Aerodynamic and acoustic evidence for the articulations of complex nasal consonants

Didier Demolin (1) , Katharina Haude (2) , Luciana Storto (3)

1 ULB - Université libre de Bruxelles
2 SeDyL - Structure et Dynamique des Langues
3 USP - Universidade de São Paulo = University of São Paulo

Indigenous languages contribute in an essential way to understand variation in speech production and perception and to identify the constraints that act on natural languages. These constraints play a crucial role to make, to test or to revise hypotheses made in phonology. The paper examines data from Karitana, a Tupi language of Brasil, from Movima, an isolated language from the Bolivian Amazon, and from Rwanda, a Bantu language from Africa. These languages show rather uncommon data. The objectives of this paper are to make an experimental study of the variation in the production of complex nasal consonants of these languages; to show that aerodynamic measurements provide strong evidence for the timing of articulatory movements; to discuss the articulatory control hypothesis and to determine whether these consonants are complex nasals or make a complex onset in the syllable structure of the languages where they are observed.

Mots clés: Karitiana; Movima; Rwanda; complex nasal consonants; experimental phonetics

Domaines: Linguistique

Didier Demolin, Katharina Haude, Luciana Storto. Aerodynamic and acoustic evidence for the articulations of complex nasal consonants. Revue PAROLE, 2006, 39/40, pp.177-205. ⟨halshs-00692079⟩