Vowel epenthesis has been most adequately described using nonlinear phonology approaches. It has been shown that vowel insertion is predictable from the syllabic constraints imposed in a specific language. Halle and Vergnaud (1978) considered vowel epenthesis, as a rule, applied to fill empty nodes created in derivation. Piggot and Singh (1985) proposed that vowel epenthesis and consonant epenthesis are “repair strategies” that are used when assimilation, elision, and resyllabification have failed. Epenthesis can be universally characterized as the insertion of a segment into the appropriate slot that can be interpreted + or − syllabic depending on its position in the syllabic structure (Kaye and Lowenstamm, 1983). One of the most important observations from such analysis is that there is no need for an epenthesis rule. Epenthesis is applied to repair syllabifications that are disallowed in a specific language.
[1]
Diana Archangeli,et al.
Yokuts harmony: evidence for doplanar representation in nonlinear phonology
,
1985
.
[2]
Jean Lowenstamm,et al.
The internal structure of phonological elements: a theory of charm and government
,
1985,
Phonology Yearbook.
[3]
Douglas Pulleyblank.
Tone in Lexical Phonology
,
1986
.
[4]
E. Selkirk.
The French Foot: On the Status of Mute e
,
1978
.
[5]
Glyne L. Piggott,et al.
The Phonology of Epenthetic Segments
,
1985,
Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique.
[6]
D. Archangeli.
Underspecification in Yawelmani phonology and morphology
,
1984
.
[7]
D. Steriade.
Greek prosodies and the nature of syllabification
,
1982
.