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Notes on the nasal consonants of Yoruba

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

Extract

Taking them one by one, it is generally agreed that [] are the allophones of /w r j/ occurring only before nasal vowels. Ward (1952) noticed the nasalization of these approximants before nasal vowels but was rather confused by their orthographic forms. We have observed that all instances of [ɲ] occur when [j] is followed by a nasal vowel. This non-syllabic palatal nasal is therefore an allophone of /j/ and it is different from the syllabic one which is homorganic with the following consonant. Examples of this non-syllabic [ɲ] can be seen in the following words:

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 1986

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References

REFERENCES

Awobuluyi, A. O.. 1964. The phonology and morphonemics of Yoruba. Unpublised Masters thesis, Columbia University, New York.Google Scholar
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Peter, Ladefoged. 1964. A phonetic study of West African languages. (West African Monograph series, I.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Bertha, Siertsema. 1958–9. ‘Problems of phonemic interpretation-I: Nasalization in Yoruba’, Lingua, VII, 356,366Google Scholar
Ward, Ida c. 1952. Introduction to the Yoruba Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar