Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T00:53:15.103Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Revisiting Mandarin ‘apical vowels’: An articulatory and acoustic study

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 November 2014

Sang-Im Lee-Kim
Sang-Im Lee-Kim*
Affiliation:
New York University [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The present study investigates the articulatory and acoustic properties of the unique apical segments in Mandarin Chinese that occur after dental and retroflex sibilants instead of the high front vowel [i]. An ultrasound study showed that the segments are homorganic with the preceding dental and retroflex sibilants. However, an acoustic study showed that they have a periodic waveform and clear formant structures with no inherent frication noise, indicating that they are not ‘voiced fricatives’. The results also suggest that the observed F2 pattern can only be explained with an acoustic model of a sonorant consonant, wherein F2 is attributed to the cavity behind the apical constriction. Based on this, it is argued that the segments can be best seen as ‘dental approximant [ ]’ and ‘retroflex approximant [ɻ]’. A phonological implication of the pattern is also discussed: the co-occurrence restriction with the high front vowel eliminates a potential chance of palatalization of the dental and retroflex sibilants that may lead to neutralization of the place contrast. The tongue front gesture in the following approximants seems to provide an additional cue to the place of the preceding consonants; the low F3 of [ɻ], for example, enhances cues to the place of the preceding retroflex sibilant.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the International Phonetic Association , Volume 44 , Issue 3 , December 2014 , pp. 261 - 282
Copyright
Copyright © International Phonetic Association 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alwan, Albeer, Narayanan, Shrikanth & Haker, Katherine. 1997. Toward articulatory–acoustic models for liquid approximants based on MRI and EPG data. Part II: The rhotics. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 101 (2), 1078–1089.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ao, Xiaoping B. 1997. Phonetics and phonology of Nantong Chinese. Ph.D. dissertation, The Ohio State University.Google Scholar
Boersma, Paul & Weenink, David. 2011. PRAAT: Doing phonetics by computer. Version 5.2, http://www.praat.org (accessed April 2011).Google Scholar
Chao, Yuenren. 1934. The non-uniqueness of phonemic solutions of phonetic systems. Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philosophy, Academia Sinica 4 (4), 363–397.Google Scholar
Chao, Yuenren. 1968. A grammar of spoken Chinese. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Chen, Matthew Y. 2000. Tone Sandhi: Patterns across Chinese dialects. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cheng, Chinchuan. 1973. A synchronic phonology of Mandarin Chinese. The Hague: Mouton.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cheng, Robert L. 1966. Mandarin phonological structure. Journal of Linguistics 2 (2), 135–262.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davidson, Lisa. 2006. Comparing tongue shapes from ultrasound imaging using smoothing spline analysis of variance. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 120 (1), 407–415.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Davidson, Lisa & De Decker, Paul. 2005. Stabilization techniques for ultrasound imaging of speech articulations. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 117 (4), 2544.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duanmu, San. 2000. The phonology of standard Chinese. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Duanmu, San. 2007. The phonology of standard Chinese, 2nd edn. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Epstein, Melissa A. & Stone, Maureen. 2005. The tongue stops here: Ultrasound imaging of the palate. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 118 (4), 2128–2131.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Flemming, Edward. 1995. Auditory representations in phonology. Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Gu, Chong. 2002. Smoothing spline ANOVA models. New York: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamann, Silke R. 2003. The phonetics and phonology of retroflexes. Ph.D. dissertation, Utrecht University. [Utrecht: LOT Press]Google Scholar
Hartman, Lawton M. 1944. The segmental phonemes of the Peiping dialect. Language 20 (1), 28–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howie, John M. 1976. Acoustical studies of Mandarin vowels and tones. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Hsueh, F. F. S. 1986. Beijing Yinxi Jiexi [Analysis of the Beijing dialect sound system]. Beijng: Beijing Yuyan Xueyuan Chubanshe.Google Scholar
Iskarous, Khalil, Shadle, Christine H. & Proctor, Michael I.. 2011. Articulatory–acoustic kinematics: The production of American English /s/. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 129 (2), 944–954.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Karlgren, Bernhard. 1915–16. Études sur la phonologie chinoise. Uppsala: K. W. Appelberg.Google Scholar
Ladefoged, Peter & Maddieson, Ian. 1996. The sounds of the world's languages. Oxford & Malden, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Ladefoged, Peter & Wu, Jongji. 1984. Places of articulation: An investigation of Pekingese fricatives and affricates. Journal of Phonetics 12, 267–278.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee, Wai-Sum & Zee, Eric. 2003. Standard Chinese (Beijing). Journal of the International Phonetic Association 33 (1), 109–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Li, Fangfang. 2008. The phonetic development of voiceless sibilant fricatives in English, Japanese and Mandarin Chinese. Ph.D. dissertation, The Ohio State University.Google Scholar
Li, Min, Kambhamettu, Chandra & Stone, Maureen. 2005. Automatic contour tracking in ultrasound images. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics 19 (6/7), 545–554.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lin, Yenhwei. 1989. Autosegmental treatment of segmental processes in Chinese phonology. Ph.D. dissertation, The University of Texas at Austin.Google Scholar
Lisker, Leigh. 1963. Introduction to spoken Telugu. New York: Americal Council of Learned Societies.Google Scholar
Martin, Samuel Elmo. 1992. A reference grammar of Korean. Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle.Google Scholar
Miller, Wick R. 1985. Acoma grammar and texts. Berkeley & Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Narayanan, Shrikanth, Byrd, Dani & Kaun, Abigail. 1999. Geometry, kinematics, and acoustics of Tamil liquid consonants. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 106 (4), 1993–2007.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pulleyblank, Edwin G. 1984. Middle Chinese: A study in historical phonology. Vancouver, BC: University of British Columbia Press.Google Scholar
Ramsey, S. Robert. 1987. The languages of China. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Spencer, Andrew. 1984. Eliminating the feature [Lateral]. Journal of Linguistics 20 (1), 23–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steriade, Donca. 1999. Phonetics in phonology: The case of laryngeal neutralization. UCLA Working Papers in Linguistics: Papers in Phonology 3, 25–145.Google Scholar
Stevens, Kenneth N. 1998. Acoustic phonetics. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Stevens, Kenneth N., Keyser, Samuel Jay & Kawasaki, Haruko. 1986. Toward a phonetic and phonological theory of redundant features. In Perkell, Joseph S. & Klatt, Dennis H. (eds.), Invariance and variability in speech processes, 426–449. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Stevens, Kenneth N., Li, Zhiqiang, Lee, Chao-Yang & Jay Keyser, Samuel. 2004. A note on Mandarin fricatives and enhancement. In Fant, Gunner, Fujisaki, Hiroya, Cao, Jianfen & Xu, Yi (eds.), From traditional phonology to modern speech processing, 393–403. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.Google Scholar
Wang, Yuedong. 2011. Smoothing splines: Methods and applications. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wiese, Richard. 1997. Underspecification and the description of Chinese vowels. In Wang, Jialing & Smith, Norval (eds.), Studies in Chinese phonology, 219–249. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wu, Yuwen. 1994. Mandarin segmental phonology. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Toronto.Google Scholar
Zee, Eric & Lee, Wai-Sum. 2001. An acoustical analysis of the vowels in Beijing Mandarin. 7th European Conference on Speech Communication and Technology, Aaborg, Denmark, 643–646.Google Scholar
Zhou, Dianfu & Wu, Jongji. 1963. Putonghua fayin tupu [Articulatory diagrams of Standard Chinese]. Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan.Google Scholar