linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Lingu ...

, pre-stopping, also known as pre-occlusion or pre-plosion, is a phonological process involving the historical or allophonic insertion of a very short stop consonant before a

sonorant In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant or resonant is a speech sound that is produced with continuous, non-turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; these are the manners of articulation that are most often voiced in the world's languages. Vowels ar ...

, such as a short before a nasal or a

lateral Lateral is a geometric term of location which may refer to: Healthcare *Lateral (anatomy), an anatomical direction * Lateral cricoarytenoid muscle * Lateral release (surgery), a surgical procedure on the side of a kneecap Phonetics *Lateral co ...

. The resulting sounds () are called pre-stopped consonants, or sometimes pre-ploded or (in Celtic linguistics) pre-occluded consonants, although technically may be considered an occlusive/stop without the pre-occlusion. A pre-stopped consonant behaves

phonologically Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a ...

as a single consonant. That is, like affricates and

trilled affricate Trilled affricates, also known as post-trilled consonants, are consonants which begin as a stop and have a trill release. These consonants are reported to exist in some Northern Paman languages in Australia, as well as in some Chapacuran languag ...

s, the reasons for considering these sequences to be single consonants lies primarily in their behavior. Phonetically they are similar or equivalent to stops with a nasal or

release.

Terminology

There are three terms for this phenomenon. The most common by far is ''prestopped/prestopping''. In descriptions of the languages of Southeast Asia, Australia, and the Pacific, ''preploded/preplosion'' is common, though ''prestopped'' is also used. In accounts of Celtic languages, ''preoccluded/preocclusion'' is used almost exclusively. Technically, nasals are already occlusives, and are often considered stops; however, some prefer to restrict the term 'stop' for consonants in which there is complete cessation of airflow, so 'prenasalized stop' and 'prestopped nasal' are not necessarily tautologies.

In European languages

Manx Manx (; formerly sometimes spelled Manks) is an adjective (and derived noun) describing things or people related to the Isle of Man: * Manx people **Manx surnames * Isle of Man It may also refer to: Languages * Manx language, also known as Manx ...

, pre-occlusion occurs in stressed monosyllabic words (i.e. words one syllable long), and is also found in

Cornish Cornish is the adjective and demonym associated with Cornwall, the most southwesterly part of the United Kingdom. It may refer to: * Cornish language, a Brittonic Southwestern Celtic language of the Indo-European language family, spoken in Cornwa ...

on certain stressed syllables. The inserted stop is homorganic with the sonorant, which means it has the same

place of articulation In articulatory phonetics, the place of articulation (also point of articulation) of a consonant is a location along the vocal tract where its production occurs. It is a point where a constriction is made between an active and a passive articul ...

. Long vowels are often shortened before pre-occluded sounds. In transcription, pre-occluding consonants in final position are typically written with a superscripted letter in Manx and in Cornish. Examples in Manx include: * → : → "heavy" * → : → "walking" * → : → "head" * → : → "birds" * → : → "ship" In Cornish, pre-occlusion mostly affects the reflexes of older geminate/fortis , intrinsically geminated in Old Cornish, and (or /N/ depending on preferred notation). It also arises in a few cases where the combination was apparently re-interpreted as . Examples in

: * → : "mother" * → : "this" * → : "head" * → : "heads" In Faroese, pre-occlusion also occurs, as in ''kallar'' 'you call, he calls', ''seinna'' 'latter'. A similar feature occurs in Icelandic, as in ''galli'' ('error'); ''sæll'' , ''seinna'' ; ''Spánn'' .

In Australian languages

Pre-stopped nasals and laterals are found in some Australian Aboriginal languages, such as

Kuyani The Kuyani people, also written Guyani and other variants, and also known as the Nganitjidi, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the state of South Australia who speak the Kuyani language. Their traditional lands are to the west of the Flinder ...

(Adnyamathanha),

Arabana The Arabana, also known as the Ngarabana, are an Aboriginal Australian people of South Australia. Name The older tribal autonym was Ngarabana, which may have been misheard by white settlers as Arabana, the term now generally accepted by new g ...

Wangkangurru The Wangkangurru, also written Wongkanguru and Wangkanguru, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Simpson Desert area in the state of South Australia. They also refer to themselves as Nharla. Country Norman Tindale estimated their tribal sw ...

Diyari The Diyari (), alternatively transcribed as Dieri (), is an Indigenous Australian group of the South Australian desert originating in and around the delta of Cooper Creek to the east of Lake Eyre. Language Diyari is classified as one of the K ...

, Aranda (nasals only), and Martuthunira (laterals only). Adnyamathanha, for example, has the pre-stopped nasals and the pre-stopped laterals , though these are all in allophonic variation with the simple nasals and laterals .

In Mon–Khmer languages

Pre-stopped nasals are also found in several branches of

Austroasiatic The Austroasiatic languages , , are a large language family in Mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. These languages are scattered throughout parts of Thailand, Laos, India, Myanmar, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Nepal, and southern China and are t ...

, especially in the

North Aslian languages The Northern Aslian languages (also called Jehaic or Semang) are a group of Aslian languages spoken by about 5,000 people in inland areas of Peninsular Malaysia, with a few pockets in southern Thailand. The most distinctive language in the group ...

and Shompen, where historical word-final nasals, *m *n *ŋ, have become pre-stopped, or even full voiced stops .

In Austronesian languages

Hiw of Vanuatu is the only

Austronesian Austronesian may refer to: *The Austronesian languages *The historical Austronesian peoples The Austronesian peoples, sometimes referred to as Austronesian-speaking peoples, are a large group of peoples in Taiwan, Maritime Southeast Asia, M ...

language that has been reported to have a pre-stopped

velar lateral approximant The voiced velar lateral approximant is a type of consonantal sound, used as a distinct consonant in a very small number of spoken languages in the world. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is (since 1 ...

. Its phonological behavior clearly defines it as a prestopped

, rather than as a laterally released stop.

Nemi Nemi is a town and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Rome (central Italy), in the Alban Hills overlooking Lake Nemi, a volcanic crater lake. It is northwest of Velletri and about southeast of Rome. The town's name derives from the Lati ...

of New Caledonia has consonants that have been described as '' postnasalized'' stops, but could possibly be described as prestopped nasals..

References

Bibliography

* * * *Jeff Mielke, 2008. ''The emergence of distinctive features''. * {{citation , doi=10.2307/3623111 , last=Ozanne-Rivierre , first=Françoise , author-link=Françoise Ozanne-Rivierre , year=1995 , title=Structural changes in the languages of Northern New Caledonia , journal=Oceanic Linguistics , volume=34 , issue=1 , pages=45–72 , jstor=3623111 Plosives Nasal consonants