Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-ndw9j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-02T18:31:38.471Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Phonological variation in Korean: The case of the “disappearing w”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

David James Silva
David James Silva
Affiliation:
Cornell University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In Korean, the tendency to delete the labiovelar glide w when it appears postconsonantally is conditioned by linguistic, stylistic, and social factors. Chief among these is the place specification for the preceding consonant: labiovelar glides are more likely to be deleted when preceded by a velar than by a labial, alveolar, or alveopalatal. It is proposed that this observation can be explained in terms of current phonological theory, in particular, the notions of feature geometry (Clements 1985; Sagey 1986) and the Obligatory Contour Principle (McCarthy 1986). Under such a model, adjacent segments share common features in ways that promote variability; specifically, the labiovelar glide shares the feature [back] with an adjacent velar (but shares no place features with adjacent labials, alveolars, and alveopalatals), thereby providing structural cohesiveness that inhibits the application of the deletion rule.

Type
Research Article
Information
Language Variation and Change , Volume 3 , Issue 2 , July 1991 , pp. 153 - 170
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1991

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

Ahn, Sang-Cheol. (1985). The interplay of phonology and morphology in Korean. Seoul: Hanshin.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam & Halle, Morris. (1968). The sound pattern of English. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Clements, G. N. (1985). The geometry of phonological features. In Ewen, C. & Anderson, J. (eds.), Phonology yearbook 3. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 223–250.Google Scholar
Clements, G. N. (1990). A unified set of features for consonants and vowels. Unpublished manuscript, Cornell University.Google Scholar
Crothers, John H., Lorentz, James P., Sherman, Donald, Vihman, Marilyn M. (1979). Handbook of phonological data from a sample of the world's languages: A report from the Stanford phonology archive. Stanford, CA: Stanford University, Department of Linguistics.Google Scholar
Guy, Gregory. (1990). Explanation in variable phonology: An exponential model of morphological constraints. Paper presented at NWAVE 19,University of Pennsylvania.Google Scholar
Hoare, James & Pares, Susan. (1988). Korea: An introduction. London: Kegan Paul International.Google Scholar
Hong, Yunsook. (1988). A sociolinguistic study of Seoul Korean. Doctoral dissertation, University of Pennsylvania.Google Scholar
Hume, Elizabeth. (1989). Front vowels, palatal consonants and the rule of umlaut in Korean. Paper presented at NELS 20,Carnegie Mellon University.Google Scholar
Kim, Chin-Wu. (1988). Sojourns in language I. Seoul: Tower.Google Scholar
Kim, Kee-Ho. (1987). The phonological representation of distinctive features: Korean consonantal phonology. Seoul: Hanshin.Google Scholar
Labov, William. (1972). Sociolinguistic patterns. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Martin, Samuel. (1954). Korean morphophonemics. Baltimore, MD: Linguistic Society of America.Google Scholar
Martin, Samuel. (1974). Korean reference grammar. Unpublished manuscript, Yale University.Google Scholar
McCarthy, John J. (1986). OCP effects: Gemination and antigemination. Linguistic Inquiry 17:2. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 207–264.Google Scholar
Rand, David & Sankoff, David. (1988). GoldVarb: A variable rule application for the Macintosh, Version 1.6. Montreal: Université de Montréal, Centre de recherches mathématiques.Google Scholar
Sagey, Elizabeth. (1986). The representation of features and relation in non-linear phonology. Doctoral dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.Google Scholar
Sankoff, David. (1988). Variable rules. In the documentation for GoldVarb: A variable rule application for the Macintosh, Version 1.6. Montreal: Université de Montréal, Centre de recherches mathématiques.Google Scholar
Silva, David James. (1990). Labiovelar glide deletion: A study of phonological variation in Seoul Korean. In Baek, E.-J. (ed.), ICKL 7: Papers from the Seventh International Conference on Korean Linguistics. Seoul: International Circle of Korean Linguistics and Osaka University of Economics and Law. 416–424.Google Scholar
Silva, David James. (1991). Towards explanation in variable processes: w-deletion in Korean. Paper presented at NWAVE 20,Georgetown University.Google Scholar
Silva, David James, (in preparation). The phonetics and phonology of stop lenition in Korean. Doctoral dissertation, Cornell University.Google Scholar