
This paper has argued for a unified analysis of Chilean Spanish coda obstruent lenition motivated by moraic sonority concerns
It has brought both /s/→[h] lenition and obstruent gliding under a single analysis, with the two lenition paths diverging based on the licensing of glottal segments

Summary

Introduction

Coda lenition is a common phenomenon cross-linguistically, manifesting in such varied forms as final devoicing and even sometimes vocalization. Chilean Spanish stops /p, b, t, d, k, g/ lenite into glides if in coda position, regardless of whether the segment is word-final or not (Martínez-Gil 1997: 170; Piñeros 2001: 164-165;). This paper argues that Chilean Spanish has a high-ranked *OBSTRUENTMORA constraint which bans stops and fricatives from bearing morae Coda /s/ place-deletes, because Chilean Spanish permits [h] This allows underlying /s/ to vacuously satisfy the sonority constraints on mora-bearing segments. This paper argues that a single underlying process, the banning of obstruents from bearing morae, can account for the lenition of both stops to glides, and /s/ to [h] or [ø]. As this data shows, Chilean Spanish lenites both voiced and voiceless stops to glides when they appear in the coda. Any explanation of the coda phenomena in Chilean Spanish must account for this coda /s/ lenition

Gradualness

Constraints

Obstruents

Final Constraint Ranking

Future Predictions

Conclusion