Positional Neutralization - Linguistics - University of California ...

1.4. Categories, neutralization and the phonologization process
As outlined above, while the influence of phonology on phonetics takes place in
the synchronic interpretation of categorical phonological representations as
implementable sets of phonetic targets, in the approach assumed here the influence of
phonetics on phonology is diachronic in nature, the result of the process of
phonologization changing phonological representations according to reinterpretations of
phonetic patterns. Before outlining the phonologization process, however, it is necessary
first to provide further details concerning the relationship between phonological
categories and phonetic targets in the phonologization model assumed here.
The first possibility for the relationship between the realizations of a single
phonological element in weak and strong positions involves a single wide target
specification for the phonetic feature in question. Thus, in a system where a single
phonological entity /e/ is realized as [e] under stress, but in unstressed syllables raises
toward [i] as a function of the duration accorded it, we can imagine a single wide target
window for all realizations of /e/. In stressed syllables, assuming durational targets to be
consistently high, the pressure from shortened durations necessary to condition raising
would never arise, allowing values for the specification of the height of /e/ to be realized
toward the center of target window for that dimension (whether conceived as a set of
articulatory parameters corresponding to openness of the upper vocal tract or as acoustic
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