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Umlautless Residues in Germanic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 December 2008

Robert B. Howell  and
Joseph C. Salmons
Robert B. Howell
Affiliation:
Department of German818 Van Hise Hall1220 Linden DriveUniversity of WisconsinMadison, WI 53706 [[email protected]] [[email protected]]
Joseph C. Salmons
Affiliation:
Department of German818 Van Hise Hall1220 Linden DriveUniversity of WisconsinMadison, WI 53706 [[email protected]] [[email protected]]
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Extract

Evidence suggests that Germanic languages resisted the spread of historical umlaut processes. We propose that examples of such superficially varied umlautless residues all yield to a single coherent phonological account. Specifically, these vocalic assimilations show strong preferences for reducing more extreme differences in place of articulation between trigger and target while failing to assimilate articulatorily closer vowels, so that triggering /i, j/ first and most consistently mutated /a/ and last and least consistently mutated /u(:)/. This vocalic cline interacts with the consonantal material intervening between trigger and target, so that obstruent clusters (especially velar or labial) are prone to inhibit umlaut. In both cases, the smaller the phonetic difference between target and trigger, the less likely umlaut is to occur. While umlaut failure has long been consigned to the margins of theories of umlaut, we argue that it is crucial, providing a snapshot of how umlaut unfolded across western and north Germanic.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Germanic Linguistics , Volume 9 , Issue 1 , Spring 1997 , pp. 83 - 111
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Germanic Linguistics 1997

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