Positional Neutralization - Linguistics - University of California ...

position as a licenser of contrasts, and demands an explanation from any theory seeking
to account for the typology of positional neutralization effects found in this position. In
this chapter I offer an explanation of these contradictory phonological patterns which
attributes their emergence to the effects of a diverse constellation of phonetic properties
associated with domain-final position. These effects, while perfectly compatible with one
another from a production standpoint, have consequences for the perception of contrasts
which frequently prove mutually contradictory. Whether the phonetic patterns tending to
enhance perceptual robustness or those tending to diminish it are ultimately reinterpreted
as intentional and phonologized is determined by the relative magnitudes of the language-
specific instantiations of each phonetic tendency.
While the phonological effects of this uneasy coexistence in final position among
perceptually antagonistic phonetic trends are comprehensible according to the
phonologization approach to typological patterning, final syllables present a problem for
Universalist Pure Prominence approaches to PN. The equally robust attestation of final
syllables as strong and weak licensers of vowel contrasts precludes the specification in
UG of final position as either inherently Strong or inherently Weak. While the licensing
capabilities of final syllables in a given language will be motivated from a diachronic-
phonetic standpoint, synchronically phonological Strength or Weakness for this position
appears to be a parameter which must be set arbitrarily on a language-specific basis.
117