Duration of Blackfoot /s/.

A comparison of assibilant, affricate, singleton, geminate and syllabic /s/ in Blackfoot.

Donald Derrick, UBC Linguistics For: WSCLA 11, UBC, April, 2006

Introduction

• Blackfoot is an Algonquian language primarily spoken in Alberta and Montana • Blackfoot consonant inventory includes /m, n, p, t, k, t s , k s , s/ in singleton and geminate contrasts.

Introduction

• Blackfoot has only the one sibilant: /s/ • Blackfoot /s/ appears in many contexts: – Assibilation • underlying /k/ or /t/ next to an /i/ and across morpheme boundaries “-” become /k s / and /t s / respectively (Frantz & Russel 1991, 1995 , Armoskaite & Chávez-Peón, 2005) [ staḁxt s ɪt s i] staaht-itsi under-pant "underpant" (F&R 1995:232)(BB 06/02/09) s t a a * t s I t s i 3.83257

Time (s) 5.10649

Introduction

– Affricates • /k s / or /t s / within a morpheme (Elfner, 2004) [ɪ s tː s t s áːpikɪmː] isttsi-tsáápikimm pain-wire/string "barbed wire" (F&R 1995:97 ) (BB 06/02/01 ) i s tt s t s aa p i k I mm 2.39934

3.99541

Time (s)

Introduction

– Singletons • does not alter underlying preceding vowel lengths (Frantz & Russel 1995) [niːsɪpːo] four-ten "forty" niis-kiipo (F&R, 1995:134) (BB 05/10/12) n ii s i pp 5.51657

Time (s) o 6.53907

Introduction

– Geminates [ɪsatɛsːi] • defined as an /s/ which shortens preceding long vowels or laxens preceding short vowels (Frantz & Russel 1995) i-sataisi VERB-offended "become offended!" (F&R 1995:204) (BB 06/02/01) 0.075963

i s a t E Time (s) ss i 1.30434

Introduction

– Syllabic /s/ • defined as elng /s/ preceded by a consonant (Derrick, 2006) [ ʔómʔḁksːksːiːnaː] biɡ-insect (F&R 1995:86) omahk-sskssiinaa "big insect ” (BB 05/11/29) o m ?

a 8 k ss k ss 6.69156

Time (s) ii n aa 8.58086

Introduction

– Super-long combinations • defined as spirantizations (affricates) followed by syllabic /s/ (Derrick, 2006) [ ʔomʔḁk s sːapiaʔt s ɪs] omahk-i-ssapia'tsis big-VERB-telescope "big field glasses" (F&R 1995:85) (BB 06/03/16) 9.78145

om ?

a * k sss a p ia t s I s 12.4279

Time (s)

Hypotheses

1) Blackfoot geminates /s/ and syllabic /s/ will be the same duration 2) Blackfoot long /s/ will be longer than singleton /s/ 3) Blackfoot singleton /s/ will be longer than Blackfoot affricate /s/ 4) Blackfoot affricate /s/ will be longer than Blackfoot assibilant /s/ 5) All Blackfoot /s/’s will be longer when adjacent to vowels than when adjacent to consonants.

Experiment

• Blackfoot data involving /s/ in all the contexts listed was recorded and /s/ durations were measured in order to test the above 5 hypotheses:

Methods - participant

• One participant (Beatrice Bullshields) provided citation form words containing Blackfoot assibilations, affricates, singletons, geminates, syllabic /s/ ’s and super-long /s/ ’s.

• A minimum of 3 tokens from 6 words for 18 measurements was elicited for each form (except k s V - 14 only)

Methods - stimuli

• Forms included: CsssV, CssC, CssV, VssC, CssC, VsV, VsC, t s V, t s C, t-V, k s V, k s C, k-V • C = Consonant • V = Vowel • sss = affricate + syllabic /s/ • ss = geminate or syllabic /s/ • • s = singleton s s = affricate • - = assibilation/morpheme boundary

Methods - recording

• Recordings were completed using a Marantz 660 solid-state recorder with a countryman (phantom power) wired lapel microphone.

• Measurements were recorded using text tiers on PRAAT 4.4.0.7 for Mac • Data was compiled in Excel 2004 for Mac • Statistics were analyzed using JMP IN 5.1 for Mac

Results - by type

600 500 400 300 200 100 0 affricate assibilant geminate singleton super-long syllabic Each Pair Student's t 0.05

segment group

Means for Oneway Anova Level

affricate assibilant geminate singleton super-long syllabic

Number

80 57 38 89 21 73

Mean

129.588

102.579

299.632

155.348

381.524

240.233

Std Error uses a pooled estimate of error variance

Std Error

6.744

7.990

9.786

6.394

13.163

7.060

Lower 95%

116.32

86.87

280.39

142.77

355.63

226.35

Upper 95%

142.85

118.29

318.88

167.92

407.41

254.12

Level

affricate assi b ilant super - long A geminate B syll a bic sin g leton C 381 .5 2 38 1 299 .6 3 15 8 240 .2 3 28 8 D 155 .3 4 83 1

Mean

E 129 .5 8 75 0 F 102 .5 7 89 5 • All categories significantly different F(5,252) 123, P < 0.0001

• Each category is statistically different from each other P < 0.005

Results - by Vowel Adjacency

• • • • Vowel adjacency to either edge of a long /s/ correlates to greater duration Duration of a geminate /s/ followed by a consonant is similar to a syllabic /s/ followed by a vowel Duration of a consonant bounded syllabic /s/ similar to vowel bounded singleton /s/ Vowel bounded geminates are much longer than vowel bounded singletons 500 400 300 200 100 CssC CssV segment VsV VssC VssV Each Pair Student's t 0.05

300 250 200 150 100 50 300 250 200 150 100 50 coda

Results - by Vowel Adjacency

Means for Oneway Anova

onset

l i S n g t e o n

position

Level

coda onset

Number

38 51

Mean

91.316

203.059

Std Error

6.4081

5.5314

Std Error uses a pooled estimate of error variance

Lower 95%

78.58

192.06

Both results are highly significant (P < 0.0001)

Upper 95%

104.05

214.05

coda onset

f r f A i c t a e

position

Means for Oneway Anova Level

coda onset

Number

45 35

Mean

150.067

103.257

Std Error

6.3162

7.1619

Std Error uses a pooled estimate of error variance

Lower 95%

137.49

89.00

Upper 95%

162.64

117.52

• Singleton /s/ in onset position is 100% longer than singleton /s/ in coda • Affricate /s/ in onset position is 33% shorter than affricate /s/ in coda

Discussion - Hypothesis tests

Hypothesis 1: Blackfoot geminates /s/ and syllabic /s/ will be the same duration – • False - syllabic /s/ is on average 25% shorter than geminate /s/ long /s/ is approximately 50 ms longer per edge adjacent to a vowel.

Hypothesis 2: Blackfoot long /s/ will be longer than singleton /s/ – True - geminate /s/ is 100% longer than singleton /s/, just like other geminates in Blackfoot

Discussion - Hypothesis tests

Hypothesis 3: Blackfoot singleton /s/ will be longer than Blackfoot affricate /s/ – • True, but not by much - Blackfoot singleton /s/ is about 25% longer than affricate /s/ in onset position, the difference is much greater with affricate /s/ at mean 103 ms and singleton /s/ at mean 201 ms, or 100% longer.

Hypothesis 4: Blackfoot affricate /s/ will be longer than Blackfoot assibilant /s/ – • True, but again not by much - Blackfoot affricate /s/ is about 25% longer than assibilant /s/. And, assibilant and affricate /s/ are similar lengths when in onset position.

Discussion - Hypothesis test

• Hypothesis 5: All Blackfoot /s/’s will be longer when adjacent to vowels than when adjacent to consonants.

– False, Blackfoot singleton and geminate /s/ are longer when adjacent to vowels, but affricates are shorter when adjacent to vowels Slower energy changes on either side of /s/ sounds may correlate with longer durations:

Discussion - Energy Change

k i t s i k s i kk a k oo m 6.74064

8.48575

Time (s) • /s/ energy builds slower off of /t/ than proceedings.) /k/ onset. (comparisons to appear in o m ?

ax k ss k ss ii n aa 6.69156

8.58086

Time (s) • /s/ energy decreases slowly into a vowel , quickly into a consonant .

ao k s i I ss k ii n i ss aa ss aa 0.481826

1.67286

Time (s) • singleton /s/ is shorter and sometimes quieter than geminate /s/ .

• singleton /s/ does not reduce preceding vowels.

2.82541

4.04091

Time (s) • /s/ energy decreases slowly into a vowel , and vowel energy decreases into an /s/

Conclusion

• Underlying morphophonology combined with vowel adjacency jointly predict average duration differences between geminate /s/, syllabic /s/, singleton /s/, and affricate & assibilant /s/ • With geminate and syllabic /s/, vowel adjacency effects are symmetrical • Assibilant and underlying affricate /s/ have statistically similar duration in onset position • More speakers and more natural speech must be analyzed to finalize these conclusions

References

Armoskaite, Solveiga and Ch á vez-Pe ó n, Mario. (2005) "Assibilation in Blackfoot" LING 431/531 Field Methods, UBC Derrick, Donald (2005) “ Blackfoot Geminates.

” LING 531, Field Methods, UBC Derrick, Donald (2006) "Blackfoot phonotactics." NWLC 22, SFU, Burnaby, BC, Canada Emily Elfner (2004)

The Role of Sonority in Blackfoot Phonotactics.

Honours thesis, University of Calgary Frantz , Donald G. (1991)

Blackfoot Grammar

. University of Toronto Press Frantz, Donald G. & Norma Jean Russell. (1995)

Blackfoot dictionary of stems, roots, and affixes

(second edition). University of Toronto Pres Special thanks to Beatrice Bullshields who provided all the elicitations for any data marked (BB date). Frantz's dictionary provided source material for all such elicitations, but Beatrice Bullshields's productions are used in favor of any dictionary entries.