DOCSLIB.ORG

Chain Shifts and Merger in New Zealand English

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Chain Shifts and Merger in New Zealand English CHAIN SHIFTS AND MERGER IN NEW ZEALAND ENGLISH CHIKAKO SHIBATA The vowels of New Zealand English have been developing for over a century, though the vowel system is phonemically identical to that of RP. While the chain shift of short front vowels and the rotation of closing diphthongs maintain vowel contrasts, the merger of front centering diph- thongs eliminates them and collapses the vowel system. This paper demonstrates that these sound changes are all ascribed to dominance rela- tions between the constraints on contrasts, and that the NZE constraint ranking achieves a vowel system with at most three phonologically sig- nificant degrees of height.* Keywords: constraint, distinctiveness, auditory space, phonological con- trast, vowel system 1. Introduction Some sound changes tend to preserve the auditory distinctiveness of particular phonemic contrasts. Where vowels are rather close to each other in auditory space, vowel shift reduces possible confusion between them. Diphthongization even increases the perceptibility of distinction by reinforcing a difference on the vowel height dimension. These developments sometimes constitute a chain of events in order to main- tain the entire sound system of a language. On the other hand, splits and mergers inevitably involve an alteration in the system of oppositions. While contrasting phonemes are merged into a single phoneme, allophones of a single phoneme achieve indepen- dent status through splitting. Although these sound changes are incom- patible with the system-preserving processes, chain shifts and merger * I am deeply indebted to the anonymous EL reviewers for their invaluable com- ments on the earlier versions of this article. All remaining errors and inadequacies are of course my own. -27- English Linguistics 23: 1 (2006) 27-57 (c) 2006 by the English Linguistic Society of Japan 28 ENGLISH LINGUISTICS, VOL. 23, NO. 1 (2006) occur synchronically in New Zealand English (hereafter NZE). In Section 2, I consider how the NZE vowel system is described by Hawkins (1976), Wells (1982), B auer (1986, 1994), and other research- ers. The NZE vowel system provides evidence for the existence of con- straints on contrasts. Flemming (1995) proposes a theory of phonologi- cal contrast dubbed the "Dispersion Theory," and claims that perceptual markedness is a property of contrasts rather than individual sounds. In Section 3, I examine the constraints on the system of contrasts that are introduced by NiChiosain and Padgett (2001) and Minkova and Stockwell (2003). The goal of this paper is to account for the chain shifts and merger in NZE in terms of dominance relations between the constraints on con- trasts. Analysis of the NZE vowel system reveals dispersion effects whereby contrasting sounds tend to be evenly distributed over as much auditory space as articulatory effort allows. 2. The Vowel System of New Zealand English According to Bauer (1986: 226), the phonemic system of NZE is reminiscent of or even identical with phonemic systems found in the south eastern part of England, which have the same vowel inventory as Received Pronunciation (hereafter RP). Although phonemically identi- cal, RP and NZE differ in the phonetic realization of certain phonemes.1 Wells (1982) shows the RP vowel system and the NZE vowel system as follows: (1) The RP Vowel System (Wells (1982: 119)) 1 Historical records of New Zealand tell us that European settlement began in the 1840s, and that immigrants were largely British for the rest of the nineteenth centu- ry. The proportion of native-born New Zealanders increased to nearly 60% by 1901 (Sinclair (1996)). After that date, therefore, the development of the English lan- guage in New Zealand started to reflect New Zealand rather than British trends. CHAIN SHIFTS AND MERGER IN NEW ZEALAND ENGLISH 29 (2) The NZE Vowel System (Wells (1982: 608)) In this paper an attempt is made to discuss NZE in its own terms, but from time to time it is inevitably compared with RP. 2.1. The Chain Shift of Short Front Vowels The NZE vowel in words of the lexical set KIT is commonly a central vowel, which is symbolized as /e/ in figure (2). The centralized high vowel is a diagnostic feature of NZE, which indicates that the speaker is not an Australian but a New Zealander.2 Phonologically, at least younger New Zealanders seem to have no distinction between /l/ and /e/, and pronounce finish [fene∫], Philip [felep], as compared to Australian English [filep] and RP [filip] (Trudgill and Hannah (2002: 23)). The front vowels are closer in Australian English than in RP, and they are even closer in NZE than in Australian English. In fact, /e/ of DRESScan range as close as [l] in NZE, so ten can readily be heard as RP or General American tin. However, ten can avoid risking confusion with tin in NZE because of the centrality of the vowel in tin.3 These changes bear the classic marks of a chain shift as illustrated below: 2 The vowel system of Australian English set out by Wells (1982: 596) is shown below: According to Wells (1982: 598), the short front vowels tend to be rather closer than the qualities usual in RP or GA. This development is referred to as "pancake vocalism" because of the effect of squashing up the vowels towards the upper part of the vowel area. 3 Wells (1982: 607) notes that the NZE /e/ often has some degree of diphthonging as in bed [bied]. The present author observed ten [tien] in 2001. 30 ENGLISH LINGUISTICS, VOL. 23, NO. 1 (2006) (3) The Chain Shift of NZE Short Front Vowels According to Bauer (1986: 231-232), acoustic analyses have con- firmed this shift, suggesting that auditory analyses have underestimated the closeness of the front vowels. He gives the following figures for Formant 1 and Formant 2 of the NZE short vowels, which can be com- pared with those of RP equivalents cited in Gimson et al. (1994: 96): (4) Formant Frequencies for Short Front Vowels The F1 frequencies indicate that /e/ of DRESSis closer than /l/ of KIT in NZE, and that /ae/ of TRAPin NZE is as close as /e/ in RP. If this is a chain shift, then we are faced with the issue of whether it is a push chain or pull chain, and which vowel started the chain. This issue is debated among linguists in New Zealand, where the mid vowel may be the possible initiator of the change, giving a push-pull chain. Allan and Starks (2000: 76-80) avoid deciding whether there is a link between the changes occurring to any of the front vowels. However, they assume that if the shift was a push chain, then all three vowels would move simultaneously in order to avoid merger and the potential collapse of the vowel system. If it was a pull chain, then we do not necessarily expect a simultaneous shift, because the centralization of /l/ would not result in a merger with any of the other short vowels. On this line of reasoning, if it was a push-pull chain, the high vowel /l/ would move simultaneously with the initiating mid vowel /e/, but /ae/ CHAIN SHIFTS AND MERGER IN NEW ZEALAND ENGLISH 31 could stay as low as it was before. The acoustic evidence given in (4) shows that the three vowels have shifted relatively simultaneously, sug- gesting that it is a push chain initiated by the low vowel /ae/.4 Although Wells (1982) finds it sensible to symbolize the NZE KIT vowel as /e/, Hawkins (1976) proposes to describe the NZE vowel sys- tem without the transcription [e], for this vowel is not distinctive. Given that the KIT vowel is central and the DRESSvowel is the closest short front vowel, the NZE short vowel system is represented "with only two phonologically significant degrees of height." (Wells (1982: 607)) Hawkins (1976: 50) claims that this vowel system constitutes "a more stable vowel pattern," which can be satisfactorily specified in terms of binary features, than the RP system of short vowels. The NZE short vowels are described by Hawkins (1976: 58) as follows: (5) Feature Composition of the NZE Short Vowels e ae l A U D high + - + - + - front + + - - - - round - - + + 2.2. The Diphthong Shift The diphthong shift is identified by Wells (1982) in his description of London English. This shift affects the four closing diphthongs /el/, /al/, /ou/, and /au/, as well as the closest monophthongs /iI/ and /uI/ which are realized as diphthongs in many dialects. Wells (1982: 308) remarks that the shifts in the starting points of these diphthongs are "presumably 4 Based on the data derived from the Origins of New Zealand English Mobile Unit Corpus, Trudgill (2004: 43) claims that the modem NZE close realizations of /e/ and /ae/ were already present in the speech of the first and second generation of New Zealand born English speakers, while the centralization of /l/ is a twentieth century innovation. The ONZE Mobile Corpus consists of recordings made for the National Broadcasting Corporation of New Zealand between 1946 and 1948 by their Mobile Disc Recording Unit, which traveled around small towns in both the North Island and South Island of New Zealand. Trudgill maintains that the Southern Hemisphere English varieties have short front vowels which are close in quality because they inherited these qualities from southeastern English varieties. He argues that "the occurrence of a single innovation-that of lowering in England-is very much more likely to be the correct explanation for this differentiation than the occurrence of four separate but identical innovations that just happened to take place at about the same time in four different and widely separated parts of the world." 32 ENGLISH LINGUISTICS, VOL.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • An Examination of Oral Articulation of Vowel Nasality in the Light of the Independent Effects of Nasalization on Vowel Quality
    DOI: 10.17469/O2104AISV000002 CHRISTOPHER CARIGNAN An examination of oral articulation of vowel nasality in the light of the independent effects of nasalization on vowel quality In this paper, a summary is given of an experimental technique to address a known issue in research on the independent effects of nasalization on vowel acoustics: given that the separate transfer functions associated with the oral and nasal cavities are merged in the acoustic signal, the task of teasing apart the respective effects of the two cavities seems to be an intractable problem. The results obtained from the method reveal that the independent effects of nasal- ization on the acoustic vowel space are: F1-raising for high vowels, F1-lowering for non-high vowels, and F2-lowering for non-front vowels. The results from previous articulatory research performed by the author on the production of vowel nasality in French, Hindi, and English are discussed in the light of these independent effects of nasalization on vowel quality. Keywords: vowel nasality, vowel quality, articulation, acoustics, sound change. 1. Introduction A traditional characterization of vowel nasality adopts a seemingly binary classification of vowel sounds based on the relative height of the velum: nasal vowels are produced with a low velum position (and, thus, air radiation from both the oral and nasal cavities), where- as oral vowels are produced with a high velum position (and, thus, air radiation from the oral cavity alone). While it is unquestionably true that nasal vowels are produced with a lowered velum, this traditional characterization carries an implicit assumption about the state of the oral cavity for the production of a nasal vowel, i.e., that the nasal vowel maintains the same articulatory characteristics as its non-nasal counterpart in all aspects except for the height of the velum.
    [Show full text]
  • Chapter 1. Introduction
    1 Chapter 1. Introduction Once an English-speaking population was established in South Africa in the 19 th century, new unique dialects of English began to emerge in the colony, particularly in the Eastern Cape, as a result of dialect levelling and contact with indigenous groups and the L1 Dutch speaking population already present in the country (Lanham 1996). Recognition of South African English as a variety in its own right came only later in the next century. South African English, however, is not a homogenous dialect; there are many different strata present under this designation, which have been recognised and identified in terms of geographic location and social factors such as first language, ethnicity, social class and gender (Hooper 1944a; Lanham 1964, 1966, 1967b, 1978b, 1982, 1990, 1996; Bughwan 1970; Lanham & MacDonald 1979; Barnes 1986; Lass 1987b, 1995; Wood 1987; McCormick 1989; Chick 1991; Mesthrie 1992, 1993a; Branford 1994; Douglas 1994; Buthelezi 1995; Dagut 1995; Van Rooy 1995; Wade 1995, 1997; Gough 1996; Malan 1996; Smit 1996a, 1996b; Görlach 1998c; Van der Walt 2000; Van Rooy & Van Huyssteen 2000; de Klerk & Gough 2002; Van der Walt & Van Rooy 2002; Wissing 2002). English has taken different social roles throughout South Africa’s turbulent history and has presented many faces – as a language of oppression, a language of opportunity, a language of separation or exclusivity, and also as a language of unification. From any chosen theoretical perspective, the presence of English has always been a point of contention in South Africa, a combination of both threat and promise (Mawasha 1984; Alexander 1990, 2000; de Kadt 1993, 1993b; de Klerk & Bosch 1993, 1994; Mesthrie & McCormick 1993; Schmied 1995; Wade 1995, 1997; de Klerk 1996b, 2000; Granville et al.
    [Show full text]
  • On the Anatomy of a Chain Shift1 DANIEL A
    J. Linguistics, Page 1 of 25. f Cambridge University Press 2010 doi:10.1017/S0022226710000368 On the anatomy of a chain shift1 DANIEL A. DINNSEN, CHRISTOPHER R. GREEN, JUDITH A. GIERUT & MICHELE L. MORRISETTE Indiana University (Received 4 September 2009; revised 28 April 2010) Phonological chain shifts have been the focus of many theoretical, developmental, and clinical concerns. This paper considers an overlooked property of the problem by focusing on the typological properties of the widely attested ‘s>h>f’ chain shift involving the processes of Labialization and Dentalization in early phonological development. Findings are reported from a cross-sectional study of 234 children (ages 3 years; 0 months–7;9) with functional (nonorganic) phonological delays. The results reveal some unexpected gaps in the predicted interactions of these processes and are brought to bear on the evaluation of recent optimality theoretic proposals for the characterization of phonological interactions. A developmental modification to the theory is proposed that has the desired effect of precluding certain early-stage grammars. The proposal is further evaluated against the facts of another widely cited developmental chain shift known as the ‘puzzle>puddle>pickle’ problem (Smith 1973). 1. I NTRODUCTION A common phenomenon in both first- and second-language acquisition and in fully-developed languages is for phonological processes to participate in a chain shift (e.g. Moreton & Smolensky 2002, Jesney 2005, Dinnsen 2008b). Chain shifts typically involve two phonological processes that interact in such a way that they result in an opaque generalization (i.e. one that is not surface-true). This phenomenon has generated much discussion and contro- versy in the theoretical, developmental, and clinical literature over the years and has raised questions about the very nature of chain shifts.
    [Show full text]
  • Chain Shifts in First Language Acquisition
    CHAIN SHIFTS IN FIRST LANGUAGE ACQUISITION MASTER’S THESIS BY FRANSIEN WALTON MASTER’S PROGRAMME TAAL, MENS EN MAATSCHAPPIJ TAALWETENSCHAP UNIVERSITY OF UTRECHT STUDENT NUMBER 0419273 SUPERVISOR PROF. DR. RENÉ KAGER SECOND READER PROF. DR. WIM ZONNEVELD 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE PREFACE 5 1. INTRODUCTION 7 2. PREVIOUS RESEARCH 14 2.1 EARLY GENERATIVE GRAMMAR 15 2.1.1 SMITH (1973) 17 2.1.2 MACKEN (1980) 19 2.2 OPTIMALITY THEORY 21 2.2.1 INTRODUCTION TO OPTIMALITY THEORY 21 2.2.2 CHAIN SHIFTS IN OPTIMALITY THEORY 26 2.2.3 LOCAL CONSTRAINT CONJUNCTION 28 2.2.4 FAITHFULNESS TO INPUT PROMINENCE 39 2.2.5 OPTIMALITY THEORY WITH CANDIDATE CHAINS 52 2.2.6 UNDERSPECIFIED UNDERLYING REPRESENTATIONS 58 2.3 CONCLUSION 62 3. A NEW PROPOSAL 65 3.1 INDEPENDENT PROCESSES 68 3.2 ARTICULATORY DIFFICULTIES 70 3.3 UNDERLYING REPRESENTATIONS 74 3.4 MISPERCEPTION 79 3.5 PREDICTIONS REVISITED 83 3.6 CONCLUSION 86 4. DISCUSSION 88 5. CONCLUSION 103 REFERENCES 105 3 4 PREFACE The idea for this thesis originated in the course Phonological Acquisition taught by René Kager. I read the article On the characterization of a chain shift in normal and delayed phonological acquisition by Daniel Dinnsen and Jessica Barlow (1998) and was intrigued by the phenomenon. After I started reading more on the subject, I became increasingly unhappy with the proposed analyses in the literature and decided to dive deeper into the matter. The result is this thesis. I would like to thank René for his useful comments, critical questions and positive feedback.
    [Show full text]
  • Toward a Unified Theory of Chain Shifting
    OUP UNCORRECTED PROOF – FIRST-PROOF, 04/29/12, NEWGEN !"#$%&' () TOWARD A UNIFIED THEORY OF CHAIN SHIFTING *#'+, -. ./,0/, !. I"#$%&'(#)%" Chain shifts play a major role in understanding the phonological history of English—from the prehistoric chain shift of Grimm’s Law that separates the Germanic languages from the rest of Indo-European, to the Great Vowel Shift that is often taken to define the boundary between Middle English and Early Modern English, to the ongoing chain shifts in Present-Day English that are used to estab- lish the geographical boundaries between dialect regions. A chain shift may be defined as a set of phonetic changes affecting a group of phonemes so that as one phoneme moves in phonetic space, another phoneme moves toward the phonetic position the first is abandoning; a third may move toward the original position of the second, and (perhaps) so on. Martinet (12(3) introduced the argument that chain shifts are caused by a need for phonemes to maintain margins of security between each other—so if a phoneme has more phonetic space on one side of it than on others, random phonetic variation will cause it to move toward the free space but not back toward the margins of security of phonemes on the other side. Labov (3414: chapter 5) gives a lucid exposition of the cognitive and phonetic argu- ments underlying this account of chain shifting. Despite their value as a descriptive device for the history of English, however, the ontological status of chain shifts themselves is a matter of some doubt. Is a 559_Nevalainen_Ch58.indd9_Nevalainen_Ch58.indd
    [Show full text]
  • Dialects of London East End and Their Representation in the Media
    Vanja Kavgić Dialects of London East End and their representation in the media. Cockney dialect and Multicultural London English in British sitcoms. MASTER THESIS submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Programme: Master's programme English and American Studies Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt Evaluator Univ.-Prof. Mag. Dr. Alexander Onysko Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik Klagenfurt, June 2018 Affidavit I hereby declare in lieu of an oath that - the submitted academic thesis is entirely my own work and that no auxiliary materials have been used other than those indicated, - I have fully disclosed all assistance received from third parties during the process of writing the thesis, including any significant advice from supervisors, - - any contents taken from the works of third parties or my own works that have been included either literally or in spirit have been appropriately marked and the respective source of the information has been clearly identified with precise bibliographical references (e.g. in footnotes), - to date, I have not submitted this thesis to an examining authority either in Austria or abroad and that - - when passing on copies of the academic thesis (e.g. in bound, printed or digital form), I will ensure that each copy is fully consistent with the submitted digital version. I understand that the digital version of the academic thesis submitted will be used for the purpose of conducting a plagiarism assessment. I am aware that a declaration contrary to the facts will have legal consequences. Vanja Kavgic e.h. Klagenfurt, 28.06.2018 1 Table of Contents AKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Introduction: Constraints in Phonological Acquisition
    1 Introduction: constraints in phonological acquisition René Kager, Joe Paten and Wim Zonneveld This volume presents ten studies in phonological first languageacquisition, an area of research that has become one of fast-growing importance in recent years. The reason for this is not just the fruitfulness and linguistic interest of this type of study per se: it is also thecase that the more we come to know about phonological development, by the analysis of growingnumbers of data collections and increasingly sophisticated experiments, themore the field has complied with the notion that acquisition research liesat the heart of the modern study of language. One of the aims of this introductionis to illustrate and discuss these developments. In line with them, thepast decade in phonology in particular has witnessed an upswell of productiveinteraction between empirical acquisition research and theory development. With thearrival and rise of constraint-based models, in particular Prince and Smolensky's(1993) Optimality Theory, phonological theory now providesa framework that meets the desiderata expressed more than two decadesago by Lise Menn (1980: 35-36), who is also a contributor to this volume: () ... The child'slonguetiedness',that overwhelming reality which Stampe and Jakobson both tried to capture with their respective formal structures, could be handled more felicitously if one represented the heavy articulatory limitations of the child by the formal device of output constraints I...1The child's gradual mastery of articulation then is formalized as a relaxation of those constraints. The rapid emergence of acquisition studies within OptimalityTheory reflects the general suitability of constraints for the formalisation ofdevelopmental limitations, as well as the usefulness of constraint ranking for expressingthe relaxation of these limitations.
    [Show full text]
  • Being Particularly Singlish: the Syntax of Sentence-Final Particles in Singaporean English
    Being Particularly Singlish: The Syntax of Sentence-Final Particles in Singaporean English Lan Yingjie Emmanuel College 8th June 2017 This dissertation is submitted for the degree of Master of Philosophy. Department of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics University of Cambridge Declaration This dissertation is the result of my own work and includes nothing which is the outcome of work done in collaboration except where specifically indicated in the text. This dissertation contains 23 183 words, of which 20 000 words are counted towards the official word limit. 1 Acknowledgements This thesis being my third in as many academic years, one might expect it to have been a little easier. Unfortunately, that was not quite how things panned out: I was stretched and challenged to exceed whatever I had previ- ously done, as it should be. To be able to complete this dissertation on my dearly beloved Singaporean English (SgE) therefore has been only possible because of all the people who have supported me throughout this endeav- our: my professors, my friends, family and loved ones, and my heavenly Father. To Dr Theresa Biberauer, my thesis supervisor, I owe an incredible debt of gratitude that I fear I can never repay. A powerhouse of intellectual energy and linguistic enthusiasm, Theresa pushed me to go beyond my own intellectual limits again and again. I am especially grateful for her generosity of time and energy, especially she was meant to focus on research instead of teaching this year. Despite her rigorous standards, she also knew when I needed to ease off, and I was very much touched by her care and concern the entire year.
    [Show full text]
  • Complete Paper
    The Scope of Stop Weakening in Argentine Spanish Laura Colantoni and Irina Marinescu University of Toronto 1. Approaches to weakening or lenition Recent experimental studies have documented the weakening of both voiceless (e.g. Lewis, 2000: 2001) and voiced Spanish stops in intervocalic position (e.g. Cole, Hualde & Iskarous, 1999; Ortega- Llebaria, 2004). In addition, synchronic and diachronic studies have repeatedly proposed the existence of a correlation between weakening of voiced and voiceless stops (e.g. Lloyd, 1993). However, very few studies have systematically analyzed both weakening processes in the same variety (Lavoie, 2001), and even fewer have presented experimental evidence demonstrating the existence of such a correlation. In this paper, we analyze the status of both processes in Argentine Spanish in order to motivate hypotheses that would account for diachronic changes in Spanish as well as in other Romance languages. In particular, we evaluate three competing approaches to lenition. The first approach, henceforth Hypothesis A, predicts a positive correlation between an increasing rate of approximantization and deletion of voiced stops and increasing voicing of voiceless stops across places of articulation (e.g. Martinet, 1952; Lloyd, 1993; Wireback, 1997). This approach, which is basically diachronic in nature, sees lenition as a stage towards deletion. The second approach, or the effort-based hypothesis – Hypothesis B -, (Kirchner, 2004; Blevins, 2004) analyzes lenition as effort reduction. As such lenition involves a decrease in the degree of constriction of a given gesture as well as a decrease in duration. Thus, this approach predicts that more effortful gestures should lenite more than less effortful ones, and that the degree of lenition should be affected by the vocalic context.
    [Show full text]
  • Tonal Chain-Shifts As Anti-Neutralization-Induced Tone Sandhi
    University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics Volume 11 Issue 1 Article 9 2005 Tonal chain-shifts as anti-neutralization-induced tone sandhi FENG-FAN HSIEH Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl Recommended Citation HSIEH, FENG-FAN (2005) "Tonal chain-shifts as anti-neutralization-induced tone sandhi," University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics: Vol. 11 : Iss. 1 , Article 9. Available at: https://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl/vol11/iss1/9 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl/vol11/iss1/9 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Tonal chain-shifts as anti-neutralization-induced tone sandhi This working paper is available in University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics: https://repository.upenn.edu/pwpl/vol11/iss1/9 Tonal Chain-Shifts as Anti-Neutralization-Induced Tone Sandhi Feng-fan Hsieh* 1 Introduction This paper proposes that certain attested instances of tone sandhi arc not driven by well-formedness conditions, e.g. tonal chain-shifts found in Southern Min (SM), a language group in the Min branch of Stnitic languages, in particular, Coastal Taiwanese (CT) and Mainstream Taiwanese (MT; the famous "tone circle"). As extensively discussed in the literature, SM tonal chain-shifts arc notorious in that (i) the alternations often have no phonotac- tic motivations, (ii) the alternations are not always predictable, and (iii) the chain-shifts may be circular, e.g. A —♦ B —• A. Circular chain shifts cannot be handled in Classical OT, as Morcton (1999) has convincingly argued. Therefore, there is a general consensus that SM tone sandhi rules are arbi trary and idiosyncratic.
    [Show full text]
  • Trask's Historical Linguistics
    Trask’s Historical Linguistics Trask’s Historical Linguistics, Third Edition, is an accessible introduction to historical linguistics – the study of language change over time. This engaging book is illustrated with language examples from all six continents, and covers the fundamental concepts of language change, methods for historical linguistics, linguistic reconstruction, sociolinguistic aspects of language change, language contact, the birth and death of languages, language and prehistory and the issue of very remote relations. This third edition of the renowned Trask’s Historical Linguistics is fully revised and updated and covers the most recent developments in historical linguistics, including: ᭹ more detail on morphological change including cutting-edge discussions of iconization ᭹ coverage of recent developments in sociolinguistic explanations of variation and change ᭹ new case studies focusing on Germanic languages and American and New Zealand English, and updated exercises covering each of the topics within the book ᭹ a brand new companion website featuring material for both professors and students, including discussion questions and exercises as well as discussions of the exercises within the book. Trask’s Historical Linguistics is essential reading for all students of language, linguistics and related disciplines. The accompanying website can be found at www.routledge.com/cw/trask Robert McColl Millar is Professor in Linguistics and Scottish Language at the University of Aberdeen. His most recent books include English Historical Sociolinguistics (2012) and (with William Barras and Lisa Marie Bonnici) Lexical Variation and Attrition in the Scottish Fishing Communities (2014). Larry Trask was Professor of Linguistics at the University of Sussex and an authority on Basque language and historical linguistics.
    [Show full text]
  • Sussex by the Sea: a Descriptive Analysis of Dialect Variation in the South East of England Based on English Dialect App Data
    Sussex by the sea: a descriptive analysis of dialect variation in the South East of England based on English Dialect App data Article (Published Version) Jansen, Sandra, Robinson, Justyna A, Cahill, Lynne, Leemann, Adrian, Blaxter, Tamsin and Britain, David (2020) Sussex by the sea: a descriptive analysis of dialect variation in the South East of England based on English Dialect App data. English Today, 36 (3). pp. 31-39. ISSN 0266- 0784 This version is available from Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/93516/ This document is made available in accordance with publisher policies and may differ from the published version or from the version of record. If you wish to cite this item you are advised to consult the publisher’s version. Please see the URL above for details on accessing the published version. Copyright and reuse: Sussex Research Online is a digital repository of the research output of the University. Copyright and all moral rights to the version of the paper presented here belong to the individual author(s) and/or other copyright owners. To the extent reasonable and practicable, the material made available in SRO has been checked for eligibility before being made available. Copies of full text items generally can be reproduced, displayed or performed and given to third parties in any format or medium for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-profit purposes without prior permission or charge, provided that the authors, title and full bibliographic details are credited, a hyperlink and/or URL is given for the original metadata page and the content is not changed in any way.
    [Show full text]