Methodology VOWEL QUALITY TRANSITION IN VOCOID SEQUENCES

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CHAPTER 6 VOWEL QUALITY TRANSITION IN VOCOID SEQUENCES

As an extension of the study of vowel quality in Chapter 5, this chapter discusses vowel quality in vocoid sequences – the movement across the vowel space from one vocoid to the next – using the same general approach employed in chapter Chapter 5. The distinction between disyllabic and tautosyllabic sequences is especially interesting here. Disyllabic sequences are expected to be produced at further extremities of the vowel space than tautosyllabic sequences because disyllabic sequences contain two separate syllable peaks and thus more space for the phonemes to be realized, while tautosyllabic sequences are in a more confined space and reduction of some kind is likely. Similarly, vocoids in open syllables may be different from those in closed syllables. The position of the two vocoids in both types of sequences are also compared with the place of plain vowels. Only oral sequences are included in this study.

6.1 Methodology

Examples of most vocoid sequences were recorded in the frame [ʔu pe ___ ʔãn pe janik] ‘Please say ___’. The scope of this thesis does not allow an analysis of all the sequences, so only sequences at the extremities of the vowel space were chosen for analysis: those with the vowels [i], [ɨ], [u], and [a]. Two tokens of each sequence were chosen from four speakers, for a total of eight tokens per sequence. The sequences selected for analysis are listed in 49. 49 Vocoid sequences in the frame [ʔu pe ___ ʔãn pe janik] ‘Please say ___’ kiak [ki.ak] ‘blood’ pɨah [pɨ.ah] ‘face’ 83 puak [pu.ak] ‘go’ bahauʔ [bah.aʊ̯ʔ] ‘heart’ hiur [hi.ur] ‘dust’ kahʔuis [kahə̆ʔu.is] ‘sea crab’ Some LH sequences were missed when recording frames, so words from another speaker said in isolation had to be substituted. Two instances of these words repeated in isolation were used for analysis. These words are shown in 50. 50 Vocoid sequences in isolation karaʔai [karaʔ.ai ̯] ‘type of tree’ iarkɨaʔaɨ [jarkɨ.aʔ.aɨ ̯] ‘small fence’ baʔau [baʔ.au̯] ‘guava’ paiʔ [paɪ ̯ʔ] ‘throw’ Ren 1986, 12 found that in Chinese the second formant correlates with diphthong transition rate more closely than the first or third formant. Based on this, for all sequences where the first and second vocoid differed in backness, I measured the two targets of the vocoid sequences based on F2 rather than F1. Following Ren, I defined the two target points of the sequences as the highest and lowest points of the F2 trajectory within the bounds of the sequence. For example, in the sequence [u.a] in [pu.ak] ‘go’ puak, the first target was placed at the lowest point on the F2 trajectory, and the second target at the highest point of the F2 trajectory, at the point where it reaches a steady state. This is shown in Figure 24. 84 Figure 24. Targets [u] and [a] in [pu.ak] ‘go’ F1 measurements were taken at these same positions. For the sequences [aɨ ̯] and [ɨ.a] where the F2 remains relatively steady between the first and second vocoid, I defined the two target points as the highest and lowest points in the F1 trajectory within the bounds of the sequence. This is shown in Figure 25. Here the F2 fluctuates slightly, but there is no definite trajectory. The F2 values at the beginning and end of the sequence are nearly identical. Figure 25. Targets [a] and [ɨ] in [jarkɨ.aʔ.aɨ ̯] ‘fence’ 85 All formant measurements were rounded to the nearest five hertz and are found in Appendix E.

6.2 Results