The Acquisition Path of [w]-final Plurals in Brazilian Portuguese

Abstract

The plural of Brazilian Portuguese [w]-final nouns includes an alternation with [j], but the change is partially blocked in monosyllables and following a tense vowel (Becker et al. 2017). In this paper, we present a nonce word study with 115 children ages 7-13 and 43 adults, all participants from the state of São Paulo, showing that blocking in monosyllables is acquired earlier than blocking by tense vowels. We claim that sensitivity to monosyllabicity and vowel tenseness are both due to universal phonological pressures, but the effect of vowel tenseness is learned more slowly because it is limited to the plural morphology in this language. Our results from nonce words are convergent with evidence from innovative plurals and loanword adaptation, showing the primacy of phonological factors over history, orthography, and lexical frequency when it comes to alternations and their acquisition.

Gradient and categorical assimilation of pretonic vowels in Brazilian Portuguese

“…While written with graphemes corresponding to non-high pretonic vowels, words like these are more frequently produced with pretonic high vowels [i] or [u], and show no alternations of [e ∼ i] or [o ∼ u] in this position. It is therefore very likely that BP speakers have stored these words with high pretonic vowels in their mental lexicon (showing a mismatch between orthography and underlying representation), and do not apply an active process of height harmony (see Becker, Nevins, Sandalo, and Rizzato (2018) who make a similar point with respect to [w ∼ j] plural alternations in BP). Our present study showed that for nonce words with the same orthographic presentation of pretonic vowels as the one found in the real words of earlier experimental studies, height harmony does not occur.…”

Frequência e distribuição de plurais irregulares no Corpus Brasileiro / Frequency and distribution of irregular plurals in the Corpus Brasileiro

“…Em contraste está a alternativa de se lexicalizar o morfema, mais do que sua base, assumindo-se, se não alomorfia propriamente dita, a hipótese de subléxicos, ativados por restrições fonológicas ou de outra natureza, inclusive extralinguística. É, por exemplo, a análise assumida por Becker et al (2018) e Rizzatto (2018), para o tratamento de plurais de palavras fechadas foneticamente por Vw, ou por Abaurre Gnerre (1983), para o tratamento de plurais de palavras fechadas por ditongo nasal.…”

“…A alternância dos expoentes fonológicos do plural de ditongos orais e nasais foi avaliada na perspectiva de sua produtividade em contextos fonológicos e morfológicos específicos por Huback (2010aHuback ( , 2010b, Cristófaro-Silva (2012), Becker et al (2018), Rizzato (2018), Gomes, Prado e Amaral (2021, no prelo), entre outros autores. Nesta seção apresentamos algumas das principais ideias desses textos em versão resumida.…”

“…O comportamento de plurais irregulares em PB foi objeto de muitos estudos, em diferentes perspectivas, em especial no que diz respeito à origem do glide, nos dois casos mencionados, e à representação da nasalidade, no caso dos ditongos em ão (CAMARA JR., 1969, 1970ABAURRE GNERRE, 1983;BISOL, 1998BISOL, , 2016BISOL, , 2020WETZELS, 1997WETZELS, , 2000GUIMARÃES;NEVINS, 2013; entre outros), mas também na perspectiva à qual se soma esta análise, a da produtividade (HUBACK, 2010a(HUBACK, , 2010bCRISTÓFARO-SILVA, 2012;BECKER et al, 2018;GOMES;PRADO;AMARAL, 2021, no prelo;RIZZATO, 2018;entre outros).…”

Prominence Augmentation via Nasalization in Brazilian Portuguese

“…We appeal to the findings of Smith (2005) that the initial position is one that requires prominence-boosting for the psycholinguistic purposes of lexical access and word-recognition, in addition to potentially for reasons of speech planning by the speaker. For phonologically-based studies of the importance of the initial syllable, see Beckman (1998) and Becker et al (2018), among many others.…”