Assignment of Grammatical Gender in Heritage Greek

This study investigates the acquisition of grammatical gender in Heritage Greek as acquired by children (6–8 years of age) and adolescents (15–18 years) growing up in Adelaide, South Australia. The determiner elicitation task from Varlokosta (2005) was employed to assess the role of morphological and semantic cues when it comes to gender assignment for real and novel nouns. Ralli’s (1994) inflectional classes for Greek nouns and Anastasiadi-Symeonidi and Cheila-Markopoulou’s (2003) categories of prototypicality were employed in the analysis of the collected data. The performance of heritage speakers was compared to that of monolingual speakers from Greece (Varlokosta, 2011). The results indicate that–beyond age differences in the two groups–a formal phonological rule guides gender assignment in the production of heritage speakers which departs from initial expectations.

Phonological change and interdialectal differences between Egyptian and Coptic: ḏ, ṯ → c = ϫ versus ḏ, ṯ → t = ⲧ

The development of the Egyptian palatals ḏ and ṯ has long been a thorny issue in Egyptian linguistics. No convincing phonological rule for it has been identified so far. In the present paper I argue that the distribution of these phonemes is the result of inter-dialectal borrowings between a pre-Coptic dialect (C‑Dialect) in which ḏ , ṯ → c = ϫ and a pre-Coptic dialect (T‑Dialect) in which ḏ , ṯ → t = ⲧ. It is then argued that the attested Coptic dialects derive from T‑Dialects with lexical borrowings from C‑Dialects. A preliminary discussion of the sociolinguistic contexts of these dialects is presented in the second part of the article, where it is suggested that the C‑Dialect may have been associated with the area of the cities of Avaris/Pi-Ramses/Tanis and may have become a prestigious dialect and thus a source of lexical borrowings starting from the 19th dynasty.

The Tonal Residue of the Conjoint/Disjoint Alternation in Rukiga

The Bantu language Rukiga (JE14, Uganda) shows tonal reduction on the verb in a subset of tenses, similar to the conjoint/disjoint alternation in Haya. Whereas in other languages the conjoint/disjoint alternation is usually marked by segmental morphology in at least one tense, Rukiga is unique in showing only tonal reduction. Nevertheless, our analysis shows that tonal reduction in Rukiga is not merely a phonological rule, but it encodes the conjoint/disjoint alternation. Furthermore, we show that tonal reduction in Rukiga is determined by constituent-finality, and there is no direct relation to focus

Phonological rule spreading across hostile lines: (TH)-fronting in Philadelphia

This article examines the transfer of (TH)-fronting, a phonological feature of African American English, into the speech of white speakers from South Philadelphia. While most cases of linguistic diffusion, particularly of African American English, are found in speakers with a positive affiliation with the source dialect (e.g., Bucholtz, 1999; Cutler, 1999; Fix, 2010), here the white adopters of (TH)-fronting exhibit overtly hostile attitudes toward black neighbors. I argue that (TH)-fronting has been adopted as an index of street or masculinity by the white speakers in this study. Furthermore, I demonstrate that the phonological constraints on borrowed (TH)-fronting have been restricted and simplified from the constraints in the source dialect. Finally, I discuss how hostile interactions may play a role in language change, allowing change in dialects not only to proceed in tandem across unexpected boundaries (e.g., Milroy & Milroy, 1985), but also to be directly diffused across hostile boundaries.

Distinctive Features Analysis of Foreign Language Borrowing Words in Javanese Language Found in Panjebar Semangat Magazine

The Javanese language belongs to language which has unique phonological system. There are so many foreign language has influenced the development of Javanese. This study is intended to examine the sound change of borrowing word of foreign language in Javanese which is found in Panjebar Semangat magazine. The data is taken from Panjebar and checked using old Javanese dictionary. This study belongs to descriptive qualitative research and used Simak method and Non Participant Observation in collecting the data. The data analysis is done by using Padan method. The result of the study reveals three sound changes of vowels sound and four phonological rules. Then, there are four types of sound change and four phonological rule of consonant sound. The result showed that the sound change of borrowing word in Javanese is influenced by the differences of phonological system between Javanese and the foreign language.

The phonological word in the Ningbo dialect

This paper examines the domain of the prosodic word in the Ningbo dialect. The goal of this paper is to provide a critical review of the studies on the prosodic word (PW) in various languages of the world, and to investigate the phonological phenomena within the domain formed by morpho-syntactic words in the Ningbo dialect as well as discussing the role that the prosodic word plays in the phonological rule application in the Ningbo dialect. This paper provides a complete survey on various types of morpho-syntactic formation in the Ningbo dialect as well as examining the application of phonological phenomena with reference to the different types of morpho-syntactic words. It will show that the lexical tone sandhi rule (LTS) applies within the domain formed by the major types of morpho-syntactic words in Ningbo dialect. However, pure phonological information may also affect the application of LTS.

The state of stop–fricative alternation in Modern Hebrew

The stops [p, b, k] often alternate with respective fricatives [f, v, χ] in Modern Hebrew (MH). This general pattern was designed to follow the spirantization process of Biblical Hebrew as it was depicted in the Masoretic orthography. While this orthography is retained in MH, its phonological infrastructure is very different from that of Biblical Hebrew, and it cannot support a phonological process of spirantization. This problematic state of affairs has been a source of confusion for many language users, as well as a source of interest for many language researchers. This paper overviews the current state of affairs with respect to the stop-fricative alternation in MH, emphasizing cases of systematic stability and instability. The apparent patterns seem to reflect speakers’ limited yet impressive ability to recruit their native knowledge of morphology and orthography to generalize a pseudo-phonological rule.