Re: Language change that complicates the syllable structure

>What little I've read of historical linguistics suggests that weakening
>and elision of consonants is much more common than elision of
>vowels and epenthetical insertion, which by the way are the only two
>syllable-complicating processes I know of. Can other kinds of language
>change (ie. non-phonological) influence the syllable structure in a
>complicating way? The arise of compounding? Cliticization of particles,
>and subsequent incorporation in an inflectional/derivational system?
My logic tells me that, if you are starting with a language that has a
strictly (C)V syllable structure, then no amount of compounding is ever
going to get you a consonant cluster.

There are a couple of suggestions that I can make, and they all involve
vowel loss.  (In the phonology textbook that I am currently reading for
fun/research, I have seen a number of examples of loss of word-final
vowels.  (There is actually a tecnical term for loss of a word-final vowel
but I can't remember what it is, and I can't find it in the textbook
quickly, and don't have the time for a more thorough search at the moment.)

Loss of word-final vowels, followed by compounding, would give you
consonant clusters.  However, you would still never see a consonant cluster
at the beginning or end of a word, only in the middle.  Additional loss of
some word-initial vowels could give you some word-initial consonant clusters.

You could also have the language undergo a process similar to Havlik's Rule
in Russian.  (Havlik's Rule was a natural  process that really seems too
weird to be true.  It seems like someone must have made it up
artificially.)  Havlik's rule dramatically altered the structure of a lot
of Russian words leading to some great new consonant clusters.

My last suggestion is not something taken from natural language, but an
idea mostly out of my own head.  Doesn't Japanese devoice vowels between
voiceless obstruents, or something like that?  Have a process like that,
then take it one step further and eliminate those vowels altogether.  That
should give you some consonant clusters to be reckoned with.

Isidora

Reply