Plosive (de-)voicing and f0 perturbations in Tokyo Japanese: Positional variation, cue enhancement, and contrast recovery

Gao, Jiayin; Arai, Takayuki

doi:10.1016/j.wocn.2019.100932

Cited by 16 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 65 publications

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“…It is also interesting to note that the unidirectional F0 enhancement is largely consistent with an enhanced F0 rising effect of the onset consonant-induced pitch perturbations (also known as CF0 ) observed in various other languages [ 48 , 60 , 61 ]—i.e., the vowel is produced with a higher F0 following the release of voiceless obstruents than of voiced ones. In particular, a prominence (or focus)-related augmentation of high CF0 after the voiceless stop has been found in languages with a two-way laryngeal contrast in which the voiced consonant is (frequently) produced with prevoicing during closure such as Tokyo Japanese [ 48 ], French and Italian [ 60 , 61 ]. showed comparable CF0 effects in Khmer, Thai and Vietnamese which all have a three-way stop contrast (voiced, voiceless unaspirated, voiceless aspirated), regardless of whether the language was non-tonal (Khmer) or tonal (Thai and Vietnamese), although the magnitude of CF0 was larger in non-tonal Khmer than in the tonal languages.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 77%

“…Such positional variation in the use of the segmental voicing features (as reflected in VOT and %-voicing-in-closure) vs. F0 is largely comparable to what has recently been reported with regard to how the two-way stop voicing contrast may be phonetically implemented in Tokyo Japanese [48]. [48] showed that the use of F0 was limited to the stop voicing contrast in a phrase-initial ("post-pausal") position in which the role of VOT is attenuated, whereas F0 was no longer used in a phrase-medial (especially in a word-medial) position in which phonetic voicing served a sufficient phonetic feature for the stop voicing contrast [48]. Further noted, however, that Tokyo Japanese would not soon follow a similar pathway of sound change that Seoul Korean is currently undergoing [48].…”

Section: Prosodically-conditioned Use Of the Segmental Voicing Feature (Vot) Versus The Tonal Featuresupporting

confidence: 79%

Section: Spread Of the Phrase-initial Use Of Post-lexical Tones Into Other Prosodic Positionssupporting

confidence: 76%

“…[ 48 ] showed that the use of F0 was limited to the stop voicing contrast in a phrase-initial (“post-pausal”) position in which the role of VOT is attenuated, whereas F0 was no longer used in a phrase-medial (especially in a word-medial) position in which phonetic voicing served a sufficient phonetic feature for the stop voicing contrast [ 48 ]. Further noted, however, that Tokyo Japanese would not soon follow a similar pathway of sound change that Seoul Korean is currently undergoing [ 48 ]. Explained that this would be possibly because the phonological system with a two-way voicing contrast (voiced vs. voiceless) in Tokyo Japanese would leave more room for its phonetic distinction along the VOT dimension as compared to a three-way stop contrast system in Seoul Korean, but also possibly because the pitch-accent system would constrain F0 perturbations.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Explained that this would be possibly because the phonological system with a two-way voicing contrast (voiced vs. voiceless) in Tokyo Japanese would leave more room for its phonetic distinction along the VOT dimension as compared to a three-way stop contrast system in Seoul Korean, but also possibly because the pitch-accent system would constrain F0 perturbations. It remains to be seen, as [ 48 ] noted, how Tokyo Japanese may change in the use of F0 vs. the phonetic voicing feature in relation to the constraints of the phonological system.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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An apparent-time study of an ongoing sound change in Seoul Korean: A prosodic account

2020

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In present-day Seoul Korean, the primary phonetic feature for the lenis–aspirated stop distinction is shifting from VOT to F0. Some previous studies have considered this sound change to be a tonogenesis, whereby the low-level F0 perturbation has developed into tonal features (L for the lenis and H for the aspirated) in the segmental phonology. They, however, have examined the stop distinction only at a phrase- or utterance-initial position. We newly explore the sound change in relation to various prosodic structural factors (position and prominence). Apparent-time production data were recorded from four speaker groups: young female, young male, old female, old male. The way the speakers use VOT versus F0 indeed varies as a function of position and prominence. Crucially, in all groups, VOT is still used for the lenis–aspirated distinction phrase-medially due to the lenis stop voicing. This role of VOT, however, is found only in the non-prominent (unfocused) condition, in which the F0 difference is reduced to a low-level perturbation effect. In the prominent (focused) context in which tones come into play, the role of VOT diminishes, led by young female speakers. These can be interpreted as a prosodically-conditioned, complementary use of the features to maintain sufficient contrast. Importantly, however, the tonal difference under focus is not bidirectionally polarized, so that F0 is not lowered for the lenis stop. A lack of direct enhancement of the distinctive L tone weakens a possibility that F0 is transphonologized to the phonemic feature system of the language. As an alternative to the view that tonal features are newly introduced in the segmental phonology, we propose a prosodic account: the sound change is best characterized as a prosodically-conditioned change in the use of the segmental voicing feature (implemented by VOT) versus already available post-lexical tones in the intonational phonology of Korean.

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