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

three vertical sets, as in (3.18). 11 Trubetzkoy’s evidence for this analysis is the
pattern of neutralization in unstressed syllables (3.17b), where /u/ and /o/
neutralize to /u/, /i/ and /e/ neutralize to /i/, and /´/ and /a/ neutralize to
/´/.
(3.18) Bulgarian: [round] > [front] > [low], [high]
qp
+round -round
ty ei
–high +high +front -front
g g ty ty
o u –high +high +low -low
g g g g
e i a ´
This way of cutting up the vowel space can be schematically represented
as in (3.19). It may be the ordering of all place features before height that makes
this a ‘rare case’ for Trubetzkoy.
(3.19) Bulgarian: round > front > low, high
[–round]
[+front] [–front]
[+round]
i u [+high]
´
e o [–high]
[–low]
a [+low]
11 Alternatively, a single height feature [high] or [low] can be employed if we interpret height
features in a more relative manner than is the usual practice.
88