Spoken syntax: The phonetics of giving a hand in New Zealand English
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Jennifer Hay
Abstract
This article considers the exemplar theories which are independently developing in phonetics and in syntax, and argues that they jointly make some predictions that neither does alone. One of these predictions is explored in the context of two sound changes which occurred in the history of New Zealand English. We show that both of these phonetic changes were affected by phrase-level factors. The raising of /æ/ was more advanced in the word hand when it referred to a limb, than when used in phrases such as give a hand or lend a hand. And the centralization of the /i/ vowel was more advanced in utterances of give involving abstract themes (give a chance), than when it had a meaning of transfer of possession (give a pen). We argue that existence of such effects lends support both to the idea (from syntactic exemplar theory) that phrases are stored, and the idea (from phonetic exemplar theory) that lexical representations are phonetically detailed.
© Walter de Gruyter
Articles in the same Issue
- Introduction to the special issue on exemplar-based models in linguistics
- Statistically gradient generalizations for contrastive phonological features
- Phonological variation in spoken word recognition: Episodes and abstractions
- Exemplar models, evolution and language change
- Exemplar-learning and schematization in a usage-based account of syntactic acquisition
- Exemplar-based syntax: How to get productivity from examples
- Spoken syntax: The phonetics of giving a hand in New Zealand English
- From fush to feesh: Exemplar priming in speech perception
Articles in the same Issue
- Introduction to the special issue on exemplar-based models in linguistics
- Statistically gradient generalizations for contrastive phonological features
- Phonological variation in spoken word recognition: Episodes and abstractions
- Exemplar models, evolution and language change
- Exemplar-learning and schematization in a usage-based account of syntactic acquisition
- Exemplar-based syntax: How to get productivity from examples
- Spoken syntax: The phonetics of giving a hand in New Zealand English
- From fush to feesh: Exemplar priming in speech perception
