The Role of Perception in Slavic Sibilant Systems

1
The Role of Perception inSlavic Sibilant
Systems

• Marzena Rochon
• Zentrum für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft (ZAS),
  Berlin
• marzena_at_zas.gwz-berlin.de

2
Goal

• Perception plays a crucial role in Slavic
• (and other) sibilant systems
• A trifold sibilant distinction such as s ? ?
  is not optimal in terms of maintaining sufficient
  perceptual contrast. Therefore languages either
• (a) enhance the contrast by replacing a
  post-alveolar sibilant (?) by a retroflex one ??
  , e.g. Polish, Russian, or
• (b) they reduce a trifold distinction to a
  bifold one, e.g. s, ? or s ?j, e.g. Croatian,
  Polish dialects, Serbian.

3
Outline of the talk

• 1. Coronal fricatives and affricates in Polish
• 2. Sibilant systems in other Slavic languages
  similarities and contrasts
• 3. Preliminary analysis
• 4. Acoustic analysis and the role of perception
  in sibilant inventories
• 5. Conclusions marked vs. unmarked systems

4
Standard Polish
5
2
3
1 Mazovian
1
2 Kashubian
3 Mazurian
3
Dejna 1994 71
6
Mazovian spoken in Mazovia (except the extreme
northeast), in Malopolska (except the areas
between the rivers Wislok i San, the Upper Wieprz
and Bug) and in northern Silesia.

• Standard Polish
• ??yto rye nom.sg.
• t???as time nom.sg.

• Mazovian
• zyto
• t?sas

7
Mazovian
8
Kashubian spoken in the northern part of Poland,
close to Gdansk

• Standard Polish
• a on ?pji and he sleeps
• nie wid??eli they didnt see

• Kashubian
• a on spji
• nie wid?zeli

9
How are Standard Polish retroflexes realized in
Kashubian?

• Standard Polish
• ??aro grey
• ??arpie he pulls
• Conclusion they are palatalized post- alveolars

• Kashubian
• szaro
• szarpie

10
Kashubian
11
Mazurian Jablonków dialects spoken in the
northeastern regions of Poland (around Malbork,
Ostróda, Lubawa and eastern Warmia) and in the
small area in the southern part of Poland (around
Jab³onków)

• Standard Polish
• ??yto ryenom.sg.
• t???as time nom.sg.

• Mazurian Jablonków
• ?jyto
• t??jas

12
Mazurian Jablonków dialects
13
Polish systems

• Standard Polish ? ? ?? ?? ?
  ?
• Mazovian ? ? ? ?
• Kashubian ? ? ?j ?j
• Mazurian ? ? ?j ?j
• Conclusions
• 1. A trifold sibilant system is not optimal.
• 2. Dialects, trying to avoid it, prefer a
  bifold distinction.
• 3. The retroflexes ?? ?? are consistently
  avoided.

14
Why have Mazovian dialects chosen alveolopalatals
and not retroflexes ?

• They are easier from an articulatory point of
  view, cf. also acquisition of ? vs. ??, Lobacz
  (1996).
• In morphology the role of ? ? t?? d?? is much
  more important than that of ?? ?? ????? ????.
• They appear in both nominal and verbal
  inflection, e.g. nos no?e nose nom./loc.,
  plote plet???esz to weave 1.sg./2.pl.pres.,
  cf. Stankiewicz (1986 109)

15
Serbian/Croatian
16

• Kordic (19975) on Serbian Croatian
• The meaning of the words containing c (t??)
  or c (t??) remains the same even if a speaker
  does not distinguish c and c. .. The majority
  of native speakers pronounce both c or c in the
  same way making no difference between them. The
  same holds for dž (d???) and dz (d??) as well.
• Stankiewicz (1986 110)
• c, dz have a very low frequency. Their
  overlap has no effect on the morphological
  structure.

17
Lower Sorbian, cf. Stadnik (1998385), de Bray
(1951701)
18
Russian, cf. Stadnik (1988 380)
19
Russian

• Alveolopalatals are emerging
• sjadl he sat down
• vzjatj to take
• Sawicka (200111) tj, dj are frequently
  accompanied by affricatization.
• Jones Ward (1969 104) a very short fricative
  element is heard.

20
Phonological phonetic evidence

• Hamman (2001)
• Polish Retraction Rule Rubach (1984)
• ko/s/ic ko?ic to mow
• towarzy/??/ic towarzy???c to
  accompany
• Russian Hamilton (1990)
• b?tj to be bjitj to hit
• s??tj to sew s?jitj
• Bulgarian
• ti?ina silence
• stra?ilo monster
• Conclusion in Russian retroflexes occur they
  are velarized tongue backing and tongue-fronting
  for front vowels are incompatible

21
Belorussian, cf. Stadnik (1988 382) sjudy
here tjomnyj dark
22
Ukrainian, cf. Stadnik (1988381)Stankiewicz
(1986) ?, ?, t???, d?? occur in the
southwestern Ukrainian dialects.
23
Russian (Belorussian, Ukrainian)

• Alveolopalatals are emerging and post-
• alveolars are changing to retroflexes.

24
Czech, cf. Kucera (196124)
25
Slovenian, cf. Stadnik (1998  391)
26
Slovak, cf. Rubach (1993 31)
27
Bulgarian, cf. Stadnik (1988 389)
28
Upper Sorbian, cf. Schuster-Šewc (1996 41) de
Bray (1951688)Carlton (1990260) In modern US
t?? merges with t??.
29
Preliminary conclusions

• 1. If a language has a bifold distinction, then
  it is between alveolars/dentals and
  postalveolars.
• 2. As soon as alveolopalatals emerge,
  postalveolars change to retroflexes.
• 3. A system such as ? ?? ? is more optimal
  than ? ? ?.
• Is this a Polish/Slavic specific phenomenon or a
  universal one?

30
Hall (1997a) The Historical Development of
Retroflex Consonants in Indo-Aryan.

• Indo-European s ? Indo-Iranian ? ? Old
  Indo-Aryan s?.
• Two claims
• No language can contrast palatoalveolars and
  alveolopalatals.
• If a language contrasts two postalveolar
  (retroflex, palatoalveolar, alveolopalatal)
  sounds then one will be apical and the other
  laminal.

31
Hall (1997a)

• stage 1 /s, ?/ ? stage 2 /s , ? , ? / ? stage
  3 /s, s?, ?/
• s s? ? , ?
• coronal
• anterior - -
• distributed - -
• Contrasts like /?, ?/ and /? , ?/ are
  nonoccurring.

32
Feature round
33
Functional explanation a. articulation does not
explain why s? is more preferable to ?.b.
perception
s?
?
cf. Wierzchowska (197064,98)
34
Acoustics, cf. Kudela (1968), Dogil (1990),
Stevens (1998).
35
Acoustic comparison,cf. Halle and Stevens(1989),
Kudela (1968), Dogil 1990)

• ? ?
• F3, F4 higher than in s?.
• Absence of the major amplitude
• peak in the F2 frequency region.
• Halle and Stevens(1989) prominent spectral peaks
  in the F3-F4 follow from the natural resonances
  of the cavity situated under the inferior surface
  of the tongue blade the so called lower incisors
  cavity
• F3 and F4 in ? ? are higher because of the
  expected influence of palatalization.

• s? z?
• A broad band in the 2-4kHz frequency range
• Dogil (1990) the observed acoustic difference
  must be attributed to the participation of the
  lips in the production of these sound types.
• The closed front cavity has the property of
  enhancing the natural frequencies with the F2
  region. The spread lips in the case of ? ?
  leave the front cavity open and thus radiation of
  the F2 frequencies is facilitated which, explains
  why natural frequencies corresponding to the
  second resonance of the entire vocal tract are
  absent in these consonants.

36
Acoustics / Perception

• s? and ? are very similar from an acoustic point
  of view. Speakers of different languages have
  difficulty in distinguishing them.
• Piela Dukiewicz (1962), Piela (1964) show that
  the range of 1024-2048 plays a crucial role in
  the recognition of sibilants.
• s? and ? considerably differ in F2 (1280 vs
  1750). s? is preferred over ? because it creates
  more contrast to s (2000) and ? (2700).
• If a language already has dental/alveolar and
  alveolopalatal fricatives, the perceptual
  contrast is better maintained by retroflexes than
  by post-alveolars.

37
Conclusions

• Perception plays a crucial role in Slavic
  sibilant systems
• A trifold distinction such as s ? ? is not
  optimal in terms of maintaining sufficient
  perceptual contrast. Therefore languages either
• (a) create a system in which a postalveolar is
  replaced by a retroflex fricative, e.g. Polish,
  Russian, or
• (b) reduce a trifold distinction to a bifold one,
  e.g. Croatian, Polish dialects, Serbian. In this
  case the system contains postalveolars.

38
Markedness

• ? s
• ? ?j sj s
• ? ? s
• s? ? s
• ? s
• ?j s

39
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