Dynamic invariance in the phonetic expression of syllable structure: a case study of Moroccan Arabic consonant clusters

Abstract

We asked whether invariant phonetic indices for syllable structure can be identified in a language where word-initial consonant clusters, regardless of their sonority profile, are claimed to be parsed heterosyllabically. Four speakers of Moroccan Arabic were recorded, using Electromagnetic Articulography. Pursuing previous work, we employed temporal diagnostics for syllable structure, consisting of static correspondences between any given phonological organisation and its presumed phonetic indices. We show that such correspondences offer only a partial understanding of the relation between syllabic organisation and continuous * We would like to thank the editors, the associate editor and four anonymous reviewers for comments that greatly improved the paper. 455 indices of that organisation. We analyse the failure of the diagnostics and put forth a new approach in which different phonological organisations prescribe different ways in which phonetic indices change as phonetic parameters are scaled. The main finding is that invariance is found in these patterns of change, rather than in static correspondences between phonological constructs and fixed values for their phonetic indices.

A Dynamical Model of Hierarchical Selection and Coordination in Speech Planning

“…the timing of the prevocalic consonant relative to the vowel does not differ between CCCV, CCV, and CV forms. This has been found to be the case in Moroccan Arabic [64], Slovak [65], Tashlhiyt Berber [66], [67], and for/sC/ clusters in Italian [26], where non-prevocalic word-initial consonants are not syllabified as onsets. This pattern can be understood to arise when all consonants except for the prevocalic one are sequentially selected and hence do not influence the coordinative interactions between the prevocalic consonant and vowel.…”

Timing of German onset and word boundary clusters

“…In a simplex onset language, Moroccan Arabic, Shaw et al (2011) found evidence for right-edge stability predominately, but also cases where (three out of four) speakers, who in most contexts showed right-edge stability, exhibited C-center stability. In these latter 'exceptional' cases, Shaw et al observed that the syllable duration in the CV sequence was longer compared to the CCV sequence (equivalently, the CV portion of the phonetic string compressed in duration from the CV to the CCV context).…”

“…They thus proposed that invariances characterizing the relation between syllabic organization and phonetics are dynamic as opposed to static. Gafos et al (2014) pursued further analysis of the experimental and computational result of Shaw et al (2011). In their study, the statistics of syllabic organization were expressed in equations involving estimates of continuous phonetic parameters expressing the timing of consonants and vowels: consonantal plateau durations, vowel durations, and their variances.…”

“…Apart from these studies where both right-edge stability and C-center stability were found, there exist languages which seem to exhibit right-edge stability predominantly, such as Berber (Goldstein et al 2007;Hermes et al 2011) and Moroccan Arabic (Shaw et al 2009;Shaw et al 2011). In agreement with the phonological literature on Berber and Moroccan Arabic (Dell and Elmedlaoui 1996), these experimental studies provide converging evidence that these languages do not allow for more than a single consonant as part of the syllable onset (simplex onsets).…”

The coordination of boundary tones and its interaction with prominence

“…Repeated measures ANOVAs across the five Speakers were applied in this case, as opposed to separate ANOVAs per Speaker, because of the limited number of values used per Speaker for this analysis (a single value per Stress condition) (cf. Shaw, Gafos, Hoole and Zeroual, 2011). Both main and interaction effects were assessed, and in case of a significant effect, post-hoc pair-wise comparisons using the Bonferroni adjustment were performed.…”