Preaspiration in the Nordic Languages: Synchronic and Diachronic ...

stops that we find in, for example, Central Standard Swedish (CSw) was
already present in PN. Essentially, then, it is proposed that in most of
Scandinavia, the realisation of fortis stops has not changed much over the
last 1500 years. We should therefore see the present tendency for preaspiration
as a stable phonetic pattern rather than a transient phenomenon
or an anomaly.
Importantly, the presence of non-normative preaspiration and postaspiration
provides the phonetic preconditions necessary for the development
of normative preaspiration and postaspiration. The role of such preconditions
for sound change has been emphasised by, for example, Ohala
(e.g., 1993) and Engstrand et al. (1998). It is further posited that the development
of normative preaspiration has taken place relatively independently
in the different dialects. The reason is that this seems to be the
most straightforward way to account for (i) the cross-dialectal diversity
of the phonological distribution of normative preaspiration, (ii) the close
agreement between the observed durational characteristics of nonnormative
preaspiration and the phonological distribution of normative
preaspiration, and (iii) the existence of dialects that have developed normative
postaspiration instead of preaspiration. As regards preconditions
for change, it can be pointed out that the linguistic literature offers several
examples of genetically related languages or dialects that undergo
similar changes even though they have not been in contact for some time
(Sapir 1927:171ff, Dixon 1997:14).
A second question addressed in this last chapter emerges from the
scenario described above: exactly how does a transition from nonnormative
to normative preaspiration occur? Or, for that matter, from
non-normative to normative postaspiration? It will be suggested that an
explanation can be obtained by seeing phonetic variation as dynamic
over time and bound not only by physiology or system internal pressures,
but also by convention. As a consequence, phonetic variation can
be expected to expand and/or contract over time. A phonetic change can
occur as a result of an expansion of phonetic variation (such that the
variation covers an increasing volume in “phonetic space”) followed by a
contraction of phonetic variation to a different locations in phonetic
space. This will be referred to as the E/C (expansion/contraction) model.
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