1. A Faithfulness Ranking Projected from a Perceptibility Scale: The Case of [+ Voice] in Japanese.
- Author
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Kawahara, Shigeto
- Subjects
- *
LOANWORDS , *OPTIMALITY theory (Linguistics) , *GENERATIVE grammar , *PSYCHOLINGUISTICS , *COMPARATIVE phonology , *JAPANESE language , *LINGUISTICS , *LANGUAGE & languages , *COMMUNICATION - Abstract
Within the framework of optimality theory (Prince & Smolensky 2004), Steriade (2001a,b) proposes the P-map hypothesis, whose fundamental tenet is that the rankings of faithfulness constraints are grounded in perceptual-similarity rankings. This article provides empirical support for this hypothesis. In Japanese loanword phonology, a voiced geminate, but not a singleton, devoices to dissimilate from another voiced obstruent within a single stem. Based on this observation, I argue that the [+ voice] feature is protected by two different faithfulness constraints, IDENT(+ voi)Sing and IDENT(+ voi)Gem and they are ranked as lDENT(+ voi)Sings (+ voi)Gem in Japanese. I further argue that this ranking is grounded in the relative perceptibility of [+ voice] in singletons and geminates, and this claim is experimentally supported. The general theoretical implication is that phonetic perceptibility can directly influence patterns in a phonological grammar. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2006
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