Structural changes in a language are considered nearly inevitable consequences of language death (Campbell & Muntzel 1989; Wolfram 2002). The literature on sound change in endangered languages has focused on whether the changes are internally or externally motivated and, therefore, the difference between categorical sound shifts and gradient phonetic effects has been overlooked. This paper discusses sound change in Northern Paiute through two experiments that investigate the difference between categorical changes in the phonological inventory and subphonemic variation within a category. The paper argues that sound change in obsolescing languages may take one of two predictable paths: substitution or approximation/expansion of phonological categories in the moribund language.
Babel, Molly, Andrew Garrett, Michael J. Houser & Maziar Toosarvandani
2013. Descent and Diffusion in Language Diversification: A Study of Western Numic Dialectology. International Journal of American Linguistics 79:4 ► pp. 445 ff.
Babel, Molly, Michael J. Houser & Maziar Toosarvandani
2012. Mono Lake Northern Paiute. Journal of the International Phonetic Association 42:2 ► pp. 233 ff.
2021. Complexity and Its Relation to Variation. Frontiers in Communication 6
Palakurthy, Kayla
2022. Phonetic transfer in Diné Bizaad (Navajo). Linguistics Vanguard 8:s5 ► pp. 691 ff.
Palakurthy, Kayla
2022. New speakers and language change in Diné Bizaad (Navajo). International Journal of Bilingualism 26:5 ► pp. 601 ff.
Palakurthy, Kayla
2023. The status of sibilant harmony in Diné Bizaad (Navajo). Journal of the International Phonetic Association 53:2 ► pp. 404 ff.
Shiryaev, Alexander, Michael Daniel & George Moroz
2022. Glottalized lateral in Rikvani Andi: an acoustic study. Phonetica 79:4 ► pp. 353 ff.
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 21 november 2023. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
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