Palatal sound change in the romance languages : diachronic and synchronic perspectives

This monograph presents a thorough investigation of the main historical and present-day variation and change patterns undergone by palatal sounds in the Romance languages. By relying on phonetic and phonological information to motivate a formal account of palatal sound change, the analyses proposed in this book offer a principled, constraint-based explanation for the evolution of palatals in the Romance-speaking world. It provides a robust and up-to-date literature review on the subject, taking into consideration not only the viewpoints and data from diachronic research, but also the results from various phonetic, phonological, dialectal, and comprehensive studies. By taking into account the role of phonetic information in the shaping of phonological patterns, this book approaches sound change from its inception during the speaker-listener interaction and formalizes it as the difference in constraint ranking between the grammar of the speaker and that of the listener-turned-speaker. This perspective is intended to model how and why similar change events may take place in different varieties and/or the same language across periods of time. Title......3 Contents......5 Series preface......7 Acknowledgments......9 List of abbreviations......11 1 Introduction......13 1.1 The Romance languages......13 1.2 Romance palatals......14 1.3 Approach and objectives......16 1.4 Book outline......18 2 Theoretical considerations......20 2.1 Introduction......20 2.2 The concept of sound change......22 2.3 Optimality Theory......26 2.4 The role of the speaker and the listener-turned-speaker in sound change......33 2.5 A non-teleological constrained-based model of sound change......38 2.6 Concluding remarks......41 3 The phonetics of palatals......43 3.1 Introduction......43 3.2 The phonetics of palatal vowels and the glide [j]......44 3.3 The phonetics of palatal sonorants......46 3.4 The phonetics of palatal obstruents......51 3.5 Summary and concluding remarks......56 4 Palatals in the history of the Romance languages......58 4.1 Introduction......58 4.2 The emergence of Latin YOD......59 4.3 The emergence of the palatal lateral......61 4.3.1 First-stage, palatal lateral one......61 4.3.2 Second-stage, palatal lateral two......74 4.4 The emergence of the palatal nasal......90 4.4.1 -nj-......90 4.4.2 -gn- and -n:-......92 4.5 The emergence of palatal obstruents......95 4.5.1 Initial j-......95 4.5.2 dj, gj, j......99 4.5.3 gi, ge, gE, and ki, ke, kE......101 4.5.4 k and g with front a......104 4.5.5 sj and apical s......105 4.5.6 tj and kj......106 4.5.7 kt, ks......107 4.5.8 pl kl fl bl gl, and pj bj mj vj......108 4.6 Summary and concluding remarks......109 5 Palatals in the Romance languages today......111 5.1 Introduction......111 5.2 Palatals in Ibero-Romance varieties......112 5.2.1 The rise and spread of YEISMO in Modern Spanish......112 5.2.2 Palatals in the languages of Spain......117 5.2.3 Palatals in the Spanish dialects of Hispanic America and other varieties......125 5.2.4 Palatals in Portuguese varieties......155 5.3 Palatals in Gallo-Romance......156 5.4 Palatals in Italo-Romance and Sardinian......157 5.5 Palatals in Rhaeto-Romance and Easterm Romance varieties......159 5.6 Summary and concluding remarks......161 6 Palatal sound change in the Romance languages: A unified account......162 6.1 Introduction......162 6.2 Sound change as constraint reranking......163 6.3 Pathways for the emergence and evolution of palatal sonorants......165 6.4 Pathways for the emergence and evolution of palatal obstruents......184 6.5 Summary and concluding remarks......211 7 Final remarks......212 Appendix 1: Demographic questions......219 Appendix 2: Sentence-reading task......220 Appendix 3: Knowledge of potential minimal pairs......221 References......223 Index......243 From the same series......245 This book presents a thorough investigation of the main diachronic changes that have taken place in the palatal sounds of the Romance languages, as well as their current patterns of synchronic variation. André Zampaulo draws on extensive data not only from diachronic sources, but also from a range of current phonetic, phonological, and dialectal studies to motivate a formal, constraint-based account of palatal sound change. The analysis takes into account the role of phonetic information in the shaping of phonological patterns, approaching sound change from its inception during the speaker-listener interaction and formalizing it as the difference in constraint ranking between the grammar of the speaker and that of the listener-turned-speaker. The volume offers insights into how and why similar types of change may take place in different varieties and/or the same language at different times, and will be of interest to graduate students and researchers in historical linguistics, phonetics and phonology, Romance linguistics, and dialectology more broadly. This book presents a thorough investigation of the main diachronic changes that have taken place in the palatal sounds of the Romance languages, as well as their current patterns of synchronic variation. Andre Zampaulo draws on extensive data not only from diachronic sources, but also from a range of current phonetic, phonological, and dialectal studies to motivate a formal, constraint-based account of palatal sound change. The analysis takes into account the role of phonetic information in the shaping of phonological patterns, approaching sound change from its inception during the speaker-listener interaction and formalizing it as the difference in constraint ranking between the grammar of the speaker and that of the listener-turned-speaker. The volume offers0insights into how and why similar types of change may take place in different varieties and/or the same language at different times, and will be of interest to graduate students and researchers in historical linguistics, phonetics and phonology, Romance linguistics, and dialectology more broadly A very lightly compressed scan of Zampaulo's 2019 book on Romance palatalization. From the introduction of the book: "This book presents a thorough investigation of the historical and present-day variation and change patterns undergone by so-called “palatal” consonants in the Romance languages. The word “palatal” is used here as a general term for sounds that have emerged from palatalization processes, which entail not only changes in place of articulation (e.g. a consonant’s articulation moving toward a more palatal position), but also changes in manner of articulation (e.g. the emergence of alveolar affricates from Latin /tj dj/). Some scholars favor the use of a more precise term such as “(alveolo)palatal” to refer to these sounds..." This book presents a formal, constraint-based account of the main diachronic and synchronic patterns of variation in the palatal sounds of the Romance languages. It will appeal to graduate students and researchers in historical linguistics, phonetics and phonology, Romance linguistics, and dialectology more broadly. This text presents a formal, constraint-based account of the main diachronic and synchronic patterns of variation in the palatal sounds of the Romance languages. It will appeal to graduate students and researchers in historical linguistics, phonetics and phonology, Romance linguistics, and dialectology more broadly