Thematic Session

Organizers

Nina Topintzi, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, topintzi@enl.auth.gr &
Anthi Revithiadou, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, revith@lit.auth.gr

Topic description and research questions

At about the same time that the first ICGL was organised, Malikouti-Drachman authored her 1994 and, later, her 2001 State-of-the-Art articles, where she reviewed some important problems of Greek Phonology related to the lexical and postlexical components of the grammar. From the lexical component she focused on: (a) the so-called ‘three dreams of Householder’, that is, the representation and phonological behavior of voiced stops, the semi-vocalization, and the affrication problem that pertain to the question of whether the palatal glide [j] and the affricates [ʦ ʣ] are underlying or not, (b) issues of syllabification in Greek and several of its dialectal varieties, (c) aspects of the acquisition of Greek syllables with emphasis on the acquisition of onsets, (d) the prosodic principles that underline the formation of hypocoristics, and (e) the representation and assignment of word stress. From the post-lexical component, Malikouti discussed: (a) sandhi rules that take place within and across smaller and larger prosodic constituents (b) the type of prosodic constituents that exist above the phonological word, with particular emphasis on the necessity for the clitic group, (c) the properties of secondary/rhythmic stress postlexically (e.g., in clitic constructions and in phonological phrases).

Today, after almost three decades of scholarly research, many of the above-mentioned issues are still under investigation. Taking stock of the past, it is time to consider how we move forward. This workshop, thus, aims at bringing together scholars working on the phonology of Greek, its interfaces, and its dialectal varieties with the goal to address and offer solutions to old and new problems in the language, but also to consider implications for phonological theory, in general. The present contributions cover a wide range of topics and perspectives: some examine and offer new insights to several of the problems listed above (such as affrication, glides, syllabification, truncation patterns), while others identify possible directions for future research which may help us understand the phonology of Greek and its interfaces more fully (e.g. the role of orthography or phonetic cues to syllabification). The source of data is equally diverse, including standard and non-standard varieties of the language (e.g. Italiot Greek), child and adult language, as well as experimentally-derived data and aphasic speech. Various analytical strands within the generative theoretical framework are also represented (Autosegmental Phonology, Optimality Theory, Gradient Symbolic Representations, Span Theory).

Householder, F. W. (1964). Three dreams of Modern Greek phonology. In R. Austerlitz (Ed.), Word 20 (Papers in memory of George C. Papageotes)(sup.2), 17–27.

Malikouti-Drachman, A. (1994). New approaches to some problems of Greek Phonology. In I. Philippaki–Warburton, K. Nikolaidis, & M. Sifianou (Eds.), Themes in Greek Linguistics (pp. 33–44). Amsterdam & Philadelphia: Benjamins.

Malikouti-Drachman, A. (2001). State-of-the-art review article. Greek phonology: A contemporary perspective. Journal of Greek Linguistics, 2(1), 187–243.

Papers

Irini Apostolopoulou
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
eirini.th.apostolopoulou@gmail.com

Salentinian Greek (SG) and Calabrian Greek (CG) are among the Greek dialects that do not allow final consonants (Rohlfs 1950; Tzitzilis in press). Final /s/ and /n/ are typically avoided via deletion (1) (data taken from own fieldwork).
  • Final /s/ and /n/
    1. /tris/ trí∅                                                    ‘three’
    2. /plen/ plé∅                                                  ‘more’
However, traces of these silenced segments re-emerge before particular word-initial segments within larger prosodic constituents. Specifically, both segments are “restored” before a vowel (2a‒b). Moreover, they lengthen the following consonant and give rise to a geminate (2c‒f). Exceptionally, in CG, /n/ is realized as a nasal when preceding a voiceless stop (i.e. nC̥ [‒cont]), which undergoes voice assimilation (2g; cf. 2f in SG).
  • Sandhi s##C and n##C
a.         /tris aspri/ [trísáspri] ‘three white ones’
b.         /plen aspri/ [plénáspri] ‘whiter’
c.         /tris kali/ [tríkkalí] ‘three good ones’
d.         /tris mavri/ [trímmávri] ‘three black ones’
e.         /plen mavro/ [plémmávro] ‘blacker’
f.          /plen kali/ [plékkalí] ‘better’ (SG)
g.         /plen kali/ [pléŋgalí] ‘better’ (CG)
Interestingly, within a word we encounter both [sC] (and its voiced counterpart [zC]) and, in the case of SG, [nC̥ [‒cont]] clusters, as shown in (3a‒b) and (3c), respectively (cf. avoidance of [nC̥ [‒cont]] in CG, 3d).
  • Word-internal sC and nC
a.         /vrisko/ [vrísko] ‘I find’ (both dialects)
b.         /kosmos/ [kózmo] ‘world’
c.         /pente/ [pénthe] ~ [pétthe] ‘five (SG)
d.         /pente/ [pénde] ‘five’ (CG)
I propose an analysis of the “ghost” /s/ and /n/ within Gradient Symbolic Representations (GSR; Smolensky & Goldrick 2016). I postulate that the underlying representations of the segments at hand as well as certain manner features have a gradient activity level (AL). The candidates are evaluated by a weighted constraint system (Legendre et al. 1990). I take non- final /s/ and /n/ to be fully active, i.e. fully present in the underlying representation; thus, their realization is guaranteed. By contrast, in final position, /s/ and /n/ have been reduced to partially active consonantal roots bearing a manner feature ([+strident]/[+nasal], respectively). Unless the grammar provides the additional AL required for the impoverished segments to surface, they are silenced. In absolute final positions, the reduced AL of /s/ and /n/ never suffices to secure realization. On the other hand, before consonants, these segments may make it to the surface in disguise, i.e. mostly as additional length of the following consonant. The cross- dialectal variation between SG and CG with respect to nC̥ [‒cont] is accounted for by means of different constraint weights, i.e. is seen as variation between the phonological grammars.

The Italiot Greek patterns are compared to similar sandhi phenomena in other Greek dialects (e.g. Standard, Malikouti Drachman 2001; Revithiadou & Markopoulos 2021; Cypriot, Armostis 2011, Christodoulou 2015).

References

Legendre, G., Miyata, Y., & Smolensky, P. (1990). Harmonic grammar – A formal multi-level connectionist theory of linguistic well-formedness: Theoretical foundations. In Proceedings of the 12th Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 388–395). Cambridge, MA: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Malikouti-Drachman, A. (2001). State-of-the-art review article. Greek phonology: A contemporary perspective. Journal of Greek Linguistics, 2(1), 187–243.

Rohlfs, G. (1950). Historisches Grammatik der Unteritalienischen Gräzität. Munich: H. Beck.

Revithiadou, A., & Markopoulos, G. (2021). A gradient harmonic grammar account of nasals in extended phonological words. Catalan Journal of Linguistics, 20, 57–75.

Smolensky, P., & Goldrick, M. (2016). Gradient symbolic representations in grammar: The case of French liaison. Ms., ROA 1552.

Tzitzilis, C. (Ed.) (in press). Νεοελληνικές διάλεκτοι [Modern Greek dialects] (2 vols.). Thessaloniki: Institute of Modern Greek Studies.

Katerina Iliopoulou & Ioanna Kappa
University of Crete
philp0892@philology.uoc.gr, kappa@uoc.gr

Consonant Harmony (CH), the process of assimilation among non-adjacent consonantal segments, is a process not typologically common in adult systems, where it targets peripheral features (Hansson, 2010; i.a.), but a common (feature-level) segmental process in the early stages of (a)typical phonological development in many languages, including Greek (e.g. Kappa et al., 2022; i.a.). The most common type of CH in child language involves the primary Place of Articulation (PoA) (Pater, 1997; i.a.). Few studies have addressed CH in aphasia to this day (Béland & Favreau (1991) for French; Kohn et al. (1995) for English). The phonology –including CH– of Greek-speaking Persons with Aphasia (PWA) remains a rather unexplored field in Greek phonology. For the purposes of this study, we rely:
  • on our corpus of longitudinal developmental data from the spontaneous typical speech of 4 (male) children (ages: 2-2;06.15, years; months. days), who are acquiring Greek as L1.
  • on the Corpus of Greek Aphasic Speech (Goutsos et al., 2011), from where we have drawn data from 10 Greek-speaking PWA, who are able to produce all phonemes/
In both the children’s developmental data and the data from PWA, we have attested the following homogenous CH patterns (I, II), where CH is restricted to two successive head onsets (Onset-Onset), including the onset of the stressed syllable, that have:
  1. Similar feature(s), namely the same Manner of Articulation (MoA):
CH predominantly targets Labial and Dorsal consonants, that agree to the unmarked Coronal PoA of a strictly following onset (in italics), e.g.

(1) ˈcita➝ˈtita (child: #1, #2, #6), (2) ma.na➝ˈna.na (PWA #11), (3) vojˈθiso➝ ðojˈθiso (PWA #38), following the harmonic PoA hierarchy (Prince & Smolensky, 1993),
  1. e. Coronal≻Dorsal (1), Coronal≻Labial (2, 3).
MoA and laryngeal features are realized faithfully.
  1. Dissimilar feature(s) in MoA and PoA, where two different sub-patterns emerge:
  2. a) Agreement to the unmarked PoA, as above in (I):
(4) ˈpano ➝ˈtano (child: #1, #2),     (5) sfuˈgaɾi ➝ fuˈdali (child: #2, #6), (6) xaɾˈti ➝ saˈti (child: #2, #4),       (7) e.ɟe.fa.li.ˈko ➝ e.ɟe.fa.li.ˈto (PWA #33)
  1. b) Both PoA and MoA agreement to the consonant with the unmarked PoA,
  2. g. Coronal≻Labial: (8) ˈfeta➝ ˈteta (child: #2), (9) ˈpiso➝ˈðiso (PWA #13).
We illustrate the grammars active in patterns (I) and (II), couching our analysis in Span Theory (McCarthy, 2004). Our findings suggest that, in the systems of the above children and PWA, CH applies within harmonic spans headed by a Coronal onset consonant, which is faithful to the target (input), and determines the realization of the PoA feature of the other span (onset) segment; CH is guided by agreement to the unmarked Coronal PoA of the span head.

We claim that CH in language acquisition and aphasia is heterogeneously motivated, resulting from different requirements in the relevant grammars. CH in these children’s data is viewed as a neutralization process, which minimizes the contrasts mainly in primary PoA within the (output) PWd, due to the children’s immature phonological system (e. g. Fikkert & Levelt, 2008) which is being reorganized, still retaining its demand for unmarkedness over faithfulness to the input. However, CH in our aphasic data is an infrequent process, viewed as a compensatory mechanism (Kohn et al., 1995), resulting from a phonological access deficit, rather than from system reorganization: at times, while PWA have access to the segmental quantity of the target word, some distinctive features (PoA and/or MoA) cannot be completely retrieved for some phonemes, due to the damaged retrieval of PWA. In order for these phonemes to be realized, they agree to an unmarked for PoA adjacent (onset) consonant on the segmental (consonantal) tier, resembling the dominant Coronal harmony pattern attested in the system of the children in this study, albeit heterogeneously motivated.

References

Béland, R., & Favreau, Y. (1991). On the special status of coronals in aphasia. In C. Paradis & J.-F. Prunet (Eds.), The special status of coronals: Internal and external evidence (Phonetics and Phonology, Vol. 2, pp. 201–221). Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-12-544966-3.50016-6

Fikkert, P., & Levelt, C. (2008). How does Place fall into place? The lexicon and emergent constraints in children’s developing grammars. In P. Avery, B. E. Dresher, & K. Rice (Eds.), Contrast in phonology: Theory, perception, acquisition (pp. 231–268). Mouton de Gruyter.

Goutsos, D., Potagas, C., Kasselimis, D., Varkanitsa, M., & Evdokimidis, I. (2011). The corpus of Greek aphasic speech: Design and compilation. In M.L. Carrió Pastor & M.A. Candel Mora (Eds.), Actas del III Congreso Internacional de Lingüística de Corpus (pp. 77–86). Universitat Politècnica de València.

Hansson, G. Ó. (2010). Consonant harmony: Long-distance interaction in phonology. University of California Press.

Kappa, I., Iliopoulou, K., & Gatsou, M. (2022). ‘Relics’ of place harmony in atypical phonological development. In S. Akamine (Ed.), Proceedings of the Thirty-third Western Conference on Linguistics (vol. 27, pp. 95–106). California State University.

Kohn, S. E., Melvold, J., & Smith, K. L. (1995). Consonant harmony as a compensatory mechanism in fluent aphasic speech. Cortex, 31(4), 747–756.

McCarthy, J. J. (2004). Headed spans and autosegmental spreading. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/ linguist_faculty_pubs/42

Pater, J. (1997). Minimal violation and phonological development. Language Acquisition, 6(3), 201–253. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327817la0603_2

Prince, A., & Smolensky, P. (1993). Optimality theory: Constraint interaction in generative grammar (Technical report). Rutgers University and University of Colorado (Revised version published 2004, Oxford: Blackwell).

Ioanna Kappa
University of Crete
kappa@uoc.gr

There is a longstanding debate in the phonological literature for Standard Modern Greek (SMG) regarding the underlying monosegmental vs. bisegmental status of affricates [ʦ] and [ʣ], namely their representation as phonemes in the Greek phonological system (e.g. Hamp 1961, Householder 1964, Malikouti 1970, Pagoni 1993, Kappa 1995, Fourakis et al. 2005, Tzakosta & Vis 2009a, b, Revithiadou 2021, a. o.) vs. the phonetic realization of underlying clusters of /Stop+strident Fricative/, for instance, /t+s/ (e.g. Newton 1961, Setatos 1974, Arvaniti 2007, a. o.).

The representation of (monosegmental) affricates has been a theoretical issue within the non-linear phonological literature, and the following main hypotheses have been proposed: (i) affricates are contour segments specified with the ordered features [–continuant] (left edge) and [+continuant] (right edge) (e.g. Sagey 1986, a. o.), (ii) affricates are complex segments specified with the unordered features [-continuant]/Stop and [+continuant] which are represented at different tiers (Lombardi 1990; see also Hualde 1988, a. o.), (iii) affricates are represented by a single manner feature node as [-continuant] and the single-valued feature [strident] (Rubach 1994 for Polish; the latter analysis of affricates as strident Stops goes back to Jakobson et al., 1952). Kappa (1998), provides external evidence in favor of the Unordered Component Hypothesis (see (ii) above), by analyzing the developmental paths in the acquisition of affricate segments in child Greek.

In the present study, we argue in favor of the monosegmental status of affricates in SMG, based on evidence from developmental naturalistic data collected from 15 typically developing children acquiring Greek as L1 (age range 1;06.-2;02, years;months). All children have CV(C)# syllables, namely, they have not acquired (i) the word-internal Coda (100%), (ii) the word-initial/-medial complex clusters C1C2 either of rising or of falling sonority: all target C1C2 clusters are simplified (100%) to a single onset either by reduction (main pattern) or by coalescence (see below in (i)), in (un)stressed word-initial/-non initial position. Fricatives have started to be sporadically realized, primarily in the final Coda position. The processes of consonant harmony and reduplication apply in the system of all children. The formal analysis is couched in the Correspondence Theory approach to Optimality Theory (McCarthy & Prince 1995). The following evidence supports the monosegmental status of affricates (i-iii below):
  1. i) The target complex clusters [p1s2] (1a) and [k1s2] (1b, c) may be simplified via coalescence, resulting in the realization of a merged single segment (C1,2) which combines features that correspond to some feature(s) of both target C1 and C2, namely to the unmarked Coronal PoA of the target C2 and to the feature specification for MoA, of both C1 [-cont] and C2 [+cont], therefore the affricate [ʦ] emerges in the single onset position of the children’s CV outputs (1).
  2. (a) [ˈpsa.ɾi]➝[ˈʦa.li] ‘fish’ (b) [ksa.ˈna]➝ [ʦa.ˈna] ‘again’     (c) [ˈe.kso]➝ [ˈe.ʦo] ‘out’
We argue that an affricate may arise as a coalesced segment when the C1C2 segments (that make up the target cluster) belong to the same natural class, specifically non-sonorants (Stop, Fricative). The children’s grammar does not allow branching onsets due to the undominated markedness segmental constraint against complex onsets. Therefore, the realization of onset with a single segment, even with a complex MoA, is considered more harmonic than a complex onset with a bisegmental cluster [C1C2]. In Greek child speech, the earlier realization of affricates can be seen as a precursor to complex onsets.
  1. ii) The affricate, licensed under a single onset, may trigger consonant harmony (CH) to a preceding non-adjacent single onset consonant, where the target agrees (a) fully, with the trigger’s ([ʦ]) PoA and MoA (Coronal CH) [2a], (b) partially, with the trigger’s MoA [2b] (in bold, the target of CH).
  2. (a) [ˈkʦes] ➝ [ˈʦa.ʦes] ‘socks’ (b) [pa.sxa.ˈli.ʦa] ➝ [pa.kaˈʦi.ʦa] ‘ladybug’
iii) Only the head of a foot, a stressed syllable with a single onset, may be reduplicated. The reduplication ensures that the (target) number of syllables is faithfully realized in the children’s output (Kappa, 2002), e.g. σ2 with a Labial Stop in onset [3a] or with a (Coronal) affricate [3b].
  1. (a) [ka.[ˈpeσ2.lo]F]PWd ➝ [pe.[ˈpeσ2.lo]F]PWd (b) [ko.[ˈʦiσ2.ða]F]PWd ➝ [ʦi.[ˈʦiσ2.da]F]PWd
References

Arvaniti A. (2007). Greek phonetics: The state of the art. Journal of Greek Linguistics, 8, 97–208.

Berns, J. (2016). The phonological representation of affricates. Language and Linguistics Compass, 10, 142–156.

Hamp, E. (1961). To ρήμα εν τη σημερινή ομιλούμενη ελληνική γλώσσα. Αθηνά, 65, 101–108.

Householder, F.W. (1964). The three dreams of Μodern Greek phonology. Word, 20(sup2), 17–27. https://doi.org/10.1080/00437956.1964.11659847

Hualde, J. I. (1988). Affricates are not contour segments. In H. Borer (Ed.), Proceedings of the WCCFL, 7, 143–157. Stanford: Stanford Linguistics Association.

Jakobson, R., Fant, G., & Halle, M. (1952). Preliminaries to speech analysis. The distinctive features and their correlates. Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Kappa, I. (1995). Silbenphonologie im Deutschen und Neugriechischen [Ph.D. Dissertation]. Salzburg University.

Kappa, I. (1998). The realization of affricates in child language. In S. Lambropoulou (Ed.), Proceedings of the 12th International Symposium on Theoretical & Applied Linguistics (vol. I) Papers on Theoretical Linguistics (pp. 322–330). Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

Kappa, I. (2002). Α longitudinal study on phonological development of the early words. In M. Makri-Tsilipakou (Ed.), Selected Papers: 14th International Symposium on Theoretical and Applied Linguistics (pp. 124–133). Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

Lombardi, L. (1990). The nonlinear organization of the affricate. Natural language and linguistic theory, 8, 375–425.

McCarthy, J., & Prince, A. S. (1995). Faithfulness and reduplicative identity. In J. Beckman, S. Urbanczyk, & L. Walsh (Eds.), University of Massachusetts occasional papers in linguistics 18: Papers in Optimality Theory (pp. 249–384). Amherst: Graduate Linguistic Student Association. Available on Rutgers Optimality Archive, ROA-103.

Mαλικούτη, A. (1970). Mετασχηματιστική μορφολογία του νεοελληνικού ονόματος [Δημοσ. Διατριβή]. Βιβλιοθήκη της εν Αθήναις Φιλεκπαιδευτικής Εταιρείας, Νο. 56.

Newton, B. (1961). The rephonemicization of Modern Greek. Lingua, 10, 275–284.

Pagoni, S. (1993). Phonological variation in Modern Greek: A government phonology approach [Ph.D. Dissertation]. UCL, London.

Ρεβυθιάδου. Α. (2021). Εισαγωγή στη φωνολογία. Θεσσαλονίκη: Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών, Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη.

Rubach, J. (1994). Affricates as strident stops in Polish. Linguistic Inquiry, 25, 119–143.

Sagey, E. C. (1986). The representation of features and relations in non-linear phonology [Ph.D. dissertation]. MIT.

Σετάτος, M. (1974). Φωνολογία της κοινής νεοελληνικής. Αθήνα: Παπαζήσης

Tzakosta, M., & Vis, J. (2009a). Αsymmetries of consonant sequences in perception and production: Affricates vs. /s/ clusters. In A. Tsangalidis (Ed.), Selected Papers from the 18th International Symposium on Theoretical and Applied Linguistics (pp. 375–384). Thessaloniki: Monochromia.

Tzakosta, M., & Vis, J. (2009b). Phonological representations of consonant sequences: The case of affricates vs. ‘true’ clusters. In M. Baltazani, G. K. Giannakis, T. Tsangalidis, & G. J. Xydopoulos (Eds.), Proceedings of the 8th International Conference of Greek Linguistics (pp. 558–573). Ioannina: University of Ioannina

Φουράκης, Μ., Μποτίνης, Α., & Νιργιανάκη, Ε. (2005). Χρονικά χαρακτηριστικά των συμφωνικών ακολουθιών [ps], [ts], [ks] (Temporal characteristics of the consonantal sequences [ps], [ts] και [ks]). Πρακτικά του 6ου Διεθνούς Συνεδρίου Ελληνικής Γλωσσολογίας (σσ. 1–8). Ρέθυμνο: Πανεπιστήμιο Κρήτης. Available at http://www.philology.uoc.gr/conferences/6thICGL/.

Athina Kikiopoulou & Nina Topintzi
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
aekikiop@enl.auth.gr, topintzi@enl.auth.gr

The Greek cluster inventory constitutes a phonological challenge; apart from many widely attested patterns, such as obstruent+liquid, e.g., /kl fl θr/, many marked combinations, such as obstruent+obstruent, e.g., /ft pt xθ/ are also attested. In general, these consonantal sequences in Greek are considered complex onsets as a function of Onset Maximization (Selkirk, 1984; Setatos, 1987). Various theoretical accounts have endeavored to formalize the tautosyllabicity of these segments but have not succeeded in providing a unified account; language specific sonority scales exclude phonemes (Kappa, 1995) or overgenerate clusters (Tzakosta, 2012), while skeletal interpretations cannot account for stop+stop or fricative+fricative patterns (Malikouti-Drachman, 2001). Though significant, these interpretations can be reexamined and updated through the use of experimentally derived data. As a logical next step, this study seeks to provide an empirically informed look into the Greek syllable and provide useful information to incorporate into its formal study.

Recent studies on English and Jazani Arabic suggest that the syllabic organization of consonantal sequences has acoustic manifestations; durational differences between temporal landmarks mirror patterns suggested by theoretical interpretations (Durvasula et al., 2021).

Central to this view is the landmark known as c-center, which refers to the temporal midpoint of a consonantal plateau (Browman & Goldstein, 1988). When a language admits complex onsets (e.g., English), the durational distance between a c-center and the anchor, i.e., the end of the following vowel, is expected to remain stable across CV and CCV syllables. When this timing pattern is absent and the c-center-to-anchor duration increases from CV to CCV, then the two consonants are not considered to form a tautosyllabic onset (e.g., Jazani Arabic).

To explore these temporal relations for Greek, we designed and are currently running a relevant phonetic task, which targets both unoffending obstruent+liquid [pl kl fl θl xl pr tr kr fr θr xr] and problematic obstruent+obstruent combinations [pt kt ft xt fθ xθ sp st sk sf sθ sx ks ps ts] in word-initial and medial environments. Four nonwords were constructed for every target. For example, for [fl] the nonwords were ['lasa] and ['flasa] for the word-initial, and [pa'las] and [pa'flas] for the medial condition. All items were set in the carrier sentence ['pite _ pa'du]. 8 repetitions of the resulting 70 sentences were produced by 10 native Greek speakers.

The use of acoustic c-centers is an innovation to the formal study of the Greek syllable and a promising, previously unexplored perspective into its internal organization. We anticipate that the emerging results will contribute valuable information on the issue of tautosyllabicity vs. lack thereof of different types of Greek clusters, across different positions in the word. Consequently, our results can enhance our theoretical understanding of Greek syllable structure and revise and possibly update its status within the typology of the syllable.

References

Browman, C. P., & Goldstein, L. (1988). Some notes on syllable structure in articulatory phonology. Phonetica, 45(2–4), 140–155.

Durvasula, K., Ruthan, M. Q., Heidenreich, S., & Lin, Y. H. (2021). Probing syllable structure through acoustic measurements: Case studies on American English and Jazani Arabic. Phonology, 38(2), 173–202.

Kappa I. (1995). Silbenphonologie im Deutschen und Neugriechischen [Doctoral dissertation]. University of Salzburg.

Malikouti-Drachman, A. (2001). Greek phonology: A contemporary perspective. Journal of Greek Linguistics, 2(1), 187–243.

Selkirk, E. (1984). Phonology and syntax: The relation between sound and structure. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Setatos, M. (1987). Από τα Αρχαία στα Νέα Ελληνικά: Φωνολογικές αλλαγές [From Ancient Greek to Modern Greek: Phonological changes]. Studies in Greek Linguistics, 8, 187–193.

Tzakosta, M. (2012). Manner, place and voice interactions in Greek cluster phonotactics. In P. Hoole, L. Bombien, M. Pouplier, C. Mooshammer, & B. Kühnert (Eds.), Consonant clusters and structural complexity (pp. 93–118). Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.

Angelos Loukas
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
loukasan@lit.auth.gr

In several dialects of Greek the velar glide /w/ has a phonemic status (Baltazani & Topintzi, 2010; Revithiadou et al., 2014a,b), whereas in Standard Modern Greek (SMG) it only occurs as an alternative realization of the vowel /u/ in postlexical hiatus contexts (Apostolopoulou, 2018; Arvaniti, 1999, 2007; Baltazani & Topintzi, 2012; Soultatis, 2013; Topintzi, 2011; Topintzi & Baltazani, 2011, 2013, 2016; cf. Holton et al., 2012). As shown by the DPs in (1), outputs with a vowel [u] and the velar glide [w] are equally grammatical:
 (1) a. /tu anθropu / [ˌtuanˈθropu] ̴ [twanˈθropu] ‘the-SG.GEN’ person-SG.GEN’
b. /tu elefanda/ [ˌtueˈlefanda] ̴ [tweˈlefanda] ‘the-SG.GEN’ elephant-SG.GEN’
c. /tu iʎu/ [tuˈiʎu] ̴ [ˈtwiʎu] ‘the-SG.GEN’ sun-SG.GEN’
We propose that free variation arises due to the underlying representation of the vowel /u/. We concur with Nevins & Chitoran (2008) and Topintzi & Baltazani (2016) that glides are underlyingly specified as [–voc], [–cons]. However, we propose that the feature [+voc] of the vowel /u/ of the definite article is underlyingly weak. More specifically, we adopt Smolensky & Goldrick’s (2016) Gradient Symbolic Representations model according to which phonological elements have an inherent strength value termed Activity Level (AL). Elements with lower than 1 AL must be strengthened in order to be pronounced; otherwise they delete. We suggest that [+voc] has an AL 0.8. Crucially, the SMG grammar allows both the boost of this element with extra energy and the deletion of that feature, resulting in its realization as a glide. This is illustrated in the following Gradient Harmonic Grammar tableau. Candidate (2a), where the weak vowel /u/ receives the extra amount of energy, and candidate (2b), where it is realized as a glide, score the exact same amount of constraint violations, hence they have an equal probability to surface. On the other hand, alternative outputs like candidates (2c) and (2d), where the vowel /u/ deletes and coalesces with the following vowel, respectively, are excluded, since they accumulate a higher amount of penalty scores.
(2) /tu[+voc0.8]anθropu/ DEP [+voc] w 20 MAX [+voc] w 5 MAX   w 10 NO HIATUS w 3 *Gw   w 2 UNIF   w 18 COMPLEX ONSET w 1   H
a. [tu[+voc1]anθropu] 1–0.8 –4 1 –3   –7   E
b. [tw[+voc0.8]anθropu] 0.8 –4 1 –2 1 –1   –7   E
c. [tu[+voc0.8]anθropu] 0.8 –4 1 –10   –14
d. [tu↔a1nθropu] 1 –18   –18
(Note on how to read DEP and MAX penalties: The penalty of DEP equals its weight × the added activity. The penalty of MAX equals its weight × the lost activity)

In conclusion, in this paper we propose that the manifestation of underlying /u/ as [w] is not dictated by the need to avoid vowel-vowel sequences, but rather by the defectiveness of the feature [+voc]. Our analysis can easily apply to other hiatus sequences with /u/, such as pronoun + verb sequences, e.g., [muˈarese] ̴ [ˈmwarese] ‘I liked it’, or even single words, e.g., [ˈfraula] ̴ [ˈfrawla] ‘strawberry’. On the other hand, deletion due to hiatus, e.g., [tanˈθropu], is attributed to informal register, where the constraints NOHIATUS and COMPLEXONSET are scaled up (Gouskova & Linzen, 2015; Hsu, 2019; Hsu & Jesney, 2016; Inkelas & Wilbanks, 2018; Pater, 2016, a.o.), resulting in considerably higher penalties for the formerly harmonic outputs.

References

Apostolopoulou, I. (2018). I fonologiki anaparastasi tu imifonu tis kinis Neas Elinikis: Mja prosengisi me vasi ti diavaθmismeni armoniki gramatiki [The phonological representation of the Standard Modern Greek glide: A gradient harmonic grammar approach] [MA thesis]. Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

Arvaniti, A. (1999). Illustrations of the IPA: Modern Greek. Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 19, 167–172.

Arvaniti, A. (2007). Greek phonetics: The state of the art. Journal of Greek Linguistics, 8, 97–208.

Baltazani, M., & Topintzi, N. (2010). The phonology and phonetics of glides in North-Western Greek dialects. In A. Ralli, B. D. Joseph, M. Janse, & A. Karasimos (Eds.), Proceedings of the 4th International Conference of Modern Greek Dialects and Linguistic Theory (MGDLT4) (pp. 54–68). Patras: University of Patras.

Baltazani, M., & Topintzi, N. (2012). On some phonetic and phonological properties of the Greek glide. In Z. Gavriilidou, A. Efthymiou, E. Thomadaki, & P. Kambakis-Vougiouklis (Eds.), Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Greek Linguistics (pp. 153–166). Komotini: Democritus University of Thrace.

Gouskova, M., & Linzen, T. (2015). Morphological conditioning of phonological regularization. The Linguistic Review, 32(3), 427–473.

Holton, D., Mackridge, P., Philippaki-Warburton, I., & Spyropoulos, V. (2012). A comprehensive gGrammar of the Modern Greek language. London: Routledge.

Hsu, B. (2019). Exceptional prosodification effects revisited in gradient harmonic grammar. Phonology, 36(2), 225–263.

Hsu, B., & Jesney, K. (2016). Scalar positional markedness and faithfulness in harmonic grammar. Chicago Linguistic Society, 51, 241–255.

Inkelas, S. & Wilbanks, E. (2018). Directionality effects via distance-based penalty scaling. Proceedings of the 2017 Annual Meeting of Phonology (pp. 1-11). Linguistic Society of America.

Nevins, A., & Chitoran, I. (2008). Phonological representations and the variable patterning of glides. Lingua, 118, 1979–1997.

Pater, J. (2016). Universal grammar with weighted constraints. In J. J. McCarthy & J. Pater (Eds.), Harmonic grammar and harmonic serialism (pp. 1–46). London: Equinox Press.

Revithiadou, A., Markopoulos, G., & Messinioti, P. (2014a). Gliding under turbidity [Poster presentation]. Old World Conference in Phonology 11, Amsterdam – Leiden, 22–25 January 2014.

Revithiadou, A., Markopoulos, G., & Messinioti, P. (2014b). Derived glides and turbid stress [Paper presentation]. Manchester Phonology Meeting 22, Manchester, 29–31 May 2014.

Smolensky, P., & Goldrick, M. (2016). Gradient symbolic representations in grammar: The case of French Liaison. ROA 1286.

Soultatis, T. (2013). The status of the glide in Modern Greek. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics, 25, 271–288.

Topintzi, N. (2011). Paradigm structure and Greek glides [Paper presentation]. The University of Leipzig, June 6, 2011.

Topintzi, N., & Baltazani, M. (2011). The glide's big fat Greek wedding... to the palatals [Poster presentation and handout]. Old World Conference in Phonology 8, Marrakech, Morocco, 19–21 January 2011.

Topintzi, N., & Baltazani, M. (2013). Where the glide meets the palatals. In N. Lavidas, T. Alexiou, & A. M. Sougari Major Trends in Theoretical and Applied Linguistics: Selected Papers from the 20th International Symposium on Theoretical and Applied Linguistics (pp. 177–196). London: Versita.

Topintzi, N., & Baltazani, M. (2016). The third dream: Aspects of the morphophonology of the Greek glide and palatals. Linguistics Unlimited, 1, 1–27.

Giorgos Markopoulos1 & Anthi Revithiadou2
1University of the Aegean, 2Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
g.markopoulos@aegean.gr, revith@lit.auth.gr

Extensive research on the phonological adjustment of borrowed words (e.g., Cohen, 2009; Duběda, 2020; Miao, 2005; Vendelin & Peperkamp, 2006) has revealed that the resulting pronunciation of a loanword can be influenced by various factors, including the phonological grammar of the borrowing language, the acoustic resemblance to the original word, as well as the visual representation of the word’s spelling. This effect of orthography has been captured in previous OT analyses as a constraint that necessitates the mapping of specific graphemes in the source form to specific phonemes in the adapted form (e.g., Damulakis & Nevins, 2022; Hamann & Colombo, 2017; Smith, 2006). The main arguments presented in this paper are that (a) the impact of orthography on language is not reflected in the phonological grammar as  a constraint, but rather in the underlying representations used by the grammar; and (b) orthography affects not only the phonology of borrowed words, but also the representation of phonemes in the native vocabulary. These assertions are supported with two case studies from Greek: the incorporation of the vowel /y/ in Turkish and French loanwords and the inconsistent production of /fs/ and /vs/ sequences (Markopoulos & Revithiadou, 2023a,b).

Adaptation of /y/: Greek has predominantly incorporated Turkish loanwords with the vowel /y/ (spelled as in Turkish orthography) by replacing it with /u/, as demonstrated in (1a–b) (see also Kappa (2006) for similar conclusions from the Cretan dialect). In contrast, French loanwords with the same vowel sound (represented as in the French orthography) exhibit variation: /y/ can be pronounced as either /u/ (2a) or /i/ (2b). Orthography’s importance is critical in the latter case, as evidenced by two key observations: firstly, the /i/ outputs are usually borrowed through written language and are considered part of the learned or formal vocabulary; secondly, they are frequently spelled with the Greek letter (e.g., ντοκυμαντέρ), which bears a closer resemblance to the letter of the original French spelling than the typical simplified spelling of .
  • dünya                      →              [duˈɲɐs]                             ‘world’
    1. türlü →              [tuɾˈlu]                                ‘dish of stewed vegetables’
  • succès                     →              [suˈkse]                              ‘hit (e.g. for a song)’
    1. documentaire →              [docimɐˈndeɾ]                  ‘documentary’
Realization of /fs/ and /vs/ sequences: Markopoulos & Revithiadou (2023, in prep.) claim that in Greek a labial fricative /f/ or /v/ (abbreviated as /F/) has different realizations when occurring before /s/ and, furthermore, show that orthography serves as a cue for distinguishing the two types of /F/. Specifically, /F/ that is orthographically represented by undergoes manner dissimilation and is always pronounced as a stop, (3a–b). On the other hand, /F/ that is spelled with the letter shows variation: it may be realized faithfully as a fricative (4a) or undergo manner dissimilation and be pronounced as a stop (4b).
  • /ɣɾaf-s-o/ <γραφ->                    →              [ˈɣɾɐpso]             ‘I write’
    1. /ɾav-s-o/ <ραβ-> →              [ˈɾɐpso]                ‘I sew’
  • /vravev-s-o/ <βραβευ->          →              [vɾɐˈvefso]         ‘I award’
    1. /ðulev-s-o/ <δουλευ-> →              [ðuˈlepso]           ‘I work’
Analysis: Our analysis, based on Gradient Symbolic Representations (Smolensky & Goldrick 2016), suggests that written representation influences the phonological representation of a sound segment by modifying its distinctive features’ activity level (AL), either increasing or decreasing its susceptibility to change. Examples (1–2) show that spelling French /y/ as reduces the AL of the [+round] feature, allowing it to be pronounced as [i]. Similarly, in (3–4), spelling /F/ as creates a distinct underlying segment that interacts differently with the following /s/ due to the lowered AL of its consonantal features.

References



Cohen, E.-G. (2009). The role of similarity in phonology: Evidence from loanword adaptation in Hebrew [Doctoral dissertation]. Tel Aviv University.

Damulakis, G., & Nevins, A. (2022). An orthographic twist to the oprah effect. Radical: A Journal of Phonology, 3, 89–124.

Duběda, T. (2020). The phonology of anglicisms in French, German and Czech: A contrastive approach. Journal of Language Contact, 13, 327–350. https://doi.org/10.1163/19552629-01302003

Hamann, S., & Colombo, I. E. (2017). A formal account of the interaction of orthography and perception. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, 35, 683–714. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-017-9362-3

Kappa, I. (2006). Loanword adaptation in the Cretan dialect. In M. Janse, B. D. Joseph, & A. Ralli (Eds.), Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference of Modern Greek Dialects and Linguistic Theory (pp. 84–94). Patras: University of Patras.

Markopoulos, G., & Revithiadou, A. (2023a). One segment, more than one phonological representation. Paper presented at FiNo 2023, January 19–20, 2023 (online).

Markopoulos, G. & Revithiadou, A. (2023b). F as in fricative or as in fortis? Or both?. Paper presented at GLOW 46, University of Vienna, 11–15 April, 2023.

Miao, R. (2005). Loanword adaptation in Mandarin Chinese: Perceptual, phonological and sociolinguistic factors [Doctoral dissertation]. Stony Brook University.

Smith, J. L. (2006). Loan phonology is not all perception: Evidence from Japanese loan doublets. In T. J. Vance & K. Jones (Eds.), Japanese/Korean Linguistics, 14 (pp. 63–74). Stanford: CSLI.

Smolensky, P., & Goldrick, M. (2016). Gradient symbolic representations in grammar: The case of French liaison [Ms.]. Rutgers Optimality Archive 1552.

Vendelin, I. & Peperkamp, S. (2006). The influence of orthography on loanword adaptations. Lingua, 116, 996–1007. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2005.07.005

Irini Ploumidi
University of Crete
eirini.ploumidi94@gmail.com

There have been several studies that have explored truncation patterns found in child language. The majority of studies show that children preserve the psycholinguistically strong positions (Beckman, 1998) in their truncations, i.e. the stressed and/or the rightmost syllable of the target form (e.g. Dutch: Fikkert, 1994; English: Echols & Newport, 1992; Greek: Kappa, 2002, Revithiadou & Tzakosta, 2004a, b; Hebrew: Adam, 2002; Ben-David & Bat-El, 2017; Japanese: Ota, 2006). Interestingly, Revithiadou & Tzakosta (2004a, b) show that Greek-speaking children not only faithfully preserve the segmental and featural composition of the target stressed syllable (e.g. /kli.ði/ → [ˈði] ‘key’), but also, they faithfully maintain the target word-initial consonant regardless of the degree of markedness and the stressed vowel (e.g. /γli.ko/ → [ˈγo] ‘sweet’).

In the present case study, based on the longitudinal naturalistic data of a monolingual typically developing Greek-acquiring girl (ages: 1;10-2;06), we show that the child’s parallel realizations of monosyllabic and disyllabic truncated outputs not only indicate intra-child variation but also a LABIAL-LEFT effect in the developing grammar. Specifically, the child’s data demonstrate that LABIAL consonants are preferred as word-initial onsets in the realized truncated outputs. Overall, three patterns are documented and account for 9% of the child’s data:

PATTERN 1: Realization of target word-initial LABIAL onsets at the left edge of the child’s form (1a-d).

PATTERN 2: Deletion of the target word-initial DORSAL- and CORONAL-initial syllables results in the emergence of LABIAL-initial syllables at the left edge of the produced form (1e-f).

PATTERN 3: Metathesis of LABIAL onsets at the beginning of the realized form (1h).
(1) Target   Output Age   Output Age Gloss
      Monosyllabic   Disyllabic    
  pa.de.ˈlo.ni a. ˈpo 1;11.01 b. ˈpo.ni 1;11.01 ‘trousers’
ma.ka.ˈro.ɲa c. ˈmo 1;11.08 d. ˈma.na 1;11.08 ‘spaghetti’
xar.to.pe.ˈtse.ta e. ˈpa 1;11.15 f. ˈpa.ta 2;02.11 ‘napkin’
du.ˈla.pa g. ˈpa 2;00.20 h. ˈpu.da 2;01.15 ‘wardrobe’
The occurrence of the above variable and overlapping patterns in the child’s system is explained as a case of conspiracy (Kisseberth, 1970) since deletion and metathesis ‘conspire’ resulting in the realization of truncated outputs with a LABIAL-LEFT (word-initial) onset.

We propose that the co-occurrence of monosyllabic and disyllabic truncated outputs even for the same target form (see (1)), reflects a transitional stage, specifically the pre-minimal word stage in the child’s system. This stage signifies the gradual transition from the sub-minimal word stage, where monosyllabic forms only emerge, to the minimal word stage, where disyllabic forms only occur (Demuth & Fee, 1995). Thus, the proposed pre-minimal word stage is a developmental path that finally leads to the establishment of disyllabic prosodic forms in the child’s system.

The analysis is couched in Optimality Theory (Prince & Smolensky, 1993) adopting the multiple parallel grammars model (e.g. Anttila, 2002; Kiparsky, 1993; Tzakosta, 2004). The child has access to multiple grammars simultaneously, that make her consistently produce variable truncations. Specifically, GRAMMAR 1 (G1) permits the realization of monosyllabic truncations and GRAMMAR 2 (G2) allows the emergence of disyllabic ones. In both grammars the undominated markedness constraint ALIGNLABLEFT (align the LABIAL place at the left word edge) satisfies the preference for LABIAL-initial outputs. G1 and G2 differ with respect to the rankings of the constraints PWD=σ (prosodic word = one syllable) and PWD=FT (prosodic word = one foot). In G1, the high ranking of PRWD=σ permits the realization of monosyllabic outputs and prohibits the emergence of disyllabic ones. In G2, the high ranking of PRWD=FTBN allows the emergence of disyllabic forms and bans the emergence of monosyllabic ones. Syllable deletion and metathesis indicate that the constraints MAX(σ) (syllable deletion is prohibited) and LINEARITY (metathesis is prohibited) are ranked relatively low in both grammars.

References

Adam, G. (2002). From variable to optimal grammar: Evidence from language acquisition and language change [Ph.D. dissertation]. Tel-Aviv University.

Anttila, A. (2002). Variation and phonological theory. In J. Chambers, P. Trudgill, & N. Schilling-Estes (Eds.), Handbook of language variation and change (pp. 206-243). Malden, MA and Oxford, UK, Blackwell.

Beckman, J. (1998). Positional faithfulness [Ph.D. dissertation]. University of Massachusetts Amherst, GLSA.

Ben-David, A., & Bat-El, O. (2017). Stressed vs. final syllable in early speech: Which one is stronger? In E. A. Bar-Asher Siegal (Ed.), Proceedings of IATL 2014, MIT Working Papers in Linguistics 82.

Demuth, K., & Fee, J. (1995). Minimal words in early phonological development [Ms.] Brown University and Dalhhousie University.

Echols, C., & Newport, E. (1992). The role of stress and position in determining first words. Language Acquisition, 2, 189–220.

Fikkert, P. (1994). On the acquisition of prosodic structure [Ph.D. dissertation]. Rijksuniversiteit Leiden.

Kappa, I. (2002). Α longitudinal study on phonological development of the early words. In M. Makri-Tsilipakou (Ed.), Selected Papers. 14thInternational Symposium on Theoretical and Applied Linguistics (pp. 124–133). Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

Kiparsky, P. (1993). Variable rules [Handout]. Rutgers Optimality Workshop 1.

Kisseberth, C. W. (1970). On the functional unity of phonological rules. Linguistic Inquiry, 1, 291–306.

Ota, M. (2006). Input frequency and word truncation in child Japanese: Structural and lexical effects. Language and Speech, 49, 261–295.

Prince, A., & Smolensky, P. (1993). Optimality theory: Constraint interaction in generative grammar [Ms.]. Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J. and University of Colorado at Boulder. (Revised version published 2004, Oxford: Blackwell).

Revithiadou, A., & Tzakosta, M. (2004a). Markedness hierarchies vs. positional faithfulness and the role of multiple grammars in the acquisition of Greek. In S. Baauw & J. Van Kampen (Eds.), Proceedings of GALA 2003: Generative approaches to language acquisition (vol. 2, pp. 377–388). Utrecht: Utrecht University.

Revithiadou, A., & Tzakosta, M. (2004b). Alternative grammars in acquisition: Μarkedness- vs. faithfulness-oriented learning. In A. Brugos, L. Micciula, & C.E. Smith (Eds.), Proceedings of the 28th BUCLD Annual Conference on Language Development: Supplement. Cascadilla Press, Somerville, CA. Available at https://www.bu.edu/bucld/files/2011/05/28-revithiadou-BUCLD2003.pdf

Tzakosta, M. (2004). Multiple parallel grammars in the acquisition of stress in Greek L1 [Ph.D. dissertation]. Leiden University.