Bimodal schwa: Evidence from acoustic measurements (original) (raw)

The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 2004

Abstract

The question of whether schwa is targeted or targetless has been the subject of much debate (Browman et al., 1992; Browman and Goldstein, 1995; Gick, 1999, 2002). Gick (2002) found that there is a pharyngeal constriction during schwa relative to rest position, and concluded that schwa is not targetless. This experiment further showed a ‘‘bimodal’’ pattern in schwa in a nonrhotic speaker, indicating that the subject has distinct schwas in lexical words and function words. The present study examines the existence of the ‘‘bimodal’’ pattern in schwas in nonrhotic dialects through an acoustic experiment. It is predicted that there is a significant difference in formant values between lexical schwas and function schwas. Results to date indicate a significant difference in them between schwas in lexical versus function words, both between historical schwas and those derived from final /r/ reduction. Data from several additional nonrhotic subjects will be presented. Implications for intrus...

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