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Acquisition of variability in Akan Phonology: Labio-palatalized consonants and front rounded vowels

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 June 2021

Wendy Kwakye AMOAKO  and
Joseph Paul STEMBERGER Open the ORCID record for Joseph Paul STEMBERGER [Opens in a new window]
Wendy Kwakye AMOAKO
Affiliation:
University of Alberta, Canada
Joseph Paul STEMBERGER*
Affiliation:
University of British Columbia, Canada
*
*Corresponding author: E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper addresses how input variability in the adult phonological system is mastered in the output of young children in Akan, a Kwa language spoken in Ghana, involving variability between labio-palatalized consonants and front rounded vowels. The high-frequency variant involves a complex consonant which is expected to be mastered late, while the low-frequency variant involves a front rounded vowel which is expected to be mastered relatively early. Late mastery of complex consonants was confirmed. The high-frequency labiopalatalized-consonant variant was absent at age 3 and not yet mastered even at age 5. All children produced the easier-to-produce low-frequency front-rounded-vowel variant, most at far greater frequency than in adult speech, implying that a child's output limitations can affect which variant the child targets for production. Modular theories, in which phonological plans reflect only the characteristics of adult input, fail to account for our results. Non-modular theories are implicated.

Keywords

phonological developmentvariabilityfrequencysegmental complexityAkan
Type
Article
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 49 , Issue 5 , September 2022 , pp. 979 - 1007
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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