Retroflex fricatives in Slavic languages

Abstract

The present study explores the phonetic and phonological grounds on which postalveolar fricatives in Polish can be analysed as retroflex, and considers whether postalveolar fricatives in other Slavic languages are retroflex as well. Velarization and incompatibility with front vowels are introduced as articulatory criteria for retroflexion, based on cross-linguistic data. According to these criteria, Polish and Russian have retroflex fricatives (i.e., /[small s with hook]/ and /[small z with retroflex hook]/), whereas Bulgarian has a laminal palatoalveolar fricative ((/[small Esh]/). In addition, it is illustrated that palatalization of retroflex fricatives in Slavic languages (and in general) causes a phonetic and phonological change to a non-retroflex fricative.

The acoustic character of fricated /t/ in Australian English: A comparison with /s/ and /ʃ/

“…One issue which is not addressed in the present study is the possibility that the emergence of an additional surface fricative in fricated /t/ might lead to some kind of 'dispersion' or 'polarisation' of the acoustic characteristics of /s/ and /S/ relative to other varieties of English and other languages. Retroflex realisations of historical /S/ may have developed in Slavic languages like Polish and Russian in response to the emergence of /Ç/ (Hamann 2004). Further research on systemic adaptations of this sort is required.…”

“…Slight differences in peak values, COG, and distribution of the range energy (within 12 dB of the peak amplitude) suggest that there may be some subtle articulatory differences between fricated /t/ and /S/. The low frequency characteristics of /S/ relative to /s/ are often partly attributed to a sub-or antelingual cavity together with lip-rounding (Hamann 2004). Fricated /t/ may show a smaller sublingual cavity (or lack it altogether), and it may also lack lip-rounding.…”

What’s wrong with being a rhotic?

“…That phonological categories are interpreted arbitrarily and have no universal correlate which can be defined in terms of articulation or acoustics has been argued before, see for example Hamann (2011) for a general overview, Hamann (2004) for retroflexivity, Kingston & Diehl (1994) and Honeybone (2005) for voicing, and Clements (1990) for sonority. The conclusion is that cross-linguistic phonetic generalizations or universal articulatory correlates for phonological objects are elusive (Keating 1988).…”

Spoken language achieves robustness and evolvability by exploiting degeneracy and neutrality

“…That the same linguistic functions can be, and are being, fulfilled in different ways is most apparent when looking at comparisons between closely related languages. For example, in the Slavic branch of the Indo‐European language family, the languages Polish, Russian, Bulgarian, and Czech show considerable variation in the tongue shapes that articulate the “same” sound . It has been stated that it is impossible to point to a single case where the corresponding sounds of two different languages have exactly the same acoustic and articulatory targets .…”