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Spanish Phonetics and Phonology in Contact: Studies from Africa, the Americas, and Spain
Edited by Rajiv Rao
[Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 28] 2020
► pp. 227–262

Chapter 9
The glottal stop in Guaraní and Paraguayan Spanish

| Western Washington University
| National University of Itapúa
This study documents the use of [ʔ] in Paraguay, analyzing its distribution among four phonetic contexts: word-internal (Guaraní), phrase-initial (Guaraní and Spanish), synalepha (Guaraní and Spanish), and linking (Spanish). In each context, [ʔ]’s distribution is analyzed by following stress and vowel. Stress favors retention of word-internal [ʔ] in Guaraní, phrase-initial [ʔ] in Spanish and epenthetic [ʔ] in Guaraní, while it disfavors use of [ʔ] in Spanish synalepha. The vowels [e] and [i] suppress word-internal and prothetic [ʔ] in Guaraní, and Spanish synalepha with [ʔ], whereas [o] and [u] suppress Spanish prothesis and epenthesis of [ʔ] for synalepha. The results suggest that, in this study of fluent bilinguals, [ʔ] in Spanish is the result of convergence rather than second language transfer.
Keywords: Glottal stop, Guaraní, Paraguayan Spanish, convergence, stress
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Relevant previous research
  • 3.Study methodology and sample characteristics
  • 4.Results of the analysis of the Guaraní and Spanish prompts
    • 4.1Non-phonetic linguistic features of the prompts
    • 4.2Distribution of [ʔ] (Guaraní and Spanish prompts)
      • 4.2.1/V.ʔV/ (Guaraní prompt)
      • 4.2.2Phrase-initial [ǀV] (Guaraní and Spanish prompts)
        • 4.2.2.1Phrase-initial [ǀV] (Guaraní prompt)
        • 4.2.2.2Phrase-initial [ǀV] (Spanish prompt)
      • 4.2.3Comparison of phrase-initial [ǀV] and [ˈǀV] (Spanish and Guaraní prompts)
    • 4.3Resolution of [V.+V] (Guaraní and Spanish prompts)
      • 4.3.1Resolution of [V.+V] and [V.+ˈV] (Guaraní prompt)
      • 4.3.2Resolution of [V.+V] (Spanish prompt)
      • 4.3.3Comparison of resolution of [V.+V] (Spanish and Guaraní prompts)
    • 4.4[V.C+V] (Spanish prompt)
  • 5.Results of the analysis of the Guaraní and Spanish corpora
    • 5.1Non-phonetic linguistic features of the corpus (n = 22)
    • 5.2Distribution of [ʔ] (Guaraní and Spanish corpora)
      • 5.2.1[V.ʔV] (Guaraní corpus)
      • 5.2.2Phrase-initial [ǀV] (Guaraní and Spanish corpora, n = 22)
        • 5.2.2.1Phrase-initial [ǀV] (Guaraní corpus, n = 22)
        • 5.2.2.2Phrase-initial [ǀV] (Spanish corpus, n = 22)
      • 5.2.3Comparison of phrase-initial [ǀV] and [ˈǀV] (Spanish and Guaraní corpora, n = 22)
    • 5.3Resolution of [V.+V] (Guaraní and Spanish corpora, n = 22)
      • 5.3.1Resolution of [V.+V] and [V.+ˈV] (Guaraní corpus, n = 22)
      • 5.3.2Resolution of [V.+V] (Spanish corpus, n = 22)
      • 5.3.3Comparison of resolution of [V.+V] (Spanish and Guaraní corpora, n = 22)
    • 5.4[V.C+V] (Spanish corpus, n = 22)
    • 5.5Age and production of [ʔ] in Spanish
  • 6.Summary and discussion
    • 6.1Summary
    • 6.2Discussion
  • 7.Conclusion: General implications for the field of Spanish contact linguistics
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 6 August 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.28.09gyn
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