An Experimental Study of Syllabification in Icelandic

In many languages the syllabification of intervocalic consonants has been shown to be influenced by the principle of onset maximization, whereby as many segments are assigned to the subsequent syllable as are phonotactically legal. Icelandic, however, has been repeatedly argued to follow a coda maximization strategy even though opinion has remained divided on this. This paper is an attempt to address this issue from the psycholinguistic perspective. The results of two experiments leave little doubt that the proper syllabification in Icelandic is onset maximization rather than coda maximization, thereby aligning Icelandic with many other languages and providing further support for the onset maximization principle. A number of other aspects were investigated, including the special status of certain two-consonant clusters, preaspiration and gemination. Clusters with a maximum sonority difference between their constituents were found to tend towards tautosyllabicity, whereas those with a smaller sonority difference gravitate towards heterosyllabicity. Furthermore, there is at least some evidence for the claim that both preaspiration and gemination lend themselves to an analysis in terms of a sequence of two identical consonants at the underlying level.

[1]  Christiane Laeufer,et al.  Effects of tempo and stress on German syllable structure , 1995, Journal of Linguistics.

[2]  J. Stemberger.  Length as a suprasegmental: Evidence from speech errors , 1984 .

[3]  Susan D. Lima,et al.  The linguistics of literacy , 1992 .

[4]  R. Treiman,et al.  Toward an understanding of English syllabification , 1990 .

[5]  Kristján Árnason,et al.  Quantity in Historical Phonology: Icelandic and Related Cases , 1980 .

[6]  Harry van der Hulst,et al.  The Structure of phonological representations , 1982 .

[7]  J. Hooper.  An introduction to natural generative phonology , 1976 .

[8]  Gregory K. Iverson,et al.  Foot and Syllable Structure in Modern Icelandic , 1989, Nordic Journal of Linguistics.

[9]  Theo Vennemann,et al.  Sound Change and Syllable Structure in Germanic Phonology , 1983 .

[10]  Magnús Pétursson,et al.  LA PRÉASPIRATION EN ISLANDAIS MODERNE. EXAMEN DE SA RÉALISATIoN PHoNÉTIQUE CHEZ DEUX SUJETS , 1972 .

[11]  E. Pulgram.  Syllable, word, nexus, cursus , 1970 .

[12]  Einar Haugen.  The Phonemics of Modern Icelandic , 1958 .

[13]  Höskuldur Thráisson,et al.  On the Phonology of Icelandic Prespiration , 1978, Nordic Journal of Linguistics.

[14]  Ilse Lehiste.  ReviewNordic prosody III: Claes-Christian Elert, Irene Johansson and Eva Strangert (eds.), Papers from a Symposium. Acta Universitatis Umensis, Umeå Studies in the Humanities 59. University of Umeå: Almqvist & Wiksell International, Stockholm, Sweden, 1984. 244 pp , 1985 .

[15]  Catherine Ringen,et al.  Aspiration, Preaspiration, Deaspiration, Sonorant Devoicing and Spirantization in Icelandic , 1999, Nordic Journal of Linguistics.

[16]  Bruce P. Hayes.  Inalterability in CV Phonology , 1986 .

[17]  Frits Beukema,et al.  Linguistics in the Netherlands, 1986 , 1986 .

[18]  Thomas Berg,et al.  Die Abbildung des Sprachproduktionsprozesses in einem Aktivationsflußmodell: Untersuchungen an deutschen und englischen Versprechern , 1988 .

[19]  Thomas Berg,et al.  Syllabification in Finnish and German: Onset filling vs. onset maximization , 2000, J. Phonetics.

[20]  John Kingston,et al.  Papers in Laboratory Phonology: Index of names , 1990 .

[21]  Stefán Einarsson,et al.  Die Laute des modernen Islandischen. , 1939 .

[22]  J. Goldsmith.  Autosegmental and Metrical Phonology , 1990 .

[23]  David Odden,et al.  The phonology and morphology of Kimatuumbi , 1996 .

[24]  Kristján Árnason.  The Segmental and Superasegmental Status of Preaspiration in Modern Icelandic , 1986 .

[25]  Johan van der Auwera,et al.  The Germanic Languages , 1994 .

[26]  I. Lehiste.  The Timing of Utterances and Linguistic Boundaries , 1972 .

[27]  J. Hooper.  The Syllable in Phonological Theory , 1972 .

[28]  Bruce L. Derwing,et al.  A ‘Pause-Break’ Task For Eliciting Syllable Boundary Judgments from Literate and Illiterate Speakers: Preliminary Results for Five Diverse Languages , 1992 .