Hostname: page-component-89b8bd64d-mmrw7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-08T20:54:06.580Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Radical underspecification in language production*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 October 2008

Joseph Paul Stemberger
Joseph Paul Stemberger
Affiliation:
University of Minnesota
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Phonological underspecification plays an important role in phonological theory. Some features are left blank in underlying representations. If they are relevant to the pronunciation of a segment, they are filled in at some point in the derivation; otherwise, they are left blank permanently. When underspecification was reintroduced to phonological theory in the 1980s, researchers originally assumed that all information that could be considered predictable had to be underspecified in underlying representations (Kiparsky 1982; Archangeli 1984). Information can be considered predictable in one of two ways. First, information is predictable if it is redundant or allophonic; the voicing and nasality of the vowel in the word grin [grin] in English are predictable (because vowels are always voiced, and are always nasalised before a nasal) and omitted from underlying representations. Second, given that a feature is binary, it is possible to leave one value of the feature blank in underlying representations; if the segment is not specified as e.g. [+ F], then it must be [− F], by default. The approach that defines predictability in this fashion is known as RADICAL UNDERSPECIFICATION

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Phonology , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , May 1991 , pp. 73 - 112
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1991

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

REFERENCES

Archangeli, D. (1984). Underspecification in Yawelmani phonology and morphology. PhD dissertation, MIT. Published 1986, New York: Garland.Google Scholar
Archangeli, D. (1988). Aspects of underspecification theory. Phonology 5. 183–207.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Archangeli, D. & D., Pulleyblank (1989). Yoruba vowel harmony. LI 20. 173–217.Google Scholar
Avery, P. & K., Rice (1989). Segment structure and coronal underspecification. Phonology 6. 179–200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berg, T. (1988). Die Abbildung des Sprachproduktionsprozesses in einem Aktivationsfluβmodell. Tübingen: Niemeyer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cairns, C. E. (1988). Phonotactics, markedness and lexical representation. Phonology 5. 209–236.Google Scholar
Chomsky, N. & Halle, M. (1968). The sound pattern of English. New York: Harper & Row.Google Scholar
Christdas, P. (1988). The phonology and morphology of Tamil. PhD dissertation, Cornell University.Google Scholar
Clements, G. N. (1985). The geometry of phonological features. Phonology Yearbook 2. 225–252.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clements, G. N. (1988). Toward a substantive theory of feature specification. NELS 18. 79–93.Google Scholar
Davis, S. (1991). Coronals and the phonotactics of non-adjacent consonants in English. In Paradis Prunet (1991 a). 49–60.Google Scholar
Dell, G. S. (1984). The representation of serial order in speech: evidence from the repeated phoneme effect in speech errors. Journal of Experimental Psychology Learning, Memory and Cognition 10. 222–233.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dell, G. S. (1985). Positive feedback in hierarchical connectionist models: applications to language production. Cognitive Science 9. 3–23.Google Scholar
Dell, G. S. (1986). A spreading activation theory of retrieval in sentence production. Psychological Review 93. 283–321.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Denes, P. B. (1963). On the statistics of spoken English. JASA 35. 892–904.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferguson, & Farwell, C. B. (1975). Words and sounds in early language acquisition. Lg 51. 419–439.Google Scholar
Francis, W. N. & Kuera, H. (1982). Frequency analysis of English usage: lexicon and grammar. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.Google Scholar
Fromkin, V. A. (1971). The non-anomalous nature of anomalous utterances. Lg 47. 27–52.Google Scholar
Gordon, B. & Caramazza, A. (1982). Lexical decision for open- and closed-class words: failure to replicate differential frequency sensitivity. Brain and Language 15.143–160.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Harley, T. A. (1984). A critique of top-down independent levels models of speech production: evidence from non-plan internal speech errors. Cognitive Science 8. 191–219.Google Scholar
Itô, J. & Mester, R. A. (1985). The phonology of voicing in Japanese. LI 17. 49–73.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, P. (1982). From cyclic phonology to lexical phonology. In van der Huist, H. & Smith, N. (eds.) The structure of phonological representations. Part 1. Dordrecht: Foris. 131–175.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, P. (1985). Some consequences of Lexical Phonology. Phonology Yearbook 2. 83–138.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCarthy, J. J. (1988). Feature geometry and dependency. Phonetica 43. 84–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacKay, D. G. (1969). Forward and backward masking in motor systems. Kybernetik 2. 57–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacKay, D. G. (1970). Spoonerisms: the structure of errors in the serial order of speech. Neuropsychologia 8. 323–350.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MacKay, D. G. (1973). Complexity in output systems: evidence from behavioral hybrids. American Journal of Psychology 86. 785–806.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacKay, D. G. (1987). The organization of perception.and action: a theory for language and other cognitive skills. New York: Springer.Google Scholar
Meara, P. & Ellis, A. W. (1981). The psychological reality of deep and surface phonological representations: evidence from speech errors in Welsh. Linguistics 19. 797–804.Google Scholar
Mester, R. A. & Itô, J. (1989). Feature predictability and underspecification: palatal prosody in Japanese mimetics. Lg 65. 258–293.Google Scholar
Mohanan, K. P. (1991). On the bases of radical underspecification. NLLT 9.Google Scholar
Mohanan, K. P. & Mohanan, T. (1984). Lexical phonology of the consonant system in Malayalam. LI 15. 575–602.Google Scholar
Motley, M. T., Baars, B. J. & Camden, C. T. (1983). Experimental verbal slips studies: a review and an editing model of language encoding. Communication Monographs 50. 79–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Paradis, C. & Prunet, J.-F. (eds.) (1991a). The special status of coronals: internal and external evidence. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Paradis, C. & Prunet, J.-F. (1991b). Asymmetry and visibility in consonant articulations. In Paradis Prunet (1991a). 1–28.Google Scholar
Piggott, G. L. (1990). The representation of sonorant features. Ms, McGill University.Google Scholar
Pulleyblank, D. (1988). Vocalic underspecification in Yoruba. LI 19. 233–270.Google Scholar
Rice, & Avery, P. (1989). On the relationship between sonorancy and voicing. Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics 10. 65–82.Google Scholar
Schwartz, R. & Leonard, L. (1982). Do children pick and choose? An examination of phonological selection and avoidance in early language acquisition. Journal of Child Language 9. 319–336.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shattuck-Hufnagel, S. (1979). Speech errors asevidence for a serial ordering mechanism in sentence production. In Cooper, W. E. & Walker, E. C. T. (eds.) Sentence processing. New York: Haisted Press. 295–342.Google Scholar
Shattuck-Hufnagel, S. & Klatt, D. (1979). The limited use of distinctive features and markedness in speech production: evidence from speech errors. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 18. 41–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shiffrin, R. M. & Schneider, W. (1977). Controlled and automatic human information processing: II. Perceptual learning, automatic attending, and a general theory. Psychological Review 84. 127–190.Google Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. (1982). The lexicon in a model of language production. PhD dissertation, UCSD. Published 1985, New York: Garland.Google Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. (1985). An interactive activation model of language production. In Ellis, A. (ed.) Progress in the psychology of language. Vol. 1. London: Lawrence Erlbaum. 143–186.Google Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. (1989a). Speech errors in early child language production. Journal of Memory and Language 28. 164–188.Google Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. (1989b). Morphological processing and the Repeated Phoneme Effect. Ms, University of Minnesota.Google Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. (1990). Wordshape errors in language production. Cognition 35. 123–157.Google ScholarPubMed
Stemberger, J. P. (1991). Apparent anti-frequency effects in language production: the addition bias and phonological underspecification. Journal of Memory and Language 30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. (in preparation). The repetition effect. Ms, University of Minnesota.Google Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. & Lewis, M. (1986). Reduplication in Ewe: morphological accommodation to phonological errors. Phonology Yearbook 3. 151–160.Google Scholar
Stemberger, J. P. & Stoel-Gammon, C. (1991). The underspecification of coronals: evidence from language acquisition and performance error. In Paradis Prunet (1991a). 181–199.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stemberger, & Treiman, R. (1986). The internal structure of word-initial consonant clusters. Journal of Memory and Language 25. 163–180.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steriade, D. (1987). Redundant values. CLS 23:2. 339–362.Google Scholar
Treisman, M. (1978). Space or lexicon? The word frequency effect and the error response frequency effect. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 17. 37–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yip, M. (1988). The Obligatory Contour Principle and phonological rules: a. loss of identity. LI 19. 65–100.Google Scholar
Yip, M. (1989). Feature geometry and cooccurrence restrictions. Phonology 6. 349–374.CrossRefGoogle Scholar