The contrastive hierarchy in phonology 2009 Dresher.pdf - CUNY ...

obstruent and sonorant coming second.’ (1955: 96). He illustrates with Lifu
(Malayo-Polynesian), in which the voicing contrast ‘is operative throughout the
system except for /h/; the latter is a manner consonant and pairs off with the
whole set of voiceless obstruents and sonorants.’
(3.37) Consonant system of Lifu (Hockett 96)
p t ˇ tS k
f T s S x
m8 n8 ¯* N*
w8 l8
b d Í ∂ dZ g
v D z Z ƒ
m n ¯ N
w l
Hockett calls the laryngeals in Ossetic and Lifu ‘manner consonants’
because ‘they match one or another of the styles of delivery found for
obstruents.’ He also considers Russian /y/ (= IPA /j/) a manner consonant,
because it ‘matches the whole set of palatal consonants as over against the plain
consonants.’
Hockett’s analysis translates easily into a contrastive hierarchy. Indeed, it
is exactly a hierarchy of successive binary splits, but not carried out all the way
or entirely explicit. Ossetic first splits into obstruent – sonorant sets. Then ///
splits from the rest of the obstruents. We could interpret Hockett’s designation of
‘manner consonant’ to mean that /// is placeless, being characterized only by
the fact it is an obstruent. The rest of the obstruents are then split into place and
manner categories. The diagram suggests that the coronal sonorants do not have
h
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