<OT> New Posting: ROA-548

[Rutgers Optimality Archive]

=======================================================================
*PLEASE NOTE*
The following is one of 13 announcements for new ROA postings that have
been submitted since the Optimal List has been reconstituted.  So, you
should be getting 13 such messages.  There is no need for alarm.
=======================================================================

ROA 548-1002

Consonant cluster phonotactics: a perceptual approach

Marie-Helene Cote <mhcote@uottawa.ca>

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=548


Abstract:
	This dissertation deals with deletion and epenthesis
processes conditioned or constrained by the consonantal
environment, essentially consonant deletion, vowel
epenthesis, and vowel deletion. It is argued that the 
standard generative approach to these processes, which 
relies on the syllable and the principle of prosodic 
licensing, is empirically inadequate, and an alternative 
sequential approach based on perceptual factors is 
developed. It is proposed that the likelihood that a 
consonant deletes, triggers epenthesis, or blocks vowel 
deletion correlates with the quality and quantity of the 
auditory cues associated to it in a given context. The 
approach is implemented in Optimality Theory and adopts more 
specifically the ‘Licensing by cue’ framework developed by 
Steriade (1999a,c).
	New empirical gneralizations concerning deletion and 
epenthesis processes are uncovered, in particular 1) the 
fact that stops are more likely than other consonants to 
delete, trigger epenthesis, or block deletion; 2) the role 
of syntagmatic contrast in deletion and epenthesis 
processes; 3) the role of the audibility of stop release 
bursts; 4) the existence of cumulative edge effects, whereby 
more and more phonotactic combinations are licensed at the 
edges of prosodic domains as we go up the prosodic 
hierarchy. These generalizations are elucidated in terms of 
internal and contextual cues, modulation in the acoustic 
signal, and cue enhancement processes at edges of prosodic 
domains.
	The proposed perceptual approach achieves a substantial 
simplification and unification of the conceptual apparatus 
necessary to analyze deletion and epenthesis processes. It 
subsumes under the more general notion of perceptual 
salience principles of syllable well-formedness and the 
Obligatory Contour Principle. Furthermore, it eliminates the 
need for exceptional mechanisms such as extrasyllabicity at 
domain edges. 
	The analysis is based on the study of deletion and 
epenthesis processes in a variety of languages. Detailed 
investigations of schwa in Parisian French, cluster 
simplification in Quebec French, and stop deletion and vowel 
epenthesis in Ondarroa Basque are provided. 

Keywords: perception, consonant clusters, syllable, deletion, epenthesis,
edges, contrast

Areas: Phonology

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=548