The gradient nature ofs-lenition in Caleño Spanish

Abstract

Previous research on /s/-lenition in Spanish has relied almost exclusively on impressionistic coding for the independent variable "/s/-realization" (cf. Brown 2008, File-Muriel 2009, Poplack 1979, Terrell 1979. In these studies, researchers are limited to the available devices accorded to them by the International Phonetic Alphabet (e.g. /s/ as [s], [z], [h], Ø, etc.). Although auditory acoustic analysis (i.e. transcription) is an extremely useful descriptive device, it can be influenced by the transcriber's background and expectations. Additionally, acoustic details are lost when tokens are forced into categorical groupings, such as short vs. long duration. The present study examines the production of /s/ by eight university students from Cali, Colombia in informal sociolinguistic interviews. This research departs from the audio transcription tradition, proposing a metric for quantifying the realization of /s/ by employing three scalar dependent variables: center of gravity, /s/ duration, and percentage of voicing. Such a method is less vulnerable to bias, given that it is based on acoustic measurements that are not necessarily perceptible to the human ear. The results of the linear regressions indicate that the dependent variables are significantly conditioned by a variety of linguistic factors: lexical frequency, local speaking rate, stress, speaker, position within the syllable, the preceding and following phonological context, word length, and lexical class. The magnitude of effect trends are elucidated by predicted probability plots. For example, as lexical frequency increases, /s/ duration decreases, center of gravity decreases, and percentage of voicing increases, all indicative of lenition. We argue that /s/ lenition is better explained in gradient terms, rather than categorical ones. This paper contributes to the growing body of literature documenting the influence of frequency effects on this otherwise well-studied phenomenon of phonological variation and change.

Production planning and coronal stop deletion in spontaneous speech

“…16 These methodological changes may help to clarify the interplay between segmental and prosodic factors in conditioning deletion rate, in line with Kendall's (2013) suggestion that variable processes can be better understood by a more detailed consideration of the role of prosodic information (pauses and speech rate). The suggested methodological change applies more generally to sociolinguistic, phonetic, and phonological studies of any variable process that can take place across word boundaries, such as final [t]-deletion in German and Dutch (closely related to English CSD) or Spanish /s/-lenition; in these literatures, 'pause' (as a proxy for boundary strength) is often treated as a possible following context (e.g., File-Muriel & Brown, 2011;Schuppler et al, 2012).…”

The variable effect of form and lemma frequencies on phonetic variation: Evidence from /s/ realization in two varieties of Colombian Spanish

“…Studying another variety of Colombian Spanish, Brown (2009a) finds a significant effect from frequency in syllable-and word-final /s/ in Cali. In another corpus of Cali Spanish, File-Muriel and Brown (2011) find frequency as significant in the realization of both syllable-initial and -final /s/. Measuring and controlling for frequency in the variable realization of sounds has been well documented in the literature.…”

“…Additionally, File-Muriel's study employs auditory acoustic analysis, not instrumental acoustic measurements, making it vulnerable to a host of issues discussed in previous literature (cf . Erker 2010;File-Muriel and Brown 2011). …”

Sibilant Merger in the Variety of Basque Spoken in Amorebieta-Etxano

“…The COG was extracted from the temporal midpoint of the sibilant. A 300 Hz high-pass filter was used in order to avoid interference in the COG value from any possible voicing during the sibilant following File-Muriel and Brown [32]. The present study explores the effect of the following independent variables on sibilant production: After segmenting the sibilants manually, a script was created in order to extract the values of COG automatically.…”