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University of Babylon
Department of English
Neutralization
( A Presentation in Phonetics and Phonology)
By
Noor Dhia' & Noor Othman
- List of contents 2
-Neutralization 3
-Optimality Theory 4
-Types of Neutralization 5
- Overlapping Neutralization and Phoneme Neutralization 6
-Neutralization through Assimilation 7
-Neutralization and Biuniqueness 8
- Neutralization, Opposition, and Consonant Clusters 9
-Neutralization of Weak Forms 10
-Neutralization of vowels 11
- Neutralization and Archiphoneme 12
-The Conclusion 13
- References 14
Neutralization
Neutralization is found in many fields of language study. There is no a separate
study concerning it. It can be considered as the outcome of many studies in each field
and one of them is phonology which is the field we are studying now. It was
introduced and developed by the linguists of the Prague School in the 1930s and
especially by the Russian linguist Nikolai Trubetzkoy's theory of 'Neutralization and
Archiphoneme'. Also It was introduced in the work and findings of the Optimality
Theory in the 1990s by Allan Prince. ( Trask, 2007:186)
Types of Neutralization
According to Crystal (2008:326), there are two types of
neutralization; positional and absolute. The positional
neutralization is the situation in which the contrast between
two phonemes is neutralized in a particular location. A well-
known example of positional neutralization is that some
combination of these features (i.e. voicing, aspiration,
glottalization) can be freely contrasted in syllable onsets, but
see their ability to contrast neutralized in syllable codas e.g.
some pairs of sounds established as phonemes in a context A
cannot enter a contrast in context B, e.g. neutralization of the
voicing contrast in German (and a number of other
languages) ,stops and fricatives in word-final position, e.g.:
"bunt" and "bund" /bnt/.
The absolute neutralization Trask (1996: 2) defines it as "an
analysis which posits an underlying contrast which is never
realized phonetically on the surface". It occurs when an
opposition is neutralized in all environments. For example the
underlying representation of the word ' write' contains a final
segment 'e' even though it is never pronounced. This term was
introduced by Paul Kiparsky (1968:14). This type can be
considered context-free since it does not depend on the context
unlike the positional neutralization. Kula and et.al (2011: 148)
state that absolute neutralization is a problem for acquisition
because the learner is unable to appeal to surface
morphophonological alternations to reconstruct the underlying
representation of the segment; their only resource is to the
rules.
The previous division of neutralization represents Crystal's,
Trubetzkoy (1939) presents what so called positional
neutralization in addition to two types. First, that which is
represented by free variation. Some varieties of English have a
contrast between /au/ and /a/, cow /ka/ cower /ka/. This
contrast is neutralized before /r/, where there may be
indeterminate variation between the diphthong and triphthong,
dowry / dari/ or /dari/.
The second is that which may be represented by a sound
which is distinct from both of the otherwise contrasting
phonemes. Vowel contrasts are reduced before certain
consonants or in unstressed syllables. For example the English
tendency to reduce all vowels to whet so called '
indeterminate //', changing // in 'legality' into / / in 'legal'.
A number of function words may have different pronunciations when they are
accented (stressed or in isolation)and when, more precisely, unaccented. The
unaccented form of these words may be neutralized in isolation. Such
neutralization generally causes no problem to listeners because of the high rate of
redundancy of meaningful cues in English. It is rarely that the context may allow
different interpretation for only one cue supplied by an accented word form. Such
neutralization occurs in rapid, familiar RP: ( Cruttenden, 2013: 294).
'Ten or under
Neutralization of Vowels
+oral
+stop
+alveolar
0 voice
The Conclusion
The study has reached to the following conclusions:
1. Neutralization is the disappearance of the distinction between two
phonemes in certain environment.
2. It can occur in weak forms, vowels, consonant cluster, and
phonemes.
3. It is similar to overlapping and can be studied through assimilation
since assimilation is an aspect of neutralization.
4. It violates the principle of both biuniqueness and opposition.
5. Its solution is by using the Theory of Archiphoneme which is
introduced by Trubetskoy N. (1939) as it is restricted to the position
of neutralization and is symbolized by the use of capital letter.
References