Kingston --- Lenition: When (some) sonority differences don't matter (abstract)

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Lenition: When (some) sonority differences don't matter

John Kingston
University of Massachusetts, Amherst

It is commonplace to interpret lenition as the result of speakers' under-exerting themselves. This interpretation is embodied in the name itself, and Kirchner has argued for it at length in his dissertation (1998). Under-exertion can take many forms, but the one Kirchner focuses on is shortening the distance articulators travel in pronouncing consonants. A lenited pronunciation results because a lesser constriction is achieved.

Crucial evidence supporting this interpretation would be if consonants were more likely to lenite in the context of sounds with more open articulations, e.g. next to lower rather than higher vowels or more rather than less sonorous consonants (assuming that sonority varies directly with the openness of the consonants' articulations). Kirchner cites cases of both kinds, but none of the cases where lenition appears to depend on vowel height hold up. However, those that depend on consonant sonority do. Thus, it appears that sonority (openness) differences between neighboring consonants influence the likelihood of a consonant's leniting but not those between neighboring vowels.

This discrepancy is the point of departure for reinterpreting lenition as phonetic evidence that the affected consonant is inside rather than at the edge of a prosodic constituent. Leniting a consonant interrupts the signal less, and thereby weakens the separation between preceding and following material. That is, speakers don't lenite consonants to avoid over-exertion but instead to provide listeners with information about the prosodic constituency of their utterances. I will also argue that speakers' behavior is shaped little if at all by effort minimization.