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An Investigation of Vowel Anteriority in Three Turkic Languages Using Ultrasound Tongue Imaging

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An Investigation of Vowel Anteriority in Three Turkic Languages Using Ultrasound Tongue Imaging AN INVESTIGATION OF VOWEL ANTERIORITY IN THREE TURKIC LANGUAGES USING ULTRASOUND TONGUE IMAGING Jonathan North Washington Submitted to the faculty of the University Graduate School in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Linguistics and the Department of Central Eurasian Studies Indiana University July 2016 Accepted by the Graduate Faculty, Indiana University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Doctoral Committee Kenneth de Jong, Ph.D. Christopher I. Beckwith, Ph.D. Stuart Davis, Ph.D. György Kara, Ph.D. Steven Lulich, Ph.D. June 29, 2016 ii Copyright © 2016 Jonathan North Washington iii For my family—past, present, and future. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS While this stack of pages (or collection of bytes) has my name on it, there is an unthinkable number of other names without which this document would not exist in its current form. While some of these people have had a fairly direct impact on the contents of the document, others have shaped my path to this point, and yet others are lurking in the shadows and at first glance may appear to have no connection tothis work. I am extremely grateful to everyone who has made this project possible, and will try to recognise by name everyone I can. My sincerest apologies to those I didn’t manage to get in here. I am most appreciative of the role my family has played in this dissertation, and throughout my time in graduate school. My wife, Tolgonay, has shown me patience (even when I haven’t earned it) and support, in a multitude of ways. She has tried her hand at pushing me forward—perhaps more than anyone—and has dealt with— most graciously—the brunt of my curiousity about Turkic languages in recent years. She has also been bearing the burden of some of the most difficult aspects of our recent venture into starting a family—those involved with being a full-time mother— while I have been away from home for far too long many days, doing what I could to simultaneously support us financially and finish my degree. I hope she knows how much I appreciate all that she does. My parents, grandparents, and sister have also been extremely supportive of my academic career, and have encouraged me in many related pursuits throughout my life v which have gotten me to this point. In particular, my grandparents helped make my first trip to Central Asia possible, and my father, Dr. Paul A. Washington, has shared his expertise in working with and representing spatial data, which has enhanced my ability to explore and understand the data acquired for this study and has had a very positive impact on the representations used. There have been many people who have helped turn my interest in various topics into what already amounts to several lifetimes worth of research questions. Most important among these are my advisors and mentors at IU. In particular, I am profusely grateful to my committee members—Ken de Jong, Chris Beckwith, Stuart Davis, György Kara, and Steven Lulich. Each of their respective specializations broadly represents a different side of my interests when I came to IU; in turn, I have acquired new interests from each one over the course of my studies here. They have each helped me develop the area of my interests that overlaps with their own, and have led me from curiosity to an ability to ask effective questions in these areas. None of them have ever waivered in their encouragement and support of this project, and Steven and Ken have been especially integral to its completion. Steven did not hesitate to open the IU Speech Production Lab to me and the participants of this study, and has helped me make the most of the resources available to me. Ken has provided constant insight on difficult problems—both academic and bureaucratic—and the attentiveness hehas shown has helped me stay on track. Discussions with Steven and direct feedback from Ken have also helped me make this a much stronger dissertation. I am also indebted to Chris, Stuart, and Kara bagsh for all that I have learned from each of them, and for their encouragement of me pursuing my interests. I consider myself fortunate to have had Stuart as my academic advisor when I came to IU, and Chris as my advisor in Central Eurasian Studies. vi I would also like to thank the attendees of my talks at PhLEGMe (Phonetics Literuture Enjoyment Group Meeting) at IU, and those who attended my talks and posters at the Central Eurasian Studies Brown Bag Series at IU in 2014, the ASA (Acoustical Society of America) conference in Indianapolis in 2014, the Tu+1 (Turkish, Turkic and the languages of Turkey) conference in Amherst in 2015, MidPhon (Mid- Continental Phonetics & Phonology Conference) in Bloomington in 2015, and the IU Linguistics Department Alumni Weekend, also in Bloomington in 2015. The feedback I got each time helped me think both about bigger-picture problems and smaller but equally important details. In particular, I’d like to acknowledge thoughtful feedback from and discussions with Traci Nagle, Samson Lotven, and Michelle Lamont. Other professors at IU who have encouraged my research and shaped my thinking in various fields include Kevin Rottet, Kate Graber, Tracy Hall, Isabelle Darcy, Markus Dickinson, Bob Botne, Nazif Shahrani, and Dov-Ber Kerler. While I have not worked closely with any of them, I would like to recognise the positive contributions they’ve each made to my academic thought processes and more “peripheral” interests over the years. More recent interactions with Kelly Berkson and Gosia Ćavar have also had a positive impact on my professional development. I have made quite a few friends throughout my years in graduate school, all of whom have been accepting of my interests, however strange they may have found them. In turn, I have learned a lot from them about their own interests through stim- ulating discussions—and in some cases about my own interests through friendly criti- cism. I’m especially grateful to Francis Tyers, Sam Bass, Niko Kontovas, Kip Hutchins, Aaron Albin, Andrew Lamont, Andrew Shimunek, Andrew Bradley Johnson, and vii Hassan Bokhari for hours and hours of engaging conversation in recent years. In sev- eral cases, this dialogue has turned into collaboration and coauthorship on projects, always with positive outcomes. I am ever so grateful to the speakers of Turkic languages who participated in this study. They include Madina Satybaldinova, Kishimjan Eshenkulova, Aqsana Bor- biyeva, Aybike Şeyma Tezel, Mirlanbek Nurmatov, Saulet Alpysbayeva, Aitbubu Ab- dyibraeva, and a number of other participants who preferred to remain anonymous. They all took the time and endured the discomfort associated with the imaging getup to share their languages with me. I would like to express to each of them yet again how grateful I am for their participation. Not only have they made this dissertation possible for me, but they have also (at least it is my hope) contributed to the scientific understanding of their languages—and, perhaps, to our understanding of language in general. I’d also like to thank all of my language teachers over the years for their patience with me. I realise that I can be a difficult language student, but every last language teacher I’ve studied with has not just put up with me, but has made sure I learned not just what I wanted to, but what they wanted me to as well. I consider among my language teachers not just those who I’ve studied with in a formal setting, but every person who has helped me understand a language they know. I would especially like to thank Tserenchunt bagsh, who graciously assisted with Khalkha stimuli, which there was unfortunately not time to include in this dissertation, but which I expect to work with in the near future. Several generations of Kazakh-, Kyrgyz-, Mongolian-, and Uzbek-language Fulbright Language Teaching Assistants at IU have also contributed a lot of time to my understanding of their languages; I am especially grateful to Madina and Saulet. viii Here I’d like to acknowledge my earliest guides in learning Turkic languages, who together set the ball rolling, including Khayrulla Ismatulla, Hafiza Andreeva, and Anna Kudiyarova. Their encouragement and interest in sharing their respective back- grounds with me early in my career helped nurture my initial interest and turn it into a life-long passion. Despite a number of inevitable bureaucratic difficulties, I have generally been treated well by Indiana University and its various offices and departments. I would especially like to acknowledge the Indiana University Graduate School for its role in this dissertation by awarding me a Grant-in-Aid of Doctoral Research so that I was able to compensate participants in the study. I also recognize the role of those on my committee who recommended me for this award. Additionally, I am grateful for the experience gained while working under various supervisors and bosses at jobs I’ve held while at IU. In particular, I’d like to thank John Erickson, Öner Özçelik, Dave Baer, Ed Lazzerini, and Sam Obeng for the opportunity to have worked under their direction. I am also grateful to have taught under the supervision of Uli Schamiloglu two years ago in Madison, and for all that I learned as an Assistant Instructor under the supervision of Rich Janda and Ken de Jong. I am also extremely thankful for the mentorship of those I conducted my Masters degree work with at the University of Washington, where the initial seed for this project began to take shape.
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