Positional Neutralization - Linguistics - University of California ...

predictable according to the phonologization approach, while in other theories they
remain mysterious.
2.1.1. Vowel height contrasts
Turning first to the neutralization of height contrasts, these are far and away the
most commonly-effaced contrasts in systems of unstressed vowel reduction, forming the
basis of virtually all the well-known Romance and Slavic systems noted above. A
commonly cited example comes from Central Eastern Catalan, shown in (3).
(3) Central Eastern Catalan (Beckman 1998, Prieto 1992, Recasens 1991)
Stressed -> Unstressed
i -> i
e, , a ->
u, o, -> u
riw 'river' riwt 'river, dim.'
new 'snow' nwt 'snow, dim.'
ml 'honey' mlt 'honey, dim.'
pal 'shovel' plt 'shovel, dim.'
r 'wheel' ruet 'wheel, dim.'
mon 'monkey, fem . munt 'monkey, fem. dim.'
kur 'cure' kurt 'cure, dim.'
In Central Eastern Catalan, stressed syllables license contrasts within a seven-
vowel inventory /i, e, , a, , o, u/, while unstressed syllables license contrasts among
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