Open AccessBlending in heterosyllabic consonant clusters in three Catalan dialects
Author(s) -
Daniel Recasens
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
zas papers in linguistics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 1435-9588
DOI - 10.21248/zaspil.49.2008.365
Subject(s) - catalan , valencian , superposition principle , consonant cluster , mathematics , consonant , assimilation (phonology) , linguistics , speech recognition , computer science , philosophy , mathematical analysis , vowel
This study is an electropalatographic investigation of clusters composed of /n/ or /l/ followed by the (alveolo)palatal consonants /ʎ, ɲ/ or by dental /t/ in three Catalan dialects, i.e., Majorcan, Valencian and Eastern. Data show that articulatory blending through superposition occurs in the palatalizing environment except when C1 is highly constrained (e.g., dark /l/) or C2 is purely palatal and therefore, produced at a distant articulatory location from C1. Contrary to previous descriptions in the literature, data for /nt, lt/ reveal that blending through superposition rather than assimilation is at work. The implications of these data for theories of speech production are discussed.