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Lenition, fortition and the status of plosive affrication: the case of spontaneous RP English /t/*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 April 2012

Emanuela Buizza  and
Leendert Plug
Emanuela Buizza
Affiliation:
University of Leeds
Leendert Plug
Affiliation:
University of Leeds
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Abstract

This paper reports on a phonetic and phonological study of /t/-affrication in spontaneous British English Received Pronunciation. The study is motivated by the uncertainty surrounding plosive affrication in the literature on lenition and fortition. We suggest that a decision as to the status of a given pattern involving affrication in terms of lenition or fortition should be based on thorough phonetic and phonological analysis. We present a phonetic and phonological account of /t/-affrication, which takes into consideration the temporal and spectral characteristics of the sounds involved, as well as their distribution across phonological environments. Crucially, we compare affricated instances of /t/ with aspirated and fricated ones in the same dataset – the former arguably unmarked in this variety, the latter uncontroversially the result of lenition. We argue that the phonetic and phonological characteristics of /t/-affrication presented in this paper are consistent with an account in terms of fortition rather than lenition.

Type
Articles
Information
Phonology , Volume 29 , Issue 1 , May 2012 , pp. 1 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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