Phonological Theory Research Articles

Express[p] in expressive phonology: analysis of a nicknaming pattern using ‘princess’ in Japanese

Abstract Recent studies have shown that sound-symbolic patterns can be modelled using phonological theory. The purpose of the current study is to describe a new Japanese nicknaming pattern, pime-yobi, wherein [h] alternates with [p] to express cuteness, and to model it using Maximum Entropy Harmonic Grammar. The current study, building on the analysis of Alderete & Kochetov (2017), proposes a sound-symbolic constraint, Express[p], which requires output forms to contain [p]. The results of two experiments show that Japanese speakers found names containing [p]s to be cuter than those without them and that pime-yobi nicknaming exhibits intra- and inter-speaker variation in acceptability and cuteness. Based on these results, theoretical analysis shows that the weight of Express[p] varies both across different speakers and within the same speaker.

ON THE THEORETICAL PROBLEMS OF PREDICTABILITY IN SERBIAN PALATALIZATION

The paper presents the Serbian velar palatalization: /k/ → [tʃ], /ɡ/ → [ʒ], /x/ → [ʃ]. A detailed, comprehensive description of the phenomenon will not be provided, as it is not the main task and theme of the paper. The paper demonstrates that predictability does not strictly hold „in equal measure” in phonology, contrary to what traditional grammars suggest (e.g., Klajn 2005). Even theory-specifi approaches do not address it (e.g., Starčević 2005). This is one of the foundational assumptions of the theory of Government Phonology à la Kaye et al. (1985; 1990): phonological processes are organized according to universal principles and are not arbitrary (Non-Arbitrariness Principle). Universal rules can be overridden by parametric settings, which characterize the phonology of a specific language – in this, Government Phonology shares principles parallel to those of the Minimalist Program. The task of the paper is to show when predictability is not met, through the lens of Serbian phonology, based on the aspect that shows I-U asymmetry. The paper’s implicit goal is to highlight that the strict conditions imposed on phonological theories may not necessarily account for the variations shown on the surface, and things are much more complicated than what we might assume about Universal Grammar. The paper follows the theory of Government Phonology along with Element Theory (Backley 2011), which will be essential for explaining the phenomenon.

Phonological Process of Word-Final Consonant Sounds in Indonesian Learners by Japanese Speakers (Case Study of Japanesia Online Course Students)

This study aims to analyze the phonological processes and contributing factors affecting the pronunciation of final consonant sounds by native Japanese speakers learning Indonesian. The research employs the theory of generative transformational phonology, using distinctive features to address the research questions. A qualitative descriptive approach was adopted, utilizing data from the Japanesia course's online class videos on YouTube, collected through observation and note-taking techniques. The analysis identifies three main phonological processes in Japanese learners' pronunciation of Indonesian final consonants: sound substitution (e.g., [n] to [ŋ] and [l] to [r]), elision of [h], and addition of sounds such as [u] following [r] and [s], as well as aspirated [h] after [t] and [k]. These phonological adjustments reflect the absence of certain Indonesian sounds in Japanese, prompting learners to adapt pronunciations to their native phonological system. Furthermore, the Japanese language’s predominant open syllable structure (CVCV) generally excludes word-final consonants aside from nasals, contributing to these adaptations.

A learning-based account of local phonological processes

Abstract Phonological processes tend to involve local dependencies, an observation that has been expressed explicitly or implicitly in many phonological theories, such as the use of minimal symbols in SPE and the inclusion of primarily strictly local constraints in Optimality Theory. I propose a learning-based account of local phonological processes, providing an explicit computational model. The model is grounded in experimental results that suggest children are initially insensitive to long-distance dependencies and that as their ability to track non-adjacent dependencies grows, learners still prefer local generalisations to non-local ones. The model encodes these results by constructing phonological processes starting around an alternating segment and expanding outward to incorporate more phonological context only when surface forms cannot be predicted with sufficient accuracy. The model successfully constructs local phonological generalisations and exhibits the same preference for local patterns that humans do, suggesting that locality can emerge as a computational consequence of a simple learning procedure.

Analysis of EFL Students’ Difficulties in Learning English Phonology and Phonetics at English Department, Victory University of Sorong

This study analyzes the difficulties faced by EFL students in learning English phonology and phonetics at the English Department of Victory University of Sorong. The research involved 46 participants from the 5th and 7th semesters who had completed the English phonology and phonetics course. The findings reveal that students encounter significant challenges due to various factors, including interference from their first language (L1), inconsistencies in English spelling and pronunciation, and limited exposure to authentic speech and diverse accents. Additionally, cognitive constraints such as processing limitations and insufficient phonological working memory further hinder their ability to apply phonological theory in real-world communication. The lack of focused phonological training in the curriculum, combined with psychological barriers like pronunciation anxiety, also contributes to the students’ struggles. These findings highlight the need for enhanced phonological instruction, increased exposure to varied spoken English, and strategies to build student confidence, which are essential for overcoming the difficulties in mastering English phonology and phonetics.

An Optimality-Theoretic Analysis of -akun- Dummy Infixation: A Secret Language in the Kenitra Dialect

This paper investigates the pattern of -akun- dummy infixation in a secret language of the Kenitra dialect adopting the framework of Optimality Theory. Since previous studies on secret languages in Morocco have focused on the sociolinguistic aspects, this paper attempts to analyze this secret language from a different viewpoint. To our knowledge, this Secret Language has escaped the notice of Moroccan linguists to implement any phonological theory to account for the infixation pattern. Consequently, we show the shortcomings of traditional approaches regarding the location of the infix. Furthermore, we provide evidence that the dummy infix is consistently epenthesized before the vowel of the stem and not after the first or second consonant in the onset position of the stem based on the interaction of constraints. In conclusion, we fill the theoretical gap in the literature on secret languages in Moroccan Arabic.

Stød and stress location in Danish: A nonce word study

Abstract In Danish, the distribution of stød exhibits a pattern related to the position of the stressed syllable. Some phonological theories of stød, e.g. Basbøll (2005), consider stød on the antepenultimate or ultimate syllable, and non-stød on the penultimate syllable, to be the default. This article reports on a production study with nonce words, investigating the distributional pattern of stød in relation to the position of the stressed syllable in monomorphemic nonce words. Ten speakers were asked to pronounce 336 nonce words with stress on either the ultimate, penultimate, or antepenultimate syllable. The results showed that stød on ultimate stressed syllables and non-stød on penultimate stressed syllables replicates in nonce words, but stød on antepenultimate stressed syllables does not. This suggests that stød in antepenultimate stressed words is not the default, but lexical.

METRICAL STRESS IN MANDAR PHONOLOGY AND POETRY

This short paper is to extend the theory of metrical phonology to the system of stress in one language of Indonesia: Mandar. As the subfamily of South Sulawesi language, Mandar is spoken on the northern coast of West Sulawesi province, from the city of Polewali in the east to the town of Tinambung in the west. The data itself is gathered from native Mandar speaker which provides a good representation of the language. This paper has surveyed the distribution of word-level stress in Mandar from the perspective of the theory of metrical phonology. It has shown that the language typically requires each prosodic word to host a single instance of stress on penultimate syllable. The final proposal is to have the stress pattern emerge from the construction of a single disyllabic trochee at the right edge of the word, with the trochee requires first syllable to be heavy (CVC or CVV) and second syllable to be light (CV or CVC as word-final consonant are non-moraic, but not CVV). From this position, we have shown that our metrical analysis allows us to see another property of traditional Kalinda’da’ poetry: beyond showing a regular number of syllables in each line, these poems also require different numbers of stresses. We leave it to future work to extend this result.

The process of vowel harmony in Kurdish language in the framework of Autosegmental phonology

This study discusses the vowels harmony in Kurdish language. Vowel harmony like assimilation process is a very common process in most languages of the world. This process is studied by most phonological theories, such as generative phonology, autosegmental phonology as well as optimality theory. We examine this process from the perspective of autosegmental phonology in this paper. Therefore, we can say that the aim of this study is to investigate the process of vowel harmony in Kurdish language from the perspective of autosegmental phonology. The methodology of this study is to analyze the content of the articles and collect the data with appropriate samples. Autosegmental theory is one of the theories in the field of phonology and was first emerged by Goldsmith as an independent field of generative phonology. In 1976, along with the study of rhyme languages, he introduced autosegmental phonology and then it was published in tonal languages. This theory is actually a field or part of production phonology.

Level Ordering and Lexical Phonology of Bangla: A Stratal Optimality Theoretic Analysis

This study deals with the different word formation processes in Bangla under the framework of Lexical Phonology and Stratal OT with both descriptive and theoretical goals. The study attempts a) to provide a description of the morphophonemics of Bangla that result from the concatenation of morphemes, b) to use the theory of Lexical Phonology and Morphology (Kiparsky, 1982,1985; Mohanan, 1982) and later developments in Stratal OT (Kiparsky, 2003; Bermudez- Otero and McMohan, 2006) and others.

Phonological learning is asymmetrical between prefixes and suffixes

Phonological theories typically treat prefixes and suffixes as if phonological processes apply uniformly to both. However, previous studies have found clear asymmetries between the behavior of both affixes. We argue that this is due to phonological processes being easier to learn in suffix position rather than prefix position. To test this, an artificial language learning task was used to evaluate whether phonological learning is symmetrical between affixes. Results pattern in the direction of the hypothesis, namely, that phonological learning is asymmetrically facilitated in suffix position over prefix position, providing support to general cognitive mechanisms being responsible for strong cross-linguistic tendencies.

Opaque morphology and phonology: Historical prefixes in English

Abstract In most of the literature on English phonology, historically prefixed words such as contain, respect or submit are seen as having no morphological structure synchronically. However, such words were treated as complex in the early generative literature and are still analysed in that way in part of the literature. In this paper, we seek to review the evidence for the claim that such words are simplex words, which predicts that they should pattern with words with no internal structure in their phonological and morphological behaviours and in psycholinguistic experiments. We show that the evidence does not support that claim and shows that these words should be treated as morphologically complex units, although they differ from words with productive morphology. As these words tend to be partly or entirely opaque semantically, this raises the question of how such structures may be learned. We argue that the recurrence of forms is the main factor leading to their identification and lay out a possible order of acquisition of various morphological structures. Finally, we argue that theories of phonology may account for this by allowing the reference to morphological constituents whose semantics are impoverished.

A Non-linear Analysis of Segmental Harmony in Algerian Wadi Souf Dialect

The present study discusses some phonological processes of segmental harmony in Algerian Wadi Souf dialect. The data were collected from natural recorded speech of fifty native speakers of this dialect. Moreover, one of the researchers added some examples since she is a native speaker of this dialect. This research adopts the non-linear phonological theory. The findings showed that this theory can provide an adequate analysis for segmental harmony. It is also found that non-adjacent sibilants can spread the feature of anteriority bi-directionally. The anterior sibilants /z/ and /s/ spread the feature [+anterior] to the non-anterior sibilant /ʒ/, and it is realized as [z]. Moreover, raising and fronting vowel harmony occurs in both CaCi:C adjectives that are realized as CiCi:C and the imperfect prefix of jaCCiC and jaCCi verbs that are realized as jiCCiC and jiCCi. Raising and rounding vowel harmony occurs in the imperfect prefix of jaCCuC tri-consonantal verbs that are realized as juCCuC.

Understanding the Difficulties in Communication with Down Syndrome

The goal of this study was to identify the phonological difficulties a 19-year-old Down syndrome individual faced in her daily communication. The research method employed a qualitative descriptive approach using a case study design. A 19-year-old female with minor Down syndrome served as the research subject. Data was gathered using subject observation, interviews, and conversation recordings. The data was analyzed through some steps: first, transcribing the data; the recorded data is transcribed, the transcription process by writing the words spoken by the subject. Second, interpretation; the data was analyzed using relevant phonological process theory. The examination was conducted on the characteristics of language difficulties faced by subjects based on phonological theory. The result showed that the phonological difficulties faced by individuals with Down syndrome included the processes of assimilation, dissimilation, monophthongs, anaptyxis, substitution, apocope, and deletion of weak syllables.

Phonological Processes Triggered by Means of Verbs Conjugation in Bantu Languages

This study explores the complex relationship between phonological processes and verb extensions, focusing on the concept of word elasticity, which describes the transformations words undergo based on linguistic contexts. Anchored in the Generative Phonology Theory, which postulates a transition from underlying representation to surface structure, the research aims to understand the phonological outcomes stemming from verb extension morphology, particularly in Bantu languages. Employing a qualitative approach through a documentary systematic review of peer-reviewed literature and academic articles across diverse languages, findings reveal multiple phonological processes, such as elision, assimilation, and palatalization, demonstrating the dynamic shifts induced by verb conjugations. The study concludes that understanding the interplay between morphology and phonology is fundamental, emphasizing the transformative nature of verb extensions in shaping phonological processes across languages.

Spreading and correspondence in Huave vowel copy

Assimilation is a central phenomenon in phonology, yet there is little consensus on either its representation or computation. In particular, the empirical distinction between spreading (feature sharing) and correspondence (feature copying) is disputed. In this paper, I identify novel diagnostics from two interacting assimilation processes in San Francisco del Mar Huave (isolate: Mexico). First, vowel-copy epenthesis displays a previously unattested blocking pattern that is problematic for spreading, but predicted by feature-copying approaches like Agreement By Correspondence. Second, in CV agreement, I argue that only feature sharing driven by Dep and Specify constraints can insightfully account for the role of underspecification, which produces a range of directionality effects. Huave shows that both spreading and correspondence are needed in phonological theory, and also demonstrates that monolithically assimilation-mandating constraints like Agree can be decomposed to derive assimilation from the interaction of more elementary, independently motivated principles of markedness and faithfulness.

Discussing some Phonological Aaspects of Kurdish Through the Words befr and berf ”snow”

”befr” and ”berf” are variants of the same word. They are used in different Kurmanji-speaking areas. Although the sequencing of [f] and [r] is the main difference between them, this variation leads us to investigate some aspects of Kurdish phonology. It also works as a sample for testing some phonological theories. In this study, the sounds of befr and berf are described in phonetics terms and in the frame of distinctive features. Since one of the key questions of this study is why these two forms exist in Kurmanji, the phonotactics of their sounds within the frame of the Sonority Hiearchy and the Sonority Sequencing Principle is presented. When befr is pronounced in isolation, an epenthetic [i] is inserted between [f] and [r]. This epenthesis changes the monosyllabic [befr] to a disyllabic [be.fir]. Therefore, syllabe types and stress placement in Kurmanji are also discussed here by presenting the theory of Metrical phonology and the moraic theory.The study ends with answering the key question. The last section demonstrates why both forms of Kurdish ”snow” are acceptable by adopting Optimaltiy Theory.

Phonological processes triggered by means of verbs conjugation

This study explores the complex relationship between phonological processes and verb extensions, focusing on the concept of word elasticity which describes the transformations words undergo based on linguistic contexts. Anchored in the Generative Phonology Theory, which postulates a transition from underlying representation to surface structure, the research aims to understand the phonological outcomes stemming from verb extension morphology, particularly in Bantu languages. Employing a qualitative approach through a documentary systematic review of peer-reviewed literature and academic articles across diverse languages, findings reveal multiple phonological processes, such as elision, assimilation, and palatalization, demonstrating the dynamic shifts induced by verb conjugations. The study concludes that understanding the interplay between morphology and phonology is fundamental, emphasizing the transformative nature of verb extensions in shaping phonological processes across languages.

A Learning-Based Account of Phonological Tiers

Abstract Morphophonological alternations often involve dependencies between adjacent segments. Despite the apparent distance between relevant segments in the alternations that arise in consonant and vowel harmony, these dependencies can usually be viewed as adjacent on a tier representation. However, the tier needed to render dependencies adjacent varies crosslinguistically, and the abstract nature of tier representations in comparison to flat, string-like representations has led phonologists to seek justification for their use in phonological theory. In this paper, I propose a learning-based account of tier-like representations. I argue that humans show a proclivity for tracking dependencies between adjacent items, and propose a simple learning algorithm that incorporates this proclivity by tracking only adjacent dependencies. The model changes representations in response to being unable to predict the surface form of alternating segments—a decision governed by the Tolerance Principle, which allows for learning despite the sparsity and exceptions inevitable in naturalistic data. Tier-like representations naturally emerge from this learning procedure, and, when trained on small amounts of natural language data, the model achieves high accuracy generalizing to held-out test words, while flexibly handling cross-linguistic complexities like neutral segments and blockers. The model also makes precise predictions about human generalization behavior, and these are consistently borne out in artificial language experiments.

ENGLISH DIPHTHONGS & STUDENTS’ PERCEPTION: AN ANALYSIS FROM PHONOLOGICAL POINT OF VIEW

Certain English sounds are absent from Indonesian, making pronating English diphthongs challenging for certain students. It is challenging for students to pronounce English diphthongs correctly due to various internal and external factors, including their ignorance of when to pronounce them based on their type and position. The researchers attempt to examine how difficult it is for the students and how they perceive English diphthongs based on the issue they are facing. This study's objectives are the most challenging diphthongs pronounced by students, the most difficult diphthong position, and the degree to which students struggle with pronouncing English diphthong sounds. The design of this study is quantitative and descriptive. Forty-two students comprise the study's sample, and their answers to an oral exam and questionnaire are used to gather data. The researchers found 97 errors in the closing type and 191 in the centring type of diphthongs uttered by the students. The most challenging position of diphthongs in their pronunciation is the centering position (eə, ɪə, ʊə). In addition, five factors are becoming the reason for students' difficulty in pronouncing English diphthong sounds. They are (1) the students have less confidence while pronouncing words, (2) each student has different and limited skills, (3) the lack of motivation from the students causes difficulties in the teaching and learning process, (4) the family environment is very influential in the language development of the students, and (5) the social environment is also one of the influences in the language development of the students. The implication of this study can be in the field of linguistics and education, for example, phonological theories and pedagogical strategies.