Positional Neutralization - Linguistics - University of California ...

One the other hand, many instances of vowel devoicing are clearly phonological, due
either to surface contrast with voiced vowels or interaction with other processes in the
system which are believed to be phonological (Gordon 1998: 96). The prediction then is
this: Where final vowel devoicing has been generalized from the position in which it is
phonetically-motivated (phrase-final) to a position in which it is not (or perhaps less)
phonetically-motivated (word-final), it should no longer retain the gradient character it
may have had in the beginning, which is to say, it must be phonologized. Here the term
“phonologization” must be understood specifically in the sense of the Hyman (1976),
where it refers to the transition of a given phonetic feature from intrinsic to extrinsic
implementation in a given environment, but does not necessarily imply phonemicization.
Interestingly, in the case of voiceless vowels, as Gordon notes, the phonemicization of
the contrast is certainly logically possible, though there seem to be no completely
uncontroversial instances of its occurrence 87 . Again, in its intrinsic state, a phonetic
feature is realized automatically, as a function of the presence of another feature, and in
this sense need not be considered intentional (or commanded, as Hyman puts it). 88 In the
87 In Turkana, one of the strongest cases, for example, voiced and voiceless vowels are certainly contrasted
on the surface in final syllables. Dimmendaal and Breedveld (1986) ultimately argue, however, that this
contrast is a derived effect stemming from underlying lexical tone specifications. The analysis is somewhat
abstract, perhaps, but clear enough.
88 Hyman’s example is the relatively minor F0 perturbations in the onsets of vowels caused by the voicing
of the preceding consonant where tone is not contrastive. Such automatic features can be used as cues for
the phonological distinction of which they are a direct function, but this is a distinct issue.
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