Durational effects of boundaries in Italian fricatives
Abstract
We examine durational effects in Italian word-initial fricatives-singleton [f], [s] and fricatives in the clusters [fr], [sp], [sk]-as a function of two positional factors: position with respect to stress (including the context of raddoppiamento sintattico-RS) and position relative to an Intonational phrase (IP) boundary. Results show that word-initial fricatives are longer the closer they are to the main stress syllable of the preceding word, in keeping with RS. Fricatives are shorter in IP-initial position than in non-IP-Initial, in keeping with increased consonanticity in domain-initial position. An interaction between the two factors shows that word-initial fricatives lengthen only when non-IP-initial, confirming the fact that RS is blocked in the presence of an IP boundary. We discuss the implications of the results for the linguistic use of segmental duration.
Domains
Linguistics
Origin : Publisher files allowed on an open archive