Re: THEORY: phonemics (was: RE: [CONLANG] Optimum number of symbols

Mike S.
> On Sun, 26 May 2002 16:59:17 +0100, And Rosta <a-rosta@...> wrote:
>
> >Mike S:
> >>
> >> I believe I understand the criteria for establishing the phoneme
> >> inventory for each single phonotactic environment.  What I meant by,
> >> and was trying to point out by, the term 'invariant' is that it seems
> >> to me that each positional-phoneme in a given set will be much more
> >> precisely defined featurally than a phoneme in classical phonemics
> >> --insofar as a phoneme in classical phonemics is truly defined at all.
> >
> >OK. I understand. In that case, you're half right and half wrong.
> >Allophonic variations that are conditioned positionally (e.g.
> >alternation between clear and dark realizations of /l/ in some
> >Eng accents) would disappear. But that still leaves us with
> >allophonic variation that is not conditioned positionally, which
> >is why I gave the example of English /t/ in foot-internal
> >intervocalic position, which can, inter alia, be [t] or tap [D].
> >
> >>
> >> Getting back to your system, in the example you give below, fricative
> >> + plosive clusters in English onsets, one would identify 3 positional-
> >> phonemes here. These would be identifiable with neither /p, t, k/ nor
> >> /b, d, g/, since these sets are defined by a voice contrast.  Fair
> >> enough.  But certainly, each of these will be regularly rendered
> >> in speech as a relatively well-defined segment.  For example, the
> >> bilabial of the set can be described as [p]--a voiceless, unaspired,
> >> bilabial plosive, and never otherwise.  This is what I meant by
> >> 'invariant'.  A positional-phoneme in a given set will generally
> >> be pronounced the same way each time;  it will not vary with any
> >> feature.
> >>
> >> I better stop here to see if I am making any sense.
> >
> >You make complete sense. But as I say above, I don't think it
> >is true that allophonic variation disappears in the positional-phoneme
> >model, though it is true that there is less of it.
>
> One of the reasons I was initially attracted to the idea of your
> system was the possibility that we could scrap the allophone
> altogether, but I am gathering we cannot.  I must say that I pretty
> consistently use the tap [D] in my own idiolect, but I can think
> of other examples of variance, e.g. the <p> of <stop> in which
> the release can be either aspired or unaspired, or even unreleased
> altogether (lips just close and stay closed).  There may be other
> glitches too.
I deliberately chose the [t]/[D] allophony because it can't be
defined by underspecification: whereas the final /p/ allophony can be
defined by not specifying relase or aspiration, the intervocalic /t/
allophony can be defined only extensionally, as the list {[t], [D]}.
[That 'only' is an exaggeration, but I hope my point stands.]

> Another idea is to specify for each of your positional-phonemes
> the minimum required features which are defined (invariant) and
> ignore those which are variant.  Thus, for the simple /p/ before
> a vowel, we could say -voice, +bilabial, +plosive, +aspired.
> For the postvocalic word-final /p/ we could say -voice, +bilabial,
> +plosive and leave the aspiration unspecified, or alternately
> say +/-aspired.  In other words, there would always be a few
> minimum features that would define the positional-phoneme. Some
> positional-phonemes could be more defined than others, but in
> general this system would serve as shorthand for a small number
> of closely related allophones.
Quite right. Where this strategy works, it is the way to go. But
it doesn't always work.

> The only major glitch that comes to mind is if invervocalic /t/
> does something unusual like vary between a glottal stop and a tap--
> but I really wonder if this will normally vary in such a manner
> within the speech of the same person or dialect imbetween the
> same vowels.
Various accents of SE England, of various social strata, have
an alternation between [?] and [D] for /t/, though the two
allophones differ in register and style.

Anyway, I understand where you're coming from, but there really
is no a priori reason to think that unconditioned allophony
within a given position must be within a continuous or
intensionally definable range; in principle, [s] and [m] could
be allophones of the same phoneme, and if that is vanishingly
rare, it is merely because it is a historical improbability,
not a phonological impossibility.

--And.

Replies