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The voicing of lenis plosives in Zurich German: a sociophonetic marker of (multi-) ethnolectal speech


Morand, Marie-Anne; Bruno, Melissa; Julmi, Nora; Schwab, Sandra; Schmid, Stephan (2019). The voicing of lenis plosives in Zurich German: a sociophonetic marker of (multi-) ethnolectal speech. In: 19th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, Melbourne, Australia, 5 August 2019 - 9 August 2019. Australasian Speech Science and Technology Association Inc, 1600-1604.

Abstract

Since the turn of the millennium, the emergence of so-called (multi-)ethnolects has been observed in different cities of German-speaking Switzerland. This way of speaking differs significantly from traditional Swiss German dialects. However, a sociophonetic investigation of these varieties is lacking for the time being. The present study provides an acoustic analysis of plosive voicing in two groups of Zurich German speakers. Traditional Swiss German dialects are reported to show a contrast between two categories of homorganic plosives (fortis vs. lenis) which is based on closure duration, but not on voicing. We compared the proportion of voicing in lenis plosives of 20 speakers with a multicultural and of 10 speakers with a monocultural background. Our results support the view that multicultural speakers of Zurich German do indeed use voiced lenis plosives as a sociophonetic marker, whereas monocultural speakers adhere to the traditional fortis-lenis pattern.

Abstract

Since the turn of the millennium, the emergence of so-called (multi-)ethnolects has been observed in different cities of German-speaking Switzerland. This way of speaking differs significantly from traditional Swiss German dialects. However, a sociophonetic investigation of these varieties is lacking for the time being. The present study provides an acoustic analysis of plosive voicing in two groups of Zurich German speakers. Traditional Swiss German dialects are reported to show a contrast between two categories of homorganic plosives (fortis vs. lenis) which is based on closure duration, but not on voicing. We compared the proportion of voicing in lenis plosives of 20 speakers with a multicultural and of 10 speakers with a monocultural background. Our results support the view that multicultural speakers of Zurich German do indeed use voiced lenis plosives as a sociophonetic marker, whereas monocultural speakers adhere to the traditional fortis-lenis pattern.

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Additional indexing

Item Type:Conference or Workshop Item (Paper), refereed, original work
Communities & Collections:06 Faculty of Arts > Institute of Computational Linguistics
Dewey Decimal Classification:000 Computer science, knowledge & systems
410 Linguistics
Language:English
Event End Date:9 August 2019
Deposited On:09 Aug 2019 14:04
Last Modified:27 May 2022 13:40
Publisher:Australasian Speech Science and Technology Association Inc
ISBN:978-0-646-80069-1
OA Status:Green
Free access at:Official URL. An embargo period may apply.
Official URL:http://intro2psycholing.net/ICPhS/
Project Information:
  • : FunderSNSF
  • : Grant ID100015_165798
  • : Project TitlePhonetic features of (multi-)ethnic urban vernaculars in German-speaking Switzerland
  • Content: Published Version