The historical development of [g] and [b] in a regional German dialect
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Justin Glover
In a German dialect spoken in a rural region of Lorraine the reflexes of Middle High German (MHG) [g b] are the corresponding fricatives ([j β]) in intervocalic position, but MHG [g b] surface in the same dialect as [g b] before [ɘl], e.g. MHG le[g]en > le[j]en ‘to lay’ vs. MHG ke[g]el > Ke[g]el ‘cone’. We argue that the spirantization of MHG [b g] requires the spreading of [+continuant] from a vowel. Since the sound change also went into effect after liquids (i.e. [l r]), we hold that [l r] at this stage were also [+continuant]. Examples like Kegel are argued to require that MHG [b g] first spirantized and then occlusivized to [b g]. Since the latter process was triggered by [l] only, we take this as evidence that [l] (but not [r]) at that stage in the language was [–continuant].
The analysis supports the cross-linguistic (synchronic) evidence that [l] can be [+continuant] in some languages and [–continuant] in others (Mielke Phonology 22: 169–203, 2005). We argue that language change involved a reanalysis of the [+continuant] [l] in MHG as [–continuant]. Our treatment will also be argued to support the claim that sound change is minimal in the sense that it only changes one feature (Picard Folia Linguistica Historica 20: 63–77, 1999).
© 2009 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin Boston
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Articles in the same Issue
- Inflectional classifiers in Weining Ahmao: Mirror of the history of a people
- The historical development of [g] and [b] in a regional German dialect
- More on the idiosyncrasy of Dan Michel's Ayenbite of Inwit: Behove as a (modal) verb of necessity
- On the interplay between forces of erosion and forces of repair in language change A case study
- Constructional change in Old and Middle English Copular Constructions and its impact on the lexicon
- The rise of ergativity in Hindi: Assessing the role of grammaticalization
- Tigrinya, an “African-Semitic” language
- Bjarke Frellesvig & John Whitman eds.: Proto-Japanese. (Series IV, Current Issues in Linguistic Theory, Volume 294)
- Franck Floricic, ed.: La négation dans les langues romanes (Linguisticæ investigationes: Supplementa 26)
- Ives Goddard: The Autobiography of a Meskwaki Woman. A New Edition and Translation
- H. Christophe Wolfart, ed.: Papers of the Thirty-Eighth Algonquian Conference
