LINGUIST List 9.1560

Fri Nov 6 1998

Books: Phoentics/Phonology

Editor for this issue: Scott Fults <scottlinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Rint Sybesma, Phoentics/Phonology: R. Goedemans, Weightless segments

New from Holland Academic Graphics

Rob Goedemans
Weightless Segments
A Phonetic and Phonological Study Concerning the Metrical
Irrelevance of Syllable Onsets

Weightless Segments deals with a specific question that arises
when we regard the stress rules of quantity-sensitive languages. In
these languages, vowels and coda consonants can, by virtue of their
presence or absence, influence the weight of the syllable, and thus,
indirectly, the location of word stress. It is common knowledge that
onset consonants do not have this capacity. The question that this
book, researched within the laboratory phonology framework, tries
to answer is why.
 A phonetic explanation for the weightless behaviour of syllable
onsets is sought in the durational behaviour of onset, nucleus and
coda. Assuming that duration is the primary phonetic correlate of
phonological weight, an asymmetry in the durational behaviour of
these subsyllabic constituents might explain the observed
differences in potential weight. A series of production and
perception experiments was conducted to reveal this asymmetry,
and to explain it.
 A further task that is undertaken in this book is the
reanalysis of a group of, mostly Australian Aboriginal, languages
for which some degree of onset influence in their stress rules has
been claimed in the past (in defiance of the universal rule that
onsets do not count). In the second part of this book, after a
general overview of stress in Aboriginal languages, it is shown that
these offending languages can all be reanalysed without any
reference to onset influence whatsoever.

Contents: 1. Introduction 2. Onset durations in production
experiments 3. The perception of syllabic duration 4. Exploratory
psychophysics 5. The role of onsets in stress rules 6. Two case
studies 7. Conclusions

1998. viii+262 pp. ISBN: 90 5569 052 x. Paperback. [LOT
International Series 9. HIL/Leiden University dissertation.] Price
for individuals ordering directly from the publisher: NLG 42.00
(excl. VAT and P&P).

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