Chapter 6: Segmental change: an outline of some of the most common

phonological processes
6.1. Sounds in connected speech. Coarticulation
6.2. Feature Changes. Assimilation. Different types of assimilation
6.3. Voicing and devoicing
6.4. Nasalization
6.5. Palatalization
6.6. Lenitions and fortitions
6.7. Delitions and insertions
6.8. Metathesis

CHAPTER 6

SEGMENTAL CHANGE:
AN OUTLINE OF SOME
OF THE MOST COMMON
PHONOLOGICAL PROCESSES

6.1. Sounds in connected speech. Coarticulation

We have so far described various sounds, we analyzed and classified consonants,

vowels and other classes and subclasses of sounds. We even talked about functional
classes of sounds that we labeled phonemes and further decomposed into distinctive
features. We have, nevertheless, spoken only about individual sounds. When we talked
about groups or classes of sounds we actually operated various generalizations extending
the features of a particular sound to a hypothetical superordinate category. This means
that our analysis only dealt with isolated sounds, sounds that we picked up as we do with
a beetle that we keep in an insectarium, and we examine hoping to draw from its
individual characteristics conclusions about the traits of its entire family or species.
However, this is not how speech works. We saw from the very beginning of this book
that speech is a dynamic process and that when human beings talk they do not utter each
and every sound separately, but deliver a continuous flow of sounds that are actually
often difficult to distinguish for an ear that is not accustomed to the phonology of the
respective language. It was actually one of our first examples of the different concerns of
phonetics and phonology, as it was clear that when we listen to an unknown idiom our
mind cannot understand what the ear perceives, which in fact demonstrates that,
mentally, we operate with classes of sounds (the phonemes we described earlier)
arranged in patterns observing language-specific rules, and not with unique, individual
sounds. Since sounds come one after another in a rapid and hardly interrupted succession,
it is clear that their respective features influence one another. This is something that
intuitively, too, we are readily aware of. When we discussed the allophones as
materializations of the phonemes, we saw that the context or the distribution can often
have an important influence on the way a sound is actually pronounced. Some other
examples will clearly demonstrate that this is indeed the case.
If we examine the pronunciation of the voiced labiodental fricative in the
sequence give boats [giv bcυts], and we contrast it to the sequence give peace [gif pi:s]
we will easily notice that while in the first case [v] is fully voiced, in the second it is
rather pronounced as some kind of [f]. What could be the reason for such a
metamorphosis? This is the question much of this chapter is going to address and try to
answer.
A closer analysis of the example above will lead us to the conclusion that the only
way we can account for the different pronunciation of what we still consider to be the
same phoneme is the environment or context of occurrence of the respective phonetic
unit. When followed by [b], which is a voiced sound, the labial fricative remains fully
voiced. When followed by the voiceless counterpart of [b], namely [p], the fricative
becomes itself voiceless. It is clear that the feature or specification [-voice] of [p] has
somehow been transferred to the preceding sound. This is a common phenomenon in all
languages and in the light of our introductory discussion it is natural that the
pronunciation of a sound should influence the way in which we pronounce a
neighbouring sound, especially when we speak at a fast rate. Because the two sounds, [v]
and [p] in our case, have become in a way similar to each other – they have come to share
the specification [-voice] which they don’t normally do – we call this process
assimilation. It is sometimes loosely called coarticulation, though the latter term strictly
refers to the fact that, when pronounced, certain sounds are uttered together and thus it
actually describes the cause of assimilation.