Production mechanisms of ejectives in German, English and Georgian
Final Report Abstract
This project investigated the acoustic, aerodynamic, and articulatory mechanisms of ejectives in German, Georgian, and English. Ejectives occur in about 16–20% of the world’s languages. At the beginning of words like passen or Tassen in German, plosives are produced: the mouth and the nose are closed. Air from the lungs builds up in the closed mouth until the closure is released, creating a small explosion. In the conventional description of ejectives, not only are the mouth and nose closed, but the vocal cords also make a closure, i.e. the airway to the lungs is blocked. The larynx, which contains the vocal cords, is raised abruptly, resulting in a reduction of the oral cavity and an increase in air pressure, which also leads to an explosion when the closure in the mouth is released. Ejectives are neither part of the regular sound inventory of German nor English, yet in specific contexts in German and English, ejective-sounding sounds occur, e.g. in German at the end of the word weht in the sentence Über die Felder weht ein Wind. In English, ejectivesounding sounds often occur at the end of utterances where the last word ends in a p, t, or k, e.g., black. The project explored how ejective-sounding sounds are produced in German and English and compared them with ejectives in Georgian, where they form a regular part of the sound inventory. Various methods were used to investigate the activity of the vocal cords and larynx, as well as to record changes in air pressure in the mouth. MRI scans of some of the German and Georgian native speakers were also made to capture changes in the mouth and pharynx. The acquisition of German plosives (p t k b d g) by Georgian native speakers learning German was examined, including whether learning German also impacts their native language, i.e., whether Georgian plosives (p t k b d g p’ t’ k’) are influenced by sound patterns in German. The relevance of the findings: The study of ejective-sounding sounds in German and English has shown how ejectives can emerge in a language from the overlap of sounds already present in the language and, as in English, gradually become an independent part of the sound inventory. The mechanism of production of ejective-sounding sounds in German and English also sheds critical light on previous descriptions of ejectives in languages like Georgian. We were able to show that ejectives in Georgian are often also not produced with any vertical movement of the larynx, as in German. The study of Georgian native speakers learning German has not only shown the influence of the native language on the acquisition of a foreign language but also how patterns in the foreign language can have an impact on one's own native language.
Publications
-
Detecting larynx movement in non-pulmonic consonants using dual-channel electroglottography. In Proc. XIXth ICPhS. Melbourne
Simpson, Adrian P. & Erika Brandt
-
Measuring ejectives. In Proc. Phonetik und Phonologie 15. Düsseldorf
Brandt, Erika, Adrian P. Simpson & Nato Sulaberidze
-
Where does the air pressure come from? The production of ejectives in German and Georgian. In Jürgen Trouvain & Bernd Möbius (eds.), Workshop Measurement of Speech Respiration and Speech Preparation Phases. Saarbrücken
Simpson, Adrian P. & Erika Brandt
-
The production of ejectives in German and Georgian. Journal of Phonetics, 89, 101111.
Brandt, Erika & Simpson, Adrian P.
-
Ejectives in English: elicitation und analysis. In Proc. Phonetik und Phonologie 18. Bielefeld
Simpson, Adrian P. & Nato Sulaberidze
-
Werden deutsche epiphänomenale ejektive als ‘echte’ Ejektive wahrgenommen? In Proc. Phonetik und Phonologie 18. Bielefeld
Sulaberidze, Nato
-
Ejectives in Georgian. A real-time MRI analysis of vertical larynx movement. In Proc. XXth ICPhS. Prague, 976–980
Sulaberidze, Nato, Erika Brandt, Phil Hoole, Martin Krämer, Jürgen R. Reichenbach & Adrian P. Simpson
-
Intraoral pressure in Georgian ejectives. In Proc. Phonetik und Phonologie 19. Bern, 63–64
Sulaberidze, Nato, Erika Brandt & Adrian P. Simpson
-
Production of L2 German stops by Georgian speakers. In Proc. Phonetics and Phonology in Europe 2023. Nijmegen
Sulaberidze, Nato
-
Gender roles shaping phonetic patterns in Georgian and German. In Proc. Phonetik und Phonologie 20. Halle (Saale), 109–110
Sulaberidze, Nato, Adrian P. Simpson & Melanie Weirich
-
Sex-specific patterns in intraoral pressure in the production of Georgian and German ejectives. In 13th International Seminar of Speech Production (ISSP). Autrans, 234–235
Sulaberidze, Nato & Adrian P. Simpson
