Directional asymmetry in nasalization: a perceptual account

Sunwoo Jeong 한국음운론학회 2012 음성·음운·형태론 연구 Vol.18 No.3

In this paper, I conduct a typological study on contextual vowel nasalization to elucidate the directional asymmetry involved in the process. I show that carryover nasalization is the default and extensive form of phonetic coarticulation in many languages and that it often exceeds the degree of anticipatory nasalization as coarticulation. On the other hand, I also show that anticipatory nasalization occurs more frequently than carryover nasalization as a phonological assimilation process. Consequently, I conclude that the relevant directional asymmetry in contextual vowel nasalization does not involve one direction of nasalization having absolute ascendency over the other, but rather involves each direction of nasalization having different kinds of ascendancies at different levels of grammar. This mismatch between phonetic and phonological tendencies in contextual vowel nasalization is claimed to arise due to an asymmetry in perception: anticipatory nasalization is more easily perceived than carryover nasalization, rendering the extensive degree of anticipatory coarticulation unstable in nature. Therefore, languages will either opt to suppress anticipatory coarticulation below a certain threshold or opt to phonologize it into a more stable assimilation pattern. This perceptual hypothesis is validated by the result of an AXB perception experiment which shows that anticipatory coarticulation is more easily perceived than carryover coarticulation.

Directional asymmetry in nasalization: a perceptual account

정선우 한국음운론학회 2012 음성·음운·형태론 연구 Vol.18 No.3

In this paper, I conduct a typological study on contextual vowel nasalization to elucidate the directional asymmetry involved in the process. I show that carryover nasalization is the default and extensive form of phonetic coarticulation in many languages and that it often exceeds the degree of anticipatory nasalization as coarticulation. On the other hand, I also show that anticipatory nasalization occurs more frequently than carryover nasalization as a phonological assimilation process. Consequently, I conclude that the relevant directional asymmetry in contextual vowel nasalization does not involve one direction of nasalization having absolute ascendency over the other, but rather involves each direction of nasalization having different kinds of ascendancies at different levels of grammar. This mismatch between phonetic and phonological tendencies in contextual vowel nasalization is claimed to arise due to an asymmetry in perception: anticipatory nasalization is more easily perceived than carryover nasalization, rendering the extensive degree of anticipatory coarticulation unstable in nature. Therefore, languages will either opt to suppress anticipatory coarticulation below a certain threshold or opt to phonologize it into a more stable assimilation pattern. This perceptual hypothesis is validated by the result of an AXB perception experiment which shows that anticipatory coarticulation is more easily perceived than carryover coarticulation.

소위 ‘비모음화’ 현상의 지리적 분포와 그 성격

정인호(Jeong In-ho) 우리말글학회 2007 우리말 글 Vol.41 No.-

This study aims to display the geographical distribution of the vowel nasalization and to elucidate the nature of it. The vowel nasalization of 'ŋ' is realized most vigorously in the Gyeongsang, east Gangwon, Hamgyeong, Pyeongan, and Hwanghae dialect, and the vowel nasalization of 'n', in the Gyeongsang dialect except for west area and Hamgyeong dialect except for Yukjin area. The distributional region that vowel nasalization of 'ŋ' is realized is wider. Phonetically, nasal vowels are different from nasalized vowels and vowel nasalization means that oral vowel is changed not to nasalized vowel but to nasal vowel. In the Korean dialects, only 'n, ŋ' are relevant to vowel nasalization. This phenomenon results not only from articulatory phonetic natures of consonantal 'n, ŋ', but also a articulatory domain of vowels. In the Korean dialects, vowel nasalization of both 'ŋ' and 'n' triggers the generation of new phonological rule, that is, velar-nasalization. As s result of it, phonological restructuring happens.

Comparison of English and Korean speakers for the nasalization of English stops

Yun, Ilsung 한국음성학회 2015 말소리와 음성과학 Vol.7 No.3

This study compared English and Korean speakers with regard to the nasalization of the English stops /b, d, g, p, t, k/ before a nasal within and across a word boundary. Nine English and thirty Korean speakers participated in the experiment. We used 37 speech items with different grammatical structures. Overall the English informants rarely nasalized the stops while the Korean informants generally greatly nasalized them though widely varying from no nasalization to almost complete nasalization. In general, voiced stops were more likely to be nasalized than voiceless stops. Also, the alveolar stops /d, t/ tended to be nasalized the most, the bilabial stops /b, p/ the second most, and the velar stops /g, k/ the least. Besides, the closer the grammatical relationship between neighboring words, the more likely the stop nasalization occurred. In contrast, the Korean syllabification - the addition of the vowel /?/ to the final stops - worked against the stop nasalization. On the other hand, different stress (accent) or rhythm effects of the two languages are assumed to contribute to the significantly different nasalization between English and Korean speakers. The spectrum of stop nasalization obtained from this study can be used as an index to measure how close a certain Korean speaker’s stop nasalization is to English speakers’.

유음의 비음화 저지 현상과 형태 인식

서윤정 한말연구학회 2024 한말연구 Vol.65 No.2

. The purpose of this study is to examine the realization patterns of /ㄹ/ nasalization in standard Korean speakers and identify the factors influencing the realization of this phonological phenomenon. To achieve this goal, a total of 30 male and female speakers in their 20s, born and residing in the Seoul, Gyeonggi, and Incheon regions, were asked to read sentences containing 60 experimental data that could observe /ㄹ/ nasalization. The analysis revealed diverse patterns of /ㄹ/ nasalization realization depending on the speaker and the word. Only two speakers applied /ㄹ/ nasalization to all words, and female speakers often pronounced 'ㄹ' without nasalization, maintaining the original spelling. Additionally, it was observed that /ㄹ/ nasalization was less applied when 'ㄹ' was followed by a monophthong compared to when it was followed by a diphthong. Through this research, it was confirmed that the phenomenon of /ㄹ/ nasalization, considered a obligatory phonological phenomenon of Korean, exhibits variation among younger speaker groups. It also suggests that young speakers consciously make efforts to preserve /ㄹ/ in their pronunciation.

비음화 설명의 문제점과, 비음화와 ‘/ㄹ/ →/ㄴ/ 교체’의 탐구 순서 ―2015 교육과정 『국어』 교과서를 대상으로

신승용 국어국문학회 2023 국어국문학 Vol.- No.202

‘/l/ → /n/ substitution’ is different from nasalization. The environment is different and the cause is different each other. Nasalization is a assimilation, but ‘/l/ → /n/ substitution’ is not. ‘/l/ → /n/ substitution’ is a phenomenon related to a kind of syllable linking constraint in which /l/ is restricted to the syllable initial when preceding syllable has coda. However, some textbooks of 『Gugeo』 in the 2015 curriculum describe ‘/l/ → /n/ substitution’ as the same nasalization, which is a problem. Therefore, in this paper, first of all, I studied the discussion of academic grammar that the nasalization and ‘/l/ → /n/ substitution’ are different phenomena. And based on this, I criticized that some textbooks of 『Gugeo』 described ‘/l/ → /n/ substitution’ as the same nasalization. Finally, I presented teaching method to explore the differences and characteristics of nasalization and ‘/l/ → /n/ substitution’ 비음화와 ‘/ㄹ/ → /ㄴ/ 교체’는 조건환경도 다르고, 원인도 다른 음운 변동이다. 비음화는 동화이지만, ‘/ㄹ/ → /ㄴ/ 교체’는 동화가 아니라 /ㄹ/가 음절 초성에 제약되는 일종의 음절연결제약과 관련된 현상이다. 그런데 2015 교육과정 『국어』 12종 교과서 중에서 비음화와 ‘/ㄹ/ →/ㄴ/ 교체’를 같은 비음화로 기술한 것들이 있어 문제이다. 그래서 본고에서는 우선 비음화와 ‘/ㄹ/ → /ㄴ/ 교체’가 서로 다른 현상이라는 그동안의 학문문법의 논의를 정리하고, 이를 토대로 『국어』 12종 교과서 중에서 비음화와 ‘/ㄹ/ →/ㄴ/ 교체’를 동일한 비음화로 잘못 기술된 것들을 분석하였다. 나아가 비음화와 ‘/ㄹ/ → /ㄴ/ 교체’의 차이와 특성을 탐구할 수 있는 교수 방안을 제시하였다.

한국인 화자의 영어 발음 오류에 관한 음향적 분석

김미혜(Kim Mi-hye),강선미(Kang Sun-mi),김기호(Kim Kee-ho) 한국음성학회 2008 음성과학 Vol.15 No.3

This paper examined the acoustic differences in English speech production between English native speakers and Korean learners. Korean speakers seem to produce errors by over-applying the Korean phonological rules(nasalization and lateralization) to English speech under the conditions comparable to those of Korean which contain nasal+lateral or lateral+nasal sequences. Being based on this prediction, the experimental data is grouped into three sets, [n]+[l] sequence, [l]+[n]sequence, and [m]+[l] sequence. The result shows that, Korean speakers usually nasalize or lateralize the target words or phrases in every three categories while English natives don't. In set A([n]+[l] sequence), both nasalization and lateralization were found in [n]+[l] sequence, the same circumstances where both nasalization and lateralization can be placed as in Korean. In the case of set B([l]+[n] sequence), only lateralization is observed. It is because the nasalization never occurs in the sequence of l-n in Korean. There is no lateralization in set C([m]+[l] sequence), because only nasalization occurs in the sequence of m-l in Korean. This results reconfirmed that the nasalization and lateralization rules in Korean deeply influence on the English production data. Korean speakers need to be taught not to over-apply Korean phonological rule to English production for accurate pronunciation.

Effects of Final Stop Release and Vowel Insertion on Nasalization in English Speech by Korean EFL Speakers

Hyung-Ji Ha 한국응용언어학회 2022 응용 언어학 Vol.38 No.2

This study aims to investigate how Korean nasalization processes influence English speech by Korean EFL (English as Foreign Language) speakers as L1 interference. Specifically, the study focuses on the effects of final stop release and vowel insertion on nasalization. 24 speakers participated in the experiment. Among them, four speakers were Native American English speakers and 20 were Korean EFL speakers. The Korean-speaking participants were divided into two groups of ten according to their English proficiency; a group with high-intermediate English proficiency and a group with low English proficiency. Through this study, the following points were noted. First, the realization of final stop release and vowel insertion influences the realization of nasalization processes in English speech by Korean EFL speakers. The higher the frequency of final stop release and vowel insertion, the lower the frequency of the realization of nasalization processes when analyzed by prosodic domains and voicing and place of the final stops. Second, it was found that the effects of final stop release and vowel insertion on nasalization processes are more noticeable in the group with lower English proficiency than the group with higher English proficiency. These findings suggest that Korean nasalization processes influence English speech by Korean EFL speakers as L1 interference and the realization of Korean nasalization is closely related to the realization of final stop release and vowel insertion.

음운문법의 수의성과 전이 양상에 대한 최적성 이론적 분석: 한국어 화자의 영어와 한국어 비음-유음 연쇄 발음을 중심으로

박창범 한국중앙영어영문학회 2011 영어영문학연구 Vol.53 No.1

In Korean, either nasalization or lateralization occurs to avoid nasal- liquid sequences. However, the choice depends on the lexical items. For example, some words like /shinlaŋ/ ‘husband’ undergo lateralization resulting in [shillaŋ], whereas others like /ɨmunlon/ ‘phonology’ undergo nasalization resulting in [ɨmunnon]. According to Lee (2006), nasalization occurs when nasal and liquid sounds appear across the morpheme boundary. Thus, /ɨmun+lon/ causes nasalization instead of lateralization. Then, how are English words including nasal-liquid sequence pronounced by Korean speakers? To answer this question, this study examines the pronunciation of 10 Korean female middle-school students about nasal- liquid sequence found in both Korean and English. The result of the experiment exhibits some aspects: (i) nasal-liquid sequences are actually pronounced as various ways according to speaker’s recognition of each lexical item, (ii) such optionality of Korean words is consistently transferred into English, (iii) ungrammatical processes in Korean such as deletion or insertion to avoid nasal-liquid sequence never occur in English pronunciation as well. This study provides explicit account for such aspects by adopting optional lexical indexation (Park 2008b) within the framework of Optimality Theory (Prince & Smolensky 1993, McCarthy & Prince 1995). In addition, this study shows that optional lexical indexation is superior to the previous approach of constraints re-ranking in accounting for phonological optionality and transfer.

한어(漢語) 비모음의 언어 보편성과 지역 분포 특징

노혜정 중국어문연구회 2023 中國語文論叢 Vol.- No.112

The World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS) reports that nasal vowels do not occur in languages of the Eurasian continent. WALS erroneously analyzes Chinese languages as not having nasal vowels that contrast phonemically with oral vowels and misreports their geographical distribution due to a substantial lack of language data in mainland China and imbalances in the analyzed linguistic data. The purpose of this study is to analyze the language universals and patterns of the geographical distribution of nasal vowels in Chinese languages. In this study, nasal vowels appearing in each region are investigated, the language universals and specifics of nasal vowels appearing in Chinese languages are analyzed, and patterns of the geographical distribution of nasal vowels are identified. Based on previous studies, this study analyzes the typology of nasal vowels appearing in 351 dialects and local varieties of Chinese. Nasal vowels in Chinese languages show both universal and specific features in their inventory size and frequency of occurrence. This study thus demonstrates that most of Eurasia has nasal vowels, and provides data for revising the Chinese part of the nasal-vowel map of WALS, which was left almost entirely blank, to improve the regional coverage of nasal vowels.