Sibilants after sonorous consonants in Euskera: insertion vs. affrication, phonetics and phonology

Abstract

This paper deals with the Basque phonological process that affricates sibilant fricatives following sonorant consonants. The analysis of this process is particularly adequate for the discussion of the reciprocal relationship between phonetics and phonology as proposed by Natural Phonology. Within that theoretical framework, this study investigates the phonetic motivation of phonology; on the other hand, the perceptual –perhaps also productive– consequences of the language-specific phonemic systems are explored by comparing the Basque affrication process with the better known English process of stop insertion. It is argued that the terminological choice between affrication and insertion might not be a trivial issue, but the reflection of some difference in the phonological processing of basically equivalent phonetic conditions. The optimization of syllable structure is presented as another possible element in the shaping of the phonological process and an important factor of its relative relevance in typologically different languages. Some comments on spectrographic images are provided in section 3, in order to show the kind of observations that prompted this ongoing research.