Phonetics and Phonology in Iberia 2005 [PAPI 2005], Universitat Aut

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Phonetics and Phonology in Iberia 2005 PAPI
2005, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona



June 20-21st, 2005 Catalan Vowel Reduction
and Dispersion TheoryDylan HerrickMie
University

• 1. Introduction
• Recent work on phonological vowel reduction has
  attempted to tighten the link between phonetics
  and phonology. (Among others Barnes 2002
  Crosswhite to appear Flemming to appear Herrick
  2003 Padgett 2004 Padgett and Tabain to
  appear).
• Since these analyses are more phonetic in nature
  they make more precise phonetic predictions in
  turn, they require more phonetically detailed
  data to determine the extent to which their
  predictions are accurate.
• This paper uses acoustic data collected from six
  varieties of Catalan to examine the
  appropriateness of a Dispersion Theory (DT
  Flemming 1995 Padgett 1997 Sanders 2003)
  explanation of vowel reduction.

• 5. Dispersion Theory and vowel reduction
• Each language enforces a particular distance ?
  which must be maintained between contrasting
  vowel phonemes. See (6a).
• Articulatory constraints against low vowels in
  unstressed syllables result in a decrease in the
  available perceptual distance between
  (unstressed) vowel pairs.
• The distance between unstressed vowel phonemes is
  less than the language particular distance ?. See
  (6b).
• The result is neutralization among unstressed
  vowels (until the language specific distance
  requirement ? can be met). See (6c).
• See Flemming (to appear) Padgett (2004)
  Padgett and Tabain (to appear) Herrick (2003)
  for a more detailed explanation. For related but
  non-DT explanations, see Barnes (2002) and
  Crosswhite (to appear).

• 9. Neutralization
• Neutralization is complete.
• Anova (p lt 0.01) show that there are no
  statistically significant differences between
  vowels which are reported to neutralize in
  unstressed position for all speakers and for
  all varieties. (Herrick 2003)

• 10. Raising
• The primary characteristic of Catalan Vowel
  Reduction is raising (along F1) not
  centralization (lowering, reduction of F2)

• Predictions for raising (6-28 for Western
  29-57 for Eastern) are met. (Herrick 2003)

• 6. Illustration of DT Account of Vowel Reduction

• 2. Background
• Six varieties of Catalan
• Bages, Girona, Ciutadella, Palma, Lloseta, and
  Lleida

• 11. Perceptual Distance
• Distance (as a percent of the total space) in F1
  for stressed front vowels

• Vowel Reduction in Catalan

• Euclidian distance (F1 x F2 as a percent of the
  total space) for stressed front vowels

• Predictions for minimal perceptual distance are
  not met. (Herrick 2003)

• 7. DT Predictions and Assumptions
• Duration
• The DT explanation depends, in large part, upon
  constraints against duration and jaw lowering to
  drive the neutralization of contrasts.
• Neutralization
• DT assumes that vowel reduction will result in
  the complete neutralization of contrasting
  segments. (If not, one could argue that the
  vowels are simply more crowded and easier to
  confuse, but still distinct.)
• Raising
• DT predicts that vowel reduction is due
  primarily to raising and not necessarily
  centralization (even for Western Catalan which
  does not reduce to schwa in unstressed position).
• Perceptual Distance
• DT makes extensive use of perceptual distance
  constraints to what extent do vowels obey a
  language specific minimal distance ??

• 12. Conclusion
• Data from six varieties of Catalan provide
  support for three aspects of a DT analysis of
  phonological vowel reduction
• (a) Duration
• (b) Neutralization
• (c) Raising
• The predictions for perceptual distance, however,
  are not met by either a straightforward measure
  of linear distance (for F1) or the Euclidian
  distance (F1 x F2) between neighboring vowel
  pairs.

• 3. Speakers
• Three native speakers per variety (regional
  dialect).
• All female college students between 18-25 years
  old.
• Native both parents are native speakers Catalan
  is the speakers first language and the primary
  language of daily speech.

Selected References Barnes, J.A. 2002.
Positional neutralization a phonologization
approach to typological predictions. Doctoral
dissertation, UC Berkeley. Crosswhite, K. to
appear. Vowel reduction. In Hayes, B., R.
Kirchner, and D. Steriade (eds.) Phonetic bases
of markedness. Cambridge Cambridge, University
Press. Flemming, E. 1995. Auditory
representations in phonology. Doctoral
dissertation. UCLA. Flemming, E. to appear.
Contrast and perceptual distinctiveness. In
Hayes, B., R. Kirchner, and D. Steriade (eds.),
Phonetic bases of markedness. Cambridge
Cambridge University Press. Herrick, D. 2003.
An acoustic analysis of phonological vowel
reduction in six varieties of Catalan. Doctoral
dissertation, UC Santa Cruz. Padgett, J. 1997.
Perceptual distance of contrast vowel height and
nasality. Phonology at Santa Cruz, vol. 5
63-78. Padgett, J. 2004. Russian vowel
reduction and Dispersion Theory. Phonological
Studies, 781-96. Padgett, J. and M. Tabain. to
appear. Adaptive dispersion theory and
phonological vowel reduction in Russian.
Phonetica. Sanders, N. 2003. Opacity and sound
change in the Polish lexicon. Doctoral
dissertation. UC Santa Cruz.

• 8. Duration
• Unstressed vowels are shorter than stressed
  vowels
• High vowels and schwa are shorter than other
  vowels

• 4. Dispersion Theory
• Three principles of Dispersion Theory (Flemming
  1995)
• A. Maximize the number of contrasts.
  (easy to make big lexicons)
• B. Maximize the distinctiveness of contrasts.
  (easy perception)
• C. Minimize articulatory effort. (laziness)