This paper proposes that closed syllable laxing and open syllable tensing of non-low vowels are motivated by conflicting strategies of contrast enhancement in vowel–consonant sequences. Laxing enhances the distinctiveness of consonant contrasts by allowing for more distinct VC formant transitions, in particular in sequences involving a non-low vowel followed by an oral labial/coronal/velar consonant (e.g. [p t k]). Tensing enhances the distinctiveness of vowel contrasts by providing more distinct formant realisations for vowels. Linguistic variation results from different ways of resolving the tension between maximising vowel dispersion and maximising consonant dispersion. Laxing typically applies before coda consonants as a way to compensate for the absence of good perceptual cues to place of articulation. The hypothesis that laxing enhances the distinctiveness of postvocalic place contrasts is supported by a study of mid-vowel laxing in French, which corroborates the general claim that perceptual contrast plays a role in shaping phonotactic restrictions.

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Phonologically-derived environment effects (henceforth, PDEEs) describe patterns where a phonological process P applies only if accompanied by another phonological process P’. This paper proposed that PDEEs follow from the hypothesis that the input-output distance is perceived logarithmically: this predicts that a feature change may be less salient perceptually and therefore represent a smaller violation of faithfulness if accompanied by another feature change. This theory has two desirable consequences: (i) it reconciles the analysis of PDEEs with the hypothesis of a preference for minimal input-output changes in phonological grammar and (ii) it derives a number of constraints on the features that can interact in PDEEs, therefore providing a restrictive account of the typology.

This study examines the adaptation of French vowels in Vietnamese focusing on adaptation patterns that seem to defy a straightforward analysis based on native phonotactic restrictions or comparison of phonetic input-output similarity. A proper analysis requires reference to knowledge of the input language phonology. In the first case study, we observe that Vietnamese adapters extend the French phonotactic tendencies, i.e., Loi de Position, to loan adaptation productively. Such “intrusion” of L2 phonology knowledge may arise when phonetics underdetermines the adaptation and the adapters look to their knowledge of L2 phonology to arrive at adaptation. It is also notable that the L2 knowledge employed in adaptation is not native-like as the adaptation is not always isomorphic to the French input. In the second case study, the contrast of L2 phonology (/ʁ/ vs. /k/) is neutralized due to an L1 phonological restriction (i.e., no /ʁ/ in Vietnamese coda) but the Vietnamese adaptation systematically retains the contrast in the quality and length difference in the preceding vowel. There is plausible phonetic motivation for this adaptation pattern, but phonetically faithful mapping underdetermines the attested adaptation pattern, and reference to knowledge of L2 phonological contrasts is necessary. These findings illustrate the complexity of the loanword adaptation process, where a variety of different factors including L1 phonological restrictions, phonetic similarity, and L2 phonological knowledge, interact to affect adaptation.