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15th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences (ICPhS-15)Barcelona, Spain |
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This paper discusses the relationship between phonetic and phonological control of speech by comparing the temporal patterns in two types of Japanese dialects: the mora-based phonological system of Standard Tokyo Japanese and the syllable-based system of Kagoshima Japanese. An acoustic study of Kagoshima Japanese reveals that mora-timing is not observed in this dialect. However, this dialect does not exhibit an effect of closed syllable vowel shortening either, which is observed in Korean and other so-called syllable languages. What is observed instead is vowel shortening in the syllable following a closed syllable: vowels following a closed syllable are noticeably shorter than those following an open syllable. Because of this vowel shortening, Kagoshima Japanese exhibits a tendency towards syllable-timing rather than mora-timing.
Bibliographic reference. Kubozono, Haruo / Matsui, Francis Michinao (2003): "Phonetic vs. phonological control of speech: closed syllable vowel shortening in Japanese dialects", In ICPhS-15, 2425-2428.