The effect of stress on duration in Aleut

Abstract

Although duration is often one of the physical correlates of stress, it has been claimed [A. Berinstein, UCLAWPP 47 (1979)] that languages with contrastive vowel length do not use duration as a correlate of stress. This study addresses three questions about the phonetic correlates of stress in Aleut, a language with contrastive vowel length. Is duration a correlate of stress in Aleut? If so, does the change in duration caused by stress neutralize the phonemic contrast between short and long vowels? Finally, does stress assignment precede or follow the optional deletion of the final syllable? Data from four native speakers of Pribilof Aleut were analyzed. Vowel duration was measured from the spectrographs produced by a Kay CSL 4300B speech analysis system. Vowels were categorized as stressed or unstressed according to the Aleut stress rule [A. Taff, MA thesis, University of Washington, 1992] and as long or short according to the words dictionary entry. Statistical analysis shows that duration is a correlate of stress, counter to Berinstein’s claim. However, despite the change in duration wrought by stress, contrastive ratios between short and long vowels are maintained. In addition, stress is assigned before final syllable deletion.