"Tense" and "Lax" Stops in Korean

Abstract

Korean is thought to be unique in having three kinds of voiceless stops: aspirated /p h t h k h /, tense /p* t* k*/, and lax /p t k/. The contrast between tense and lax stops raises two theoretical problems. First, to distinguish them either a new feature [tense] is needed, or the contrast in voicing (or aspiration) must be increased from two to three. Either way there is a large increase in the number of possible stops in the world's languages, but the expansion lacks support beyond Korean. Second, initial aspirated and tense consonants correlate with a high tone, and lax and voiced consonants correlate with a low tone. The correlation cannot be explained in the standard tonogenesis model (voiceless-high and voiced-low). We argue instead that (a) underlyingly "tense" stops are regular voiceless unaspirated stops, and "lax" stops are regular voiced stops, (b) there is no compelling evidence for a new distinctive feature, and (c) the consonant-tone correlation is another case of voiceless-high and voiced-low. We conclude that Korean does not have an unusual phonology, and there is no need to complicate feature theory.

The production and perception of coronal fricatives in Seoul Korean

“…The two distinguishing acoustic properties most often discussed with respect to the Korean stop types are voice onset time (VOT) and fundamental frequency (f 0 ) in the following vowel, typically measured at vowel onset (e.g., Lisker & Abramson 1964, Han & Weitzman 1970, Hardcastle 1973, Han 1996, Ahn 1999, Lee & Jung 2000, Cho et al 2002, Choi 2002, Kim 2004). In addition, several other vocalic properties have been shown to distinguish the three laryngeal categories to some degree, such as first formant (F 1 ) trajectory, intensity buildup, and voice quality (Park 2002b, Han & Weitzman 1970, Abberton 1972, Han 1998, Cho et al 2002, Kim & Duanmu 2004. In fact, the vowel following a Korean stop carries so much information about its laryngeal type that perception of the contrast has been shown to be quite good on the basis of vocalic information alone (Cho 1996, Kim et al 2002.…”

“…Despite some conflicting results, complicated by relatively rapid sound change in the language (Silva 2006a,b, Wright 2007, Kang & Guion 2008, most research on Korean has differentiated the three series of plosives and affricates in terms of a lenis category (also called "lax", "weak", or "plain"), a fortis category (also called "tense", "strong", "forced", or "laryngealized"), and an aspirated category, which is heavily aspirated in initial position (cf. Martin 1951, Han 1996, Avery & Idsardi 2001, and Ahn & Iverson 2004 for alternative analyses of the fortis obstruents as geminate, as well as Kim & Duanmu 2004 for an alternative analysis of the lenis obstruents as voiced).…”

“…As for how the phonology operates to result in the f 0 elevation, the current analysis is amenable to the idea that fortis and aspirated obstruents are specified with underlying structure (e.g., an H tone), which gets realized domain-initially on the following vowel via spreading (Jun 1993, Ahn & Iverson 2004, Kim & Duanmu 2004, Silva 2006a). However, in order to account for the relative difference in f 0 elevation between fortis and aspirated stops, it must be assumed that the H tones are associated not with the entire feature bundles representing the stop types, but with the feature values [+tense] and [+spread glottis] specifically.…”

Effects of tone on the three-way laryngeal distinction in Korean: An acoustic and aerodynamic comparison of the Seoul and South Kyungsang dialects.

“…Accordingly, Kenstowicz & Park (2006) examined the acoustic properties of stops in Kyungsang Korean, including VOT, H1-H2 as well as f0. Since M. Kim & Duanmu (2004) had analyzed the lenis stop as underlyingly voiced because it becomes voiced in intervocalic position, Kenstowicz & Park (2006) specifically focused on the effect of the underlying voicing of the preceding consonant on the high vs. low tonal contrast in the following vowel. One of the main findings in Kenstowicz & Park (2006) is that f0 after underlying voiceless consonants such as fortis and aspirated stops is relatively high, compared to that of underlying voiced consonants such as lenis and nasal consonants in the Kyungsang dialects; this was true for both high and low tonal conditions.…”

Establishing the Three-Way Voicing Contrast in Madurese Stops

“…It is important to bear in mind, however, that the three stop categories in Korean are all voiceless in utterance-initial position and for some speakers both F0 and voice quality also play a role for the distinction among the three categories (see e.g. Cho, Ladefoged, & Jun, 2002;Han & Weitzman, 1970;Kang & Guion, 2008;Kang, 2014;Kim & Duanmu, 2004;Kong, Beckman, & Edwards, 2012). However, in terms of vowel quality, they look very similar.…”