The acoustics of plosives and the formation of prosodic structure in Polish

Abstract

Abstract The aim of this acoustic study of voiced and voiceless word-initial plosives is to establish the nature of the relationship between prosodic positions, accent, and segmental phonetics in Polish. Four different acoustic parameters were investigated (VOT, pitch, F1, and preceding vowel’s duration). The results show rather modest effects of prosodic position. The findings are interpreted with reference to the prosodic typology posited in the Onset Prominence representational framework (OP), in which prosodic domains are not imposed from above but rather are formed according to opposing mechanisms of ‘submersion’ and ‘adjunction’. The findings support the claim that Polish belongs to the latter category, in which only modest effects of position are expected.