Open AccessVoice asymmetry in Ewe nouns
Author(s) -
Long Peng
Publication year - 1995
Publication title -
studies in african linguistics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.178
H-Index - 4
eISSN - 2154-428X
pISSN - 0039-3533
DOI - 10.32473/sal.v24i1.107409
Subject(s) - vowel , obstruent , syllable , tone (literature) , linguistics , vowel length , mid vowel , relative articulation , point (geometry) , audiology , psychology , mathematics , speech recognition , computer science , philosophy , medicine , geometry , formant
I argue in this paper that the consonantal influence on tone is highly limited, restricting itself to the tone of the vowel immediately following the onset. This point is demonstrated via Ewe High Tone Insertion, which is blocked by a voiced obstruent if the insertion targets the initial vowel following the onset, but not if the insertion targets the second vowel of a bimoraic syllable. This result confirms a number of earlier studies which show that the phonetic impact of onsets on Fo is limited to the fIrst lOOms of the following vowel.