Self-organizing processes and the explanation of phonological universals.
| Number | 450 |
|---|---|
| Year | 1983 |
| Drawer | 8 |
| Entry Date | 11/19/1999 |
| Authors | Lindblom, B., MacNeilage, P., & Studdert-Kennedy, M. |
| Contact | |
| Publication | In B. Butterworth, B. Comrie, & O. Dahl (Eds.), Explanations of Linguistics. The Hague: Mouton. |
| url | http://www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL0450.pdf |
| Abstract | [Introduction] Where do phonological universals such as segments and features come from and what general form would explanations of their origin take? In the present study we shall address these questions by trying to simulate their emergence with the aid of a self-organizing model of ‘phonological structure’. This model was implemented in a series of computational experiments organized to select sequentially- in the presence of certain production-based and perception-based performance constraints-a subset of k phonetic signals from a larger inventory of n universally ‘possible gestures’. Although these gestures resembled stop-vowel syllables, their specification did not presuppose an analysis in terms of segments. Rather a possible gesture was defined as a holistic transition running between an arbitrary point in the universal phonetic space of ‘possible closures’ and a similarly arbitrary point in the universal space of ‘possible vowels’. These gestalts are phonetically described as articulatory, acoustic, and auditory patterns. To select systems of k signals, and optimization criterion was applied. It was defined so as to produce paradigms achieving ‘sufficient perceptual benefits at acceptable articulatory costs’. |
| Notes |
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