Palatalisation of /s/ in Afrikaans

• Main Authors: Daan Wissing, Wikus Pienaar, Daniel van Niekerk
• Format: Article
• Language: Afrikaans
• Published: Stellenbosch University 2016-01-01
• Series: Stellenbosch Papers in Linguistics Plus
• Subjects: Afrikaans, Acoustic features, Centre of Gravity, Palatalisation, /s/-Fronting, Voiceless sibilant fricatives
• Online Access: http://spilplus.journals.ac.za/pub/article/view/688
• ISSN: 1726-541X; 2224-3380

<p class="Abstract">This article reports on the investigation of the acoustic characteristics of the Afrikaans voiceless alveolar fricative /s/<a title="" href="file:///C:/Users/katevg/SkyDrive/Documents/%23SPiL%20(Plus)/SPiL%20Plus%2048%20-%20SAMWOP-3/Wissing%20et%20al%20-%20formatted.docx#_ftn1">[1]</a>. As yet, a palatal [ʃ] for /s/ has been reported only in a limited case, namely where /s/ is followed by palatal /j/, for example in the phrase <em>is jy </em>(‘are you’), pronounced as [ə-ʃəi]. This seems to be an instance of regressive coarticulation, resulting in coalescence of basic /s/ and /j/. The present study revealed that,  especially in the pronunciation of young, white Afrikaans-speakers, /s/ is also palatalised  progressively when preceded by /r/ in the coda cluster /rs/, and, to a lesser extent, also in other contexts where /r/ is involved, for example across syllable and word boundaries. Only a slight presence of palatalisation was detected in the production of /s/ in the speech of the white, older speakers of the present study. This finding might be indicative of a definite change in the Afrikaans consonant system. A <em>post hoc</em> reflection is offered here on the possible presence of /s/-fronting, especially in the speech of the younger females.  Such pronunciation could very well be a prestige marker for affluent speakers of Afrikaans.</p><div><hr align="left" size="1" width="33%" /><div><p><a title="" href="file:///C:/Users/katevg/SkyDrive/Documents/%23SPiL%20(Plus)/SPiL%20Plus%2048%20-%20SAMWOP-3/Wissing%20et%20al%20-%20formatted.docx#_ftnref1">[1]</a> Given that this is a study of the <em>phonetic</em> characteristics of the voiceless alveolar and palatal sibilant fricatives of Afrikaans, these two consonants as well as combinations thereof are presented with  the phonetic symbols in square brackets [ ], <strong>except</strong> when they are specifically being dealt with in a phonemic sense, in which case  the conventional slash symbols / / will be used. This is applicable to other characters too, such as the palatal fricative [j] in the next sentence.</p><p> </p><p><span>[Please click on "Supplementary files" in the ARTICLE TOOLS sidebar on the right for the accompanying video (Figure 3)]</span></p></div></div>