Positional Neutralization - Linguistics - University of California ...

asymmetries are relatively unambiguous (dramatic durational asymmetries between
stressed and unstressed syllables in the languages in question), the phonological
neutralization patterns found there are likewise fairly unequivocal. In the case of final
syllables, however, where the phonetic situation is more complicated and variable, the
phonological status of the final syllable with respect to the licensing of contrast is just as
complex, making final syllables strong for some contrasts in some languages, and weak
for the same or other contrasts in other languages. The ambiguous status of the final
syllable presents a strong argument against the notion of strength or weakness of
licensing potential as inherently determined primitives in Universal Grammar. Whether
phonological strong or weak licensing effects are ultimately phonologized in a given
position for a given feature in a given language will depend on the language-specific
phonetic characteristics expressed in the relevant position.
The recurrence of certain patterns in the phonology is entirely a function of the
recurrence in the phonetics of the input patterns to the phonologization thereof. It is at
this phonetic level then where the task of explaining the origins of these potentially
universal patterns becomes meaningful 4 . The recurrence of the phonetic patterns together
with the reinterpretative mechanism of phonologization, on the other hand, insures that
4
I refer here only to aspects of sound patterns in which issues of naturalness or phonetic content are
concerned of course. I do not mean to suggest that the phonological grammar does not or cannot make
demands of its own on the processes it implements. Only that the existence of such restrictions should be
demonstrated to be necessary, rather than assumed a priori.
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