Cover not available
Part of
Sonic Signatures: Studies dedicated to John Harris
Edited by Geoff Lindsey and Andrew Nevins
[Language Faculty and Beyond 14] 2017
► pp. 201–214

On the diachronic origin of Nivkh height restrictions

| Sapporo Gakuin University
| Leiden University Centre for Linguistics

Nivkh, a genetic isolate spoken in the Russian Far East, displays a pattern of stress-dependent height restrictions in a linguistic area where tongue-root harmony is prevalent. We argue that the Nivkh pattern derives from an earlier tongue-root system. This system developed into a height-based system following the loss of tongue-root contrasts in high vowels, in much the same way as has been proposed for dialects of Manchu.

Keywords: Nivkh, Manchu-Tungus, vowel harmony, vowel reduction, Element Theory, language contact, areal linguistics, diachronic linguistics, fieldwork
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Height harmony and TR harmony in Manchu
  • 3.From TR harmony to height harmony: The case of Sanjiazi Manchu
  • 4.Vowel co-occurrence restrictions in Nivkh
  • 5.From TR harmony to height restrictions: The case of Nivkh
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 30 November 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lfab.14.c12
References
Barnes, Jonathan
2006 Strength and Weakness at the Interface: Positional Neutralization in Phonetics and Phonology. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Botma, Bert & Hidetoshi Shiraishi
2014 Nivkh palatalization: Articulatory causes, perceptual effects. Phonology 31: 181–207. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Comrie, Bernard
1997 Typology of Siberian languages. In Matsumura Kazuto & Tooru Hayashi (eds.), The Dative and Related Phenomena, 255–284. Tokyo: Hituzi Shobo.Google Scholar
Dresher, B. Elan & Xi Zhang
2005 Contrast and phonological activity in Manchu vowel systems. Canadian Journal of Linguistics 50: 45–82. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Harris, John & Geoff Lindsey
1995 The elements of phonological representation. In Jacques Durand & Francis Katamba (eds.), Frontiers of Phonology: Atoms, Structures, Derivations, 34–79. London/New York: Longman.Google Scholar
Honeybone, Patrick
2005 Sharing makes us stronger: Process inhibition and segmental structure. In Philip Carr, Jacques Durand & Colin J. Ewen (eds.), Headhood, Elements, Specification and Contrastivity, 167–192. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Janhunen, Juha
1981 Korean vowel system in North Asian perspective. Hangeul 172: 129–146.Google Scholar
Ko, Seongyeon
2012 Tongue Root Harmony and Vowel Contrast in Northeast-Asian Languages. Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University.Google Scholar
Ko, Seongyeon, Andrew Joseph & John Whitman
2014 Comparative consequences of the tongue root harmony analysis for proto-Tungusic, proto-Mongolic, and proto-Korean. In Martine Robbeets & Walter Bisang (eds.), Paradigm Change: In the Transeurasian Languages and Beyond, 141–176. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kreinovich, Eruhim
1937 Fonetika nivkhskogo (giliackogo) iazyka [Phonetics of Nivkh (Gilyak)]. Trudy po Lingvistike 5: 7–102.Google Scholar
1979 Nivkhskii iazyk [The Nivkh language]. Iazyki Azii i Afriki 3: 295–329.Google Scholar
Li, Bing
1996 Tungusic Vowel Harmony: Description and Analysis. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Amsterdam. The Hague: HIL Publications.Google Scholar
Pukhta, Maria
2002 Nivkh–Russian Conversation and Daily-life Thesaurus. Endangered languages of the Pacific Rim A2-012. Osaka Gakuin University.Google Scholar
Shiraishi, Hidetoshi & Bert Botma
2015 Stress-dependent harmony in Nivkh. Presentation at the 23rd Manchester Phonology Meeting, Manchester, May 2015.
2016 Asymmetric distribution of vowels in Nivkh. Studia Orientalia Electronica 117: 39–46.Google Scholar
Smith, Norval S.H
2000 Dependency Phonology meets OT: A proposal for a new approach to segmental structure. In Joost Dekkers, Frank van der Leeuw & Jeroen van de Weijer (eds.), Optimality Theory: Phonology, Syntax, and Acquisition, 234–276. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Zhang, Xi
1996 Vowel Systems of the Manchu-Tungus Languages of China. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Toronto.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Ksenia Bogomolets & Harry van der Hulst
2023. Word Prominence in Languages with Complex Morphologies, DOI logo
de Kok, Kenneth, Bert Botma & Marijn van ’t Veer
2018. Glides and laryngeals as a structural class. Linguistics in the Netherlands 35 ► pp. 51 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 22 march 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.