In linguistics, pre-stopping, also known as pre-occlusion or pre-plosion, is a phonological process involving the historical or allophonic insertion of a very short stop consonant before a sonorant, such as a short before a nasal occlusive or a lateral , or a short before a nasal occlusive . The resulting sounds () are called pre-stopped consonants, or sometimes pre-ploded or (in Celtic linguistics) pre-occluded consonants, although technically may be considered an stop consonant without the pre-occlusion.
A pre-stopped consonant behaves phonology as a single consonant. That is, like affricates and trilled affricates, the reasons for considering these sequences to be single consonants lies primarily in their behavior.
Terminology
There are three terms for this phenomenon. The most common by far is
prestopped/prestopping.
In descriptions of the languages of Southeast Asia, Australia, and the Pacific,
preploded/preplosion is common,
[Adelaar & Himmelmann (2005) The Austronesian languages of Asia and Madagascar] though
prestopped is also used.
[Botma (2004) Phonological Aspects of Nasality] In accounts of Celtic languages,
preoccluded/preocclusion is used almost exclusively.
[Ball & Fife (2002) The Celtic Languages]["Pre-occluded" is also used in Laver (1994) Principles of Phonetics] Technically, nasals are already occlusives, and are often considered stops; however, some prefer to restrict the term 'stop' for consonants in which there is complete cessation of airflow, so 'prenasalized stop' and 'prestopped nasal' are not necessarily tautologies.
Occurrence
In European languages
In
Manx language, pre-occlusion occurs in stressed monosyllabic words (i.e. words one syllable long), and is also found in
Cornish language on certain stressed syllables. The inserted stop is homorganic with the sonorant, which means it has the same place of articulation. Long vowels are often shortened before pre-occluded sounds. In transcription, pre-occluding consonants in final position are typically written with a superscripted letter in Manx
[Williams, Nicholas. 1994. "An Mhanainnis", in Stair na Gaeilge: in ómós do Pádraig Ó Fiannachta. Maigh Nuad: Roinn na Sean-Ghaeilge, Colásite Phádraig. §X.4.10. ] and in Cornish.
[Williams, Nicholas. 2006. "Pre-occlusion in Cornish", in Writing on Revived Cornish. Cathair na Mart: Evertype. ]
Examples in Manx include:
-
→ : trome → "heavy"
-
→ : shooyll → "walking"
-
→ : kione → "head"
-
→ : ein → "birds"
-
→ : lhong → "ship"
In Cornish, pre-occlusion mostly affects the reflexes of older geminate/fortis , intrinsically geminated in Old Cornish, and (or /N/ depending on preferred notation). It also arises in a few cases where the combination was apparently re-interpreted as .
Examples in Cornish language:
-
→ : mabm "mother"
-
→ : hebma "this"
-
→ : pedn "head"
-
→ : pednow "heads"
In Faroese language, pre-occlusion also occurs, as in kallar 'you call, he calls', seinna 'latter'. A similar feature occurs in Icelandic, as in galli ('error'); sæll , seinna ; Spánn .
In Mon–Khmer languages
Pre-stopped nasals are also found in several branches of
Austroasiatic, especially in the North Aslian languages and
Shompen language, where historical word-final nasals, *m *n *ŋ, have become pre-stopped, or even full voiced stops .
In Australian languages
Pre-stopped nasals and laterals are found in some Australian Aboriginal languages, such as
Kuyani language (Adnyamathanha),
Arabana language, Wangkangurru,
Diyari language,
Aranda language (nasals only), and Martuthunira (laterals only).
[Mielke 2008:135] Adnyamathanha, for example, has the pre-stopped nasals and the pre-stopped laterals , though these are all in allophonic variation with the simple nasals and laterals .
In Austronesian languages
Hiw language of Vanuatu is the only Austronesian language that has been reported to have a pre-stopped velar lateral approximant .
Its phonological behavior clearly defines it as a prestopped lateral, rather than as a laterally released stop.
Nemi language of New Caledonia has consonants that have been described as Nasal release stops,[.] but could possibly be described as prestopped nasals.[.]
See also
Bibliography
-
Jeff Mielke, 2008. The emergence of distinctive features.
