A phonological analysis of soft
MUSTAFA DURMAZ INTRODUCTION
The status of the phoneme corresponding to the Turkish grapheme soft
● It is a velar fricative when it is preceded by a vowel or when it is in intervocalic position (Ergin 2012).
● It is not a consonant but a semi vowel, and it assimilates to the adjacent vowel (Demircan (2002) and Karaağaç (2008).
●It is considered to be a glide by some. (Selen 1979)
• Clearly, much remains to be answered regarding the status of the phoneme this grapheme corresponds to in Turkish.
INTRODUCTION
• Research (Demircan, 2002; Inkelas, 2009; Karaağaç, 2008; Kornfilt,1997; Göksel & Kerslake, 2005) investigating the nature of soft
• Other dialects could provide some novel insights into the formal status of this phoneme.
• This study aims to examine the nature of the phoneme corresponding to soft
• Main question: Is there any difference between the consonantal features of the phoneme corresponding to soft
SOME INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT THE SANLIURFA DIALECT • The Şanlıurfa dialect is one of the many dialects of Turkish which are spoken in Turkey. Şanlıurfa is a city located in south-east part of Turkey (bordering with Syria) and it is predominantly populated by Kurdish people, as well as Turkish (and some speakers of Arabic). • While standard Turkish has both rounding harmony and backness harmony, the Şanlıurfa dialect only has backness harmony, as can be seen in table(1 and 2).
Gloss Words in St. Turksih Sanliurfa Dative Locative Ablative dialect(nominative) 1)water melon /kar.puz/ [kɑr.pɯz] [kɑr.pɯz.dɑ] [kɑr.pɯz.dɑn] [kɑr.pɯz. ɑ]
2) tongue /dil/ [dil] [dil. ɛ] [dil.dɛ] [dil.dɛn]
3) grape /y.zym/ [y.zɯm] [y.zɯm. ɛ] [y.zɯm.dɛ] [y.zɯm.dɛn]
4) twin /i.kiz/ /i.kɯz/ /i.kɯz. ɛ/ /i.kɯz. dɛ/ /i.kɯz. dɛn/
5) wood /o.dun/ [o.dɯn] [o.dɯn. ɑ] [o.dɯn.dɑ] [o.dɯn.dɑn]
6) light /ɯ.ʃɯk/ /ɯ.ʃɯx/ /ɯ.ʃɯ. ɣɑ/ /ɯ.ʃɯ. ɣdɑ/ /ɯ.ʃɯ. ɣdɑn/
●/ɰ/ vowel remains neutral and does not participate in vowel harmony. However, the backness harmony started by initial vowel in the word spreads to the vowels in suffixes as in (3,4,5 and, 6) ●The accusative case /ɰ/ in Sanliurfa dialect does not even agree even with backness harmony, it remains neutral.
Sanliurfa Gloss Words dialect(nominative) Accusative
1) ‘grape /y.zym/ /y.zɯm/ [y.zɯm. ɯ]
2)` tongue ` /dil/ /dil/ [dil. ɯ]
3)‘water melon’ /kɑr-puz/ /kɑr-pɯz/ [kɑr-pɯz. ɯ] METHODOLOGY • Participants: • One male and one female native speaker of Sanliurfa dialect • Male participant is 30 years old and female participant is 28 years old. • Stimuli: • Target words including the phoneme corresponding to soft
● In Standard Turkish soft
Gloss word Nominative (St. Turkish) Şanlıurfa Dialect
1) garden/bound bağ [ba:] [bɑχ] 2) needle tığ [tɯ:] [tɯχ] 3) raw çiğ [t͡ʃy: ] [t͡ʃyɡ] 4) entartainment eğlence [ɛ:.lɛn.cɛ] or [ɛɣ.lɛn.cɛ]* [ɛɡ.lɛn.cɛ]
*possible (Kornfilt, 1997), but not typical. ● In Ottoman Turkish, soft /g/ alternated between two variants, in different vowel contexts (Logacev ; Fuchs; Żygis 2014): In the environment of front vowels, it was /ɡ/ and in back vowel contexts, it was /χ/.
● Soft
2) needle tığ [tɯ:] [tɯχ] [tɯ. ɣa] ● Final devoicing: soft /g/ is a voiced velar fricative [ɣ], but it gets devoiced when it is in word-final position as in (1,2) above. / ɣ / --> [-voice] / ___ # 3) raw çiğ [t͡ʃy: ] [t͡ʃyɡ] [t͡ʃyɡ.ɛ] ● Soft /g/ becomes a voiced velar plosive/ɡ/ when followed by [-back] V as in (3). ●Soft is underlying a voiced velar fricative; it has two allophones: voiceless velar fricative and voiced velar fricative plosive /g/. ● Soft
● In standard Turkish, soft
3)deaf sağır [sa. ɯr] sağır [sɑ.ɣɯr]
4)to smash (dough) yoğurmak [jo.ur.mak] yoğırmak [jo.ɣɯr.mɑk]
5) rasp eğe [ ɛ: ɛ] eğe [ ɛ.g ɛ] 6) if eğer [ ɛ: ɛɾ] eğer [ ɛ.g ɛɾ]
● In intervocalic position, the Şanlıurfa dialect does not allow the deletion of soft
●In standard Turkish, soft
Gloss word Nominati Plural suffix Locative Case Plural suffix Locative Case ve (St. (St. Turkish) (St. Turkish) Şanlıurfa Şanlıurfa Dialect Turkish) Dialect mountai dağ [da:] [da:.lar] or #[daɣ.lar] [ da :.da] or *[daɣ.da] [daɣ.lar] [daɣ.dɑ] n connecti bağ [ba:] [ba:.lar] or # [daɣ.lar] [ba:.lar] or *[baɣ.da] [baɣ. lar] [baɣ.da] on
# possible (Kornfilt,1997), but not typical *Ungrammatical
●When
Gloss Words Nominative St. Turkish St. Turkish Şanlıurfa Şanlıurfa Dialect Dialect Dative /- Dative /-A/ Genitive /-In/ Genitive /-In/ A/ 1) donkey eşek [e.ʃek] [e.ʃe.e] [e. ʃe.in] [e.ʃe. ɡe] [e. ʃe. ɡɰn]
2) stupid sɑlɑk [sɑ.lɑk] [sɑ.lɑ. ɑ] [sɑ.lɑ. ɰn] [sɑ.lɑ.ɣɑ] [sɑ.lɑ.ɣɰn]
3)sosyologist sosyoloɡ [sos. jo.lok] [sos. jo.lo.ɑ] [sos. jo.lo.un [sos. jo.loɣ.ɑ] [sos. jo.loɣ.ɰn
4) `league` /lig/ [li. ɡ] [li. ɡɛ] [li. ɡin] [li. ɡɛ] [li. ɡ ɰn] ● Unlike in Standard Turkish, the /k/ and /g/ phonemes do not trigger velar deletion in the Şanlıurfa dialect; rather, these two consonants preserve their phonetic properties. However, they demonstrate varying phonetic manifestations in different phonological environments. In word final position, a voiceless velar stop /k/ is articulated as a voiced velar stop [g] in an intervocalic position, when preceded by a front vowel as in (1) in the chart above. The /k/ consonant is pronounced as a voiceless uvular fricative [X] in word-final position when preceded by a back vowel, and when it is in intervocalic position and preceded by a back vowel, it is articulated as [ɣ], a voiced velar fricative, as in (2) above. The /g/ phoneme is pronounced as [X] in word final position, and when it is in intervocalic position and is preceded [+back] vowel, it is pronounced [ɣ] as in (3). When preceded by a [-back] vowel and followed by vowel, it is articulated as [ɡ] as in (6). DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
● Unlike in Standard Turkish, soft
● It demonstrates behaviors like other consonants in Turkish: such as being devoiced at word final position or occurring adjacent to non-sonorant consonant.
● It is a voiced velar fricative /ɣ/ and it is in complementary distribution with voiceless velar fricative /x/ (word-final & when preceded by a back vowel) and voiced velar plosive/g/ (when preceded by a front vowel).
● Based on the data presented here, this study concludes that