A Phonetically-Based Optimality Theoretic Account of Consonant ...

specifically, in the present data corpus, labials reduce before [k, t] about 25% of the time,
and non-Iabials reduce before [p] 100% of the time.
Table 4b: Gestural Overlap in CC
iP.ku iP.tu
overlap 15/27 5/5 36/36 36/36
0/36 0/36
inconclusive 9 31 o o
I infer from Table 4b that both labial-C1 and labial-C2 clusters may overlap.
Moreover, I generalize that labial-C2 clusters are more likely to overlap than labial-C1
clusters. More precisely, the present corpus offers unambiguous evidence of no overlap in
some tokens of iP.ku and unambiguous evidence of overlap in some tokens of iP.ku and
iP.tu; all instances of iK.pu and iT.pu are interpreted to be (unambiguously) overlapping.
Conclusion
This portion of the experiment supports the hypothesis that C 1 may reduce in CC.
Keeping in mind that C2 is not constant in these test tokens, we can also generalize that
either labials reduce less readily than velars and coronals, or that labials are more likely than
velars and coronals to trigger reduction of the preceding C, or both. Put another way, this
experiment has established that it is more likely for non-Iabials to reduce before labials than
for labials to reduce before non-Iabials in Taiwanese (stop) consonant clusters. Note that
the present oral pressure experiment is unable to show directly that Labials are less likely to
reduce than Velars, since the design of the experiment cannot provide evidence of the
tongue dorsum activity in a CC sequence where C1 is /k/ and C2 is /t/ 23 • Also, the oral
pressure experiment will only detect consonantal weakening if the extent of the weakening
23 Similarly, while electropalatography (EPG) will be able to shed light on the tongue dorsum activity in
the sequence K. t, it cannot also provide comparable information on the labial activity in the sequence P. t.
An EPG study, or a combination of EPG and Po study will thus still be unable to establish the relative
likelihood of word-final IPI reduction and IK/ reduction, since while EPG data may provide gradient evidence
of articulatory reduction, Po data will only provide categorical evidence of (continuant-yielding) articulatory
reduction.
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