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

similar to that in CSw today. Some speakers produced preaspirated stops,
others did not. In some areas—for reasons we can only guess at—there
occurred a change in the structure of phonetic variation. Within these
areas, an increasing number of speakers adopted the non-normative trait
of producing fortis stops with preaspiration. This ultimately resulted in
several communities of speakers in which synchronised voice offset and
oral closure ceased to be contained within the norm.
In terms of the typology of change, the emergence of preaspiration
seems to fall in the category of “strengthening processes” (Kiparsky
1988:378, 383). At least, it does not seem feasible to classify it as a
“weakening process” (ibid. 377, 381). In phonetic terms, this
strengthening might occur in the form of an “active” increase in air flow
across the glottis in the production of preaspiration. This is not uncontroversial,
however. It is possible, for example, that those CSw speakers
who regularly produce preaspiration only adjust the relative timing of the
glottal and supralaryngeal gestures and thus perform no “extra work”.
These issues might be resolved through experimentation.
Before we turn to the question of what may have triggered this
change in the structure of phonetic variation, it is useful to draw a parallel
with similar changes in vowel systems. As opposed to changes in consonant
systems, changes in vowel systems have been extensively documented.
Labov (1994) provides an overview of numerous such studies.
Among these is an extensive discussion of vowel changes in Philadelphia,
studied in the years 1973–1977 (ibid. p. 55).
In the following, hypothetical demonstration, I shall use as a template
the raising and fronting of the nucleus of the diphthong /aw/ in
words like bow and about, as described by Labov (ibid. 56ff). Labov’s
description is based on observations in “apparent time.” 1 Since I do not
have access to real raw data for this change (or any other similar
changes), the data points are fictitious. Despite this, I hope that the example
serves as an illustration of how changes in the structure of phonetic
variation can at the same time be changes in pronunciation norms.
1 Studies in apparent time refer to studies in which age strata in synchronic data (i.e.,
pronunciation differences between different generations of speakers) are taken as
indications that a change has occurred between earlier and later states of the language
(cf. Labov 1994:28).
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