<OT> New Posting: ROA-709

[roa at ruccs.rutgers.edu]

ROA 709-0105

Silent Onsets? An optimality-theoretic approach to French h aspiré� words

Christoph Gabriel <cgabriel at uos.de>
Trudel Meisenburg <tmeisenb at uos.de>

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=709


Abstract:
The aim of this paper is to examine the possible contributions
of Optimality Theory (OT) to one of the classical problems
of French phonology: the phenomenon of h aspir�é words
(Fouch� 1959, Klein 1963, Rothe 1978, Encrev� 1988).
These are vowel initial words that don�t provoke any of
the typical prosodic processes of French such as Encha�nement
(syllabification of a fixed final consonant into the empty
onset position of the following word (1)), Liaison (surfacing
of a latent final consonant into the onset position of the
following word (2)) and Elision (deletion of certain vowels
in pre-vocalic position (3)).


(1) sept amis [sE.ta.mi] 'seven friends' vs. sept Hongrois
[sEt.O~gRwa] 'seven Hungarians'


(2) les amis [le.za.mi] 'the friends' vs. les Hongrois [le.O~gRwa
] 'the Hungarians'


(3) le [l@] + ami -> l�ami [la.mi] 'the friend' vs. le
Hongrois [l at .O~gRwa] 'the Hungarian'


H aspiré� words even require the final latent schwa of
a preceding word to be realized:


(4) une souris [yn.su.Ri] 'a mouse' vs. une hausse [y.n at .os]
'a rise'


This provides strong evidence for the assumption that the
beginning of h aspiré� words is granted a special protection
while usual vowel initial words have their left edges masked
by the above mentioned processes. Such a protection, however,
causes other problems: the absence of Elision and the non-surfaci
ng of latent consonants as well as the surfacing of latent
schwas provoke an increase of hiatuses (V.V), which are
rather dispreferred in French. Furthermore, the non-application
of Encha�nement yields the structure C.V (i.e. a syllable
with a coda immediately followed by a syllable without an
onset), a constellation that implies a con-joint violation
of the basic universal constraints on syllable structure
ONSET and NOCODA. The question arises of how such problematic
cases are dealt with phonetically.


In order to answer this question we examined data from an
experiment conducted in May 2004 with 12 native speakers
of French. The analysis reveals that, following a fixed
coda consonant, the beginning of an h aspir�é word is
crucially delayed, thus leaving a pause between the coda
consonant and the initial vowel, the latter sometimes being
characterized by the phenomenon of creaky voice: sept Hongrois
[sEt._?O~gRwa]. Void in some cases, this pause is often
filled with phonetic material caused by constrictions of
the glottis and/or a glottal stop � sounds that in French
are usually limited to cases of special emphasis. Speakers
thus tend to create some sort of 'silent' onset position
in order to avoid the problematic C.V constellation. In
our data such 'silent onsets' also appear after a preceding
vowel (tout Hongrois [tu._?O~gRwa] 'every Hungarian'), although
the constellation V.V is tolerated in French. Such hiatuses
are even created when underlying floating schwas surface
before h aspir�é words as required by the norm (une hausse
[y.n at .os]). Here again our data display variation: Instead
of realizing the schwa, some speakers have the coda consonant
followed by a neat interruption and a glottal stop (une
hausse [y.n at _?os]), while others combine both strategies
(une hausse [yn._?os]). Besides these cases where the specific
character of h aspiré� words is maintained by the creation
of a 'silent onset' and/or through hiatus, another frequent
strategy consists in treating the items in question as usual
vowel initial words: The final (fixed or latent) consonant
of the preceding word consequently resyllabifies into the
onset position (une hausse [y.nos], tout Hongrois [tu.tO~gRwa]).


In order to account for the phonetic cues we observed in
the beginning of h aspiré� words, we propose an underlying
initial segment /~?/ that is responsible for the special
behavior of the items in question and surfaces as a (more
or less) 'silent onset'. As the non-treatment of h aspiré�
words as such cannot systematically be interpreted as a
function of a certain speech style, the segment (/~?/) is
assumed to be absent from the input of speakers who pronounce
them like usual vowel initial words. For speakers who switch
between these two main realizations, double input forms
have to be admitted. The main dimension of variation encountered
here thus constitutes a case of so-called pseudo-optionality
(Mü�ller 1999, Anttila 2002): it is kept out of the grammar
and left to the lexicon, an approach that is in sharp contrast
to Tranel / del Gobbo's 2002 proposal where word specific
alignment constraints are adopted. To account for the other
types of variation mentioned above, we discuss and evaluate
Anttila's 1997, 2002 stratified grammars model and Boersma/Hayes'
2001 concept of stochastic OT.



References:

Anttila, Arto (1997). 'Deriving variation from grammar.'
- In: Hinskens, Frans / van Houten, Roeland / Wetzels, Leo
(eds.): Variation, Change, and Phonological Theory. - Amsterdam:
Benjamins, 35-68.


Anttila, Arto (2002). 'Variation and Phonological Theory.'
- In: Chambers, Jack K. / Trudgill, Peter / Schilling-Estes,
Natalie (eds.): The Handbook of Language Variation and Change.
- Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 206-243.


Boersma, Paul / Hayes, Bruce (2001). 'Empirical Tests of
the Gradual Learning Algorithm.' - In: Linguistic Inquiry
32, 45-86.


Encrev�, Pierre (1988). La liaison avec et sans encha�nement.
Phonologie tridimensionelle et usages du fran�çais. -
Paris: Seuil.


Fouch�, Pierre (21959). Trait� de prononciation fran�çaise
. - Paris: Klincksieck.


Klein, Hans-Wilhelm (1963). Phonetik und Phonologie des
Franz�sischen. - M�ünchen: Hueber.


Mü�ller, Gereon (1999). 'Optionality in optimality-theoretic
syntax.' - In: Glot International 4:5, 3-8.


Rothe, Wolfgang (1978). Phonologie des Franz�sischen.
- Berlin: Schmidt.


Tranel, Bernard / del Gobbo, Francesca (2002). 'Local Conjunction
in Italian and French Phonology.' - In: Wiltshire, Caroline
R. / Camps, Joaquim (eds.): Romance Phonology and Variation.
- Amsterdam: Benjamins, 191-218.

Comments: Presented as a poster at OCP2, Tromsø (Norway), Jan. 20-22, 2005
Keywords: French, variation, onset, h aspiré� words, stochastic grammars, stratified grammars
Areas: Phonology
Type: Conference Handout

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=709