in words like [kaç] ~ [kais] 'box' is straightforward if both are analyzed as ..... Initial /u/ also occurs stem-initially in prefixed forms like /ka-uaua/ [ka-wawa].
PHONOLOGICAL AND PHONETIC ASPECTS OF ENGGANO VOWELS
by Brendon E. Yoder Bachelor of Arts, Moody Bible Institute, 2006
A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the University of North Dakota in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of Master of Arts
Grand Forks, North Dakota August 2011
Copyright 2011 Brendon Yoder
ii
This thesis, submitted by Brendon E. Yoder in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts from the University of North Dakota, has been read by the Faculty Advisory Committee under whom the work has been done and is hereby approved.
Chairperson
This thesis meets the standards for appearance, conforms to the style and format requirements of the Graduate School of the University of North Dakota, and is hereby approved.
Dean of the Graduate School Date
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PERMISSION
Title
Phonological and Phonetic Aspects of Enggano Vowels
Department
Linguistics
Degree
Master of Arts
In presenting this thesis in partial fulfillment of the requirements for a graduate degree from the University of North Dakota, I agree that the library of this University shall make it freely available for inspection. I further agree that permission for extensive copying for scholarly purposes may be granted by the professor who supervised my thesis work or, in his absence, by the chairperson of the department or the dean of the Graduate School. It is understood that any copying or publication or other use of this thesis or part thereof for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. It is also understood that due recognition shall be given to me and to the University of North Dakota in any scholarly use which may be made of any material in my thesis.
Signature ________________________________ Date
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________________________________
TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES ......................................................................................................... vii LIST OF TABLES .............................................................................................................ix ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................................xi ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................................xii CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................... 1 1.1. Historical, geographical and sociopolitical context ................................2 1.2. Previous research on Enggano................................................................6 2. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY .................................................... 12 3. OVERVIEW OF ENGGANO PHONOLOGY........................................................ 21 3.1. Consonants...........................................................................................21 3.2. Vowels .................................................................................................31 3.3. Syllable structure .................................................................................36 3.4. Stress pattern .......................................................................................37 4. SYLLABIFICATION OF VOCOID SEQUENCES.................................................. 41 4.1. Attested sequences ...............................................................................41 4.2. Syllabification ......................................................................................44 4.3. Acoustic correlates of syllabification patterns ......................................49 4.4. Phonological analysis in Optimality Theory.........................................64 5. VOWEL QUALITY............................................................................................ 70 5.1. Methodology ........................................................................................70 5.2. Results .................................................................................................72
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5.3. Discussion ............................................................................................74 6. VOWEL QUALITY TRANSITION IN VOCOID SEQUENCES .............................. 82 6.1. Methodology ........................................................................................82 6.2. Results .................................................................................................85 6.3. Summary..............................................................................................94 7. CONCLUSION.................................................................................................. 95 APPENDICES ................................................................................................................ 98 REFERENCES.............................................................................................................. 145
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LIST OF FIGURES Figure
Page
1.
Enggano island in Indonesia.................................................................................. 1
2.
Ethnologue language map of Sumatra ................................................................... 5
3.
Villages on Enggano island.................................................................................... 6
4.
Vowel quality of stressed and unstressed vowels..................................................39
5.
Intensity contour of [ɘi ̯] in [pɘi ̯s] ‘machete’ ...................................................... 50
6.
Intensity contour of [oi ̯] in [boh.oi ̯] ‘rope’ ........................................................ 51
7.
Intensity contour of [iɘ] in [pi.ɘh] ‘massage’..................................................... 52
8.
Intensity contour of [iɨ] in [hi.ɨr] ‘woman’ .........................................................53
9.
Intensity contour of [jõ] in [jĩhjõn] ‘type of tool’ .............................................. 54
10.
Intensity contour of [o̯e] in [boh.o̯e] ‘wild’ ....................................................... 55
11.
Duration of vocoid sequences in final open syllables........................................... 59
12.
Duration of vocoid sequences in final closed syllables......................................... 60
13.
Duration of vocoid sequences in final open syllables after glottal consonant............................................................................................................ 62
14.
Duration of vocoid sequences in final closed syllables after glottal consonant.............................................................................................................63
15.
Plotted oral vowels.............................................................................................. 72
16.
Plotted nasal vowels.............................................................................................73
17.
Average value of oral and nasal vowels............................................................... 74
18.
Comparison of F1 ranges of oral and nasal vowels .............................................. 76
19.
Comparison of F2 ranges of oral and nasal vowels .............................................. 77
20.
Plotted nasal vowels as spoken by Adam Kurniawan........................................... 78
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21.
Plotted nasal vowels as spoken by Josia .............................................................. 79
22.
Plotted nasal vowels as spoken by Milson Kaitora............................................... 80
23.
Plotted nasal vowels as spoken by Manogar RH .................................................. 80
24.
Targets [u] and [a] in [pu.ak] ‘go’..................................................................... 84
25.
Targets [a] and [ɨ] in [jarkɨ.aʔ.aɨ ̯] ‘fence’.......................................................... 84
26.
Disyllabic sequence [i.a] in [ki.ak] ‘blood’ ........................................................ 85
27.
Disyllabic sequence [ɨ.a] in [pɨ.ah] ‘face’........................................................... 86
28.
Disyllabic sequence [u.a] in [pu.ak] ‘go’ ........................................................... 87
29.
Disyllabic sequence [i.u] in [hi.ur] ‘dust’ .......................................................... 88
30.
Disyllabic sequence [u.i] in [kahə̆ʔu.is] ‘sea crab’............................................. 88
31.
Diphthong [ai ̯] in [karaʔ.ai ̯] ‘type of tree’ ......................................................... 89
32.
Diphthong [aɨ ̯] in [jarkɨ.aʔ.aɨ ̯] ‘small fence’ ...................................................... 90
33.
Diphthong [au̯] in [baʔ.au̯] ‘guava’ ................................................................... 91
34.
Tautosyllabic diphthong [aɪ ̯] in [paɪ ̯ʔ] ‘throw’ ................................................... 92
35.
Targets [a] and [ɪ ̯] in [paɪ ̯ʔ] ‘throw’................................................................... 92
36.
Diphthong [aʊ̯] in [bah.aʊ̯ʔ] ‘heart’ ...................................................................93
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LIST OF TABLES Table
Page
1.
Consonant inventory from Nothofer (1992) .......................................................... 8
2.
Difference between consonant inventories ............................................................ 8
3.
Vowel inventory from Nothofer (1992)................................................................. 9
4.
Difference between vowel inventories................................................................... 9
5.
Enggano consonant phonemes............................................................................. 21
6.
Consonant co-occurrences in underlying forms ................................................... 26
7.
Contrast for /x/ ................................................................................................... 29
8.
Enggano vowel phonemes ....................................................................................32
9.
Syllable types in Enggano.....................................................................................36
10.
Correlation of duration, intensity and pitch with word stress...............................38
11.
Oral vocoid sequences ......................................................................................... 42
12.
Nasal vocoid sequences ........................................................................................43
13.
Syllabification patterns in vocoid sequences........................................................ 48
14.
Final vocoid sequences for duration measurement .............................................. 57
15.
/ʔa-piah/ [ʔa.pi.ah] ‘graze’............................................................................... 65
16.
/ka-karai/ [ka.ka.rai ̯] ‘chase’ ........................................................................... 65
17.
/ki-deok/ *[ki.deo̯k] ‘pinched’, incorrect prediction ........................................ 66
18.
/ki-deok/ [ki.de.ok] ‘pinched’, correct prediction ............................................ 66
19.
/karaʔai/ [ka.raʔ.ai ̯] ‘type of tree’.................................................................... 66
20.
/kõʔĩã/ [kõʔ.jã] ‘tree sp.’ .................................................................................. 67
21.
/koʔoeʔ/ [koʔ.o̯eʔ] ‘devil’................................................................................. 67
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22.
/ki-deok/ *[kid.e̯ok] ‘pinched’, incorrect prediction ........................................ 67
23.
/ki-deok/ [ki.de.ok] ‘pinched’, correct prediction ............................................ 68
24.
Summary of OT constraint ranking...................................................................... 69
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my appreciation to the people of Meok village on Enggano. They graciously hosted me, showed me around their village and their island, and patiently answered my endless stream of questions about their language. Special thanks to my hosts Jhon Rafles K.N. and his wife. Thanks also to the other Meok residents who participated in the research: Adam Kurniawan, Josia, Milson Kaitora, Marhelam, Manogar R.H., and two anonymous participants. Thanks to SIL Indonesia for covering transportation and housing costs, as well as for providing logistical support throughout the research. I am especially grateful for my thesis advisor Dr. John Clifton, who guided me through the entire research project. My understanding of phonology has grown tremendously as John has explained and applied concepts, taken my ideas apart and put them back together again. I also owe a big thanks to my other committee members Dr. Steve Marlett and Dr. David Weber, who provided invaluable insight as research progressed. My wife Naomi has been a great support to me, enduring my long absence during research trips during our engagement, and long mental absence at home in front of the computer screen. Thank you, and I love you. Finally, I am grateful to God who gives wisdom, strength and life.
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ABSTRACT The Enggano language has received little attention in Austronesian linguistics. It is an isolate located geographically in a large area of related languages. A dedicated description of Enggano phonology has never been undertaken before. This thesis describes aspects of Enggano phonology and phonetics, primarily at the word level. It focuses mainly on vowels and vocoid sequences. As a starting point for analysis of Enggano phonemes, a list of phonemes was compiled from previous research where phonemes are mentioned. For each reported phoneme, words were elicited with the phoneme in initial, prestress and final (stressed) position. An example word containing each vowel and consonant was recorded in frames for acoustic analysis. Since sequences of two or more adjacent vocoids are common, words containing examples of all vocoid sequences were recorded in frames as well. The Enggano phoneme inventory consists of twelve consonants and fourteen vowels in a seven-vowel oral system and an analogous seven-vowel nasal system. There are seven possible syllable types. Word stress is consistently final in both monomorphemic and polymorphemic words. Acoustic measurements show that word stress is indicated by intensity in closed syllables, and possibly by length and pitch in both open and closed syllables. There are a few allophonic processes in Enggano. An intrusive vowel (Hall 2006) is inserted in consonant sequences beginning with /ʔ/. A tentative analysis of the fricative /x/ is that it is realized as [x], [ç], or [s] depending on the context. The glottal stop is
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optionally palatalized after a high front vowel, and vowels are nasalized in words with a nasal consonant. Vocoid sequences syllabify based on the preceding environment and the relative height of the two vocoids. Two-vocoid sequences after medial non-glottals are disyllabic except sequences beginning with a lower vocoid and ending with a higher vocoid (lowhigh and mid-high). These are realized as diphthongs. Vocoid sequences after medial glottal consonants [ʔ] and [h] are realized differently. Glottal consonants syllabify in the coda of the previous syllable. Syllable-initial vocoids in sequences that are not lowhigh are realized in the onset of the syllable, as in /kõʔĩã/ [kõʔ.jã] ‘tree sp.’. This process does not affect low-high sequences, or sequences where the glottal consonant is word-initial. Acoustic measurements show that the three syllabification patterns of vocoid sequences (vowel-vowel, glide-vowel, vowel-glide) can be distinguished by both intensity and overall duration of the sequences. Nasal vowels have a much greater range in the vowel space than oral vowels, and consequently there is much more overlap between adjacent vowels. This range can be attributed to variation between speakers in articulation of nasal vowels. Vocoids in sequences are very similar in place of articulation to their interconsonantal counterparts. Vocoids in disyllabic sequences are generally in more extreme areas of the vowel space, while vocoids in diphthongs are generally located in more central areas of the vowel space than plain vowels.
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CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION The Enggano [eno]1 language is an isolate spoken by about 1,500 people in Indonesia (Lewis 2009). It is spoken only on the island of Enggano, which is about 80 miles (125 km) off the southwestern coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, in the Indian Ocean. The island of Enggano is the southernmost of the Barrier Islands that extend along the western coast of Sumatra. Figure 1 shows a map of Indonesia, with an arrow marking Enggano. Figure 1. Enggano island in Indonesia2
1
ISO 639-3 language identification codes are given in square brackets following language names. 2 Accessed on the Internet at https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-worldfactbook/maps/maptemplate_id.html. I added the marker for Enggano island.
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Enggano is linguistically and geographically isolated from surrounding language groups. Because of this and the small number of people who speak it, the language has received little attention in the literature. This thesis, a description of Enggano word-level phonology and phonetics, is the first research project dedicated to analyzing the phonology of Enggano. The thesis is laid out as follows. The first three chapters are introductory in nature, giving background (Chapter 1) and methodology (Chapter 2), followed by an overview of phonemes, allophonic processes, stress patterns, and syllable structure in Chapter 3. Chapter 4 is dedicated to a discussion of vocoid sequences, focusing on syllabification processes. Chapter 5 presents an acoustic analysis of vowel quality of single vowels, while chapter 6 lays out an acoustic analysis of vowel quality transition in vocoid sequences. Finally, conclusions are given in chapter 7.
1.1 Historical, geographical and sociopolitical context Little is known about the island of Enggano or its people before the late nineteenth century. The name Enggano is popularly thought to come from the Portuguese engano ‘deception, error’. A story, told by local Enggano people as well as outsiders, says that the Portuguese explorers of the sixteenth century came upon Enggano from the West and mistakenly thought that they had found Sumatra. In their disappointment at finding that they had not arrived on Sumatra, they named the island Enggano. Any former language-internal name for the Enggano people and language has been lost, as the exonym Enggano is the only name that is known. The Museum Volkenkunde in Leiden, The Netherlands, houses a collection of artifacts and drawings from early explorers’ visits to Enggano (ter Keurs n.d.). Drawings from Modigliani (1894) show Enggano people living a Stone Age-type existence with no evidence of influence from the Malay and Javanese civilizations a few hundred miles
2
away. They lived in beehive-shaped houses similar to traditional houses of the Andaman Islands of India 1,000 miles to the northwest in the Indian Ocean. The old Malay name for the island of Enggano, Pulau Telanjang or Naked Island, reflects the fact that the Enggano had a lifestyle very different from that of the larger people groups of Sumatra and Java. With the onset of contact with outsiders, the Enggano society went through major upheaval. At some point between 1866 and 1884 the population of the island was decimated, going from over 6,000 people in 1866 to 900 people in 1884 (Jaspan 1964, 110). Some authors believe that this was caused by cholera, venereal disease, and induced abortion (Helfrich 1888). Whatever the cause of the decimation of Enggano’s population, the effects were devastating for the language. In his dictionary Kähler notes that when he conducted his 1937 field research on the island, only about 200 people still spoke Enggano as their mother tongue, “which, however, in the case of the younger generation . . . was already strongly influenced by Malay” (1987, 81). Concerning Enggano culture, Keuning (1955) said that the traditional culture had almost completely disappeared by the middle of the twentieth century. The Enggano culture and language were put in further jeopardy in the early 1960s when the Indonesian government began relocating convicts from Java and Sumatra to Enggano. By 1963 there were 2,600 offenders from other parts of Indonesia on the island in addition to the 400 remaining Enggano people (Jaspan 1964, 110). Contrary to predictions during the early 1900s, the Enggano population has actually grown in the past fifty years, and the language is still in vigorous daily use. Estimates of the number of Enggano speakers today range from 700 (Wurm 2000) to 1,500 (Lewis 2009). The total population of the island is around 2,000, with about half
3
of the population being native and the other half being people of outside descent, mostly from Java and Sumatra. Enggano has recently been heavily influenced by the culture, politics and languages of Java and Sumatra. The languages most influential on Enggano are the Malay and Indonesian language varieties spoken on Java and Sumatra. The nearest language is Bengkulu Malay, spoken in and around the city of Bengkulu (classified in the Ethnologue as a dialect of Central Malay [pse]). The only ferries connecting Enggano to Sumatra go to Bengkulu, so there is much direct contact between that city and the island. Minangkabau [min] is a regional trade language along the west coast of Sumatra, and as such it also has influence on Enggano. The third prominent language influencing Enggano is Standard Indonesian [ind], the official language of Indonesia and the language of school, government, and all official business on Enggano. Figure 2 shows the Ethnologue language map of Sumatra. Enggano island is number 13 at the far bottom, Central Malay is spoken in the area designated by number 10 in the southwest, and Minangkabau is spoken in the area designated by number 28 along the western coast.
4
Figure 2. Ethnologue language map of Sumatra
Bengkulu Malay, Minangkabau, and Indonesian are all closely related to each other. It is often difficult to tell which one has caused a particular effect in Enggano. Speakers of Bengkulu Malay, Minangkabau and Indonesian now live on Enggano island, intermingled with the local Enggano population. Speakers of other languages, including Batak and Javanese, live there as well. Since few of the immigrants speak Enggano, most interethnic communication takes place in Indonesian or Bengkulu Malay. Enggano speakers only use their language among themselves, although many immigrants claim that they can understand some of the language. There are six villages on Enggano island, all of them strung along the island’s only road on the northeast coast. Figure 3 shows the villages on the island. The lines mark the territorial boundaries of the villages, while the dots represent the residential area for each village.
5
Figure 3. Villages on Enggano island3
The three central villages of Malakoni, Apoho and Meok have greater percentages of native Enggano residents, while the outlying villages of Banjarsari, Kaana and Kahayapu have larger immigrant populations. Ferries to Bengkulu depart from Kahayapu and Malakoni.
1.2 Previous research on Enggano The first substantial documentation of life on Enggano began when Enggano’s contact with the outside world increased in the last half of the nineteenth century. Dutch administrators and explorers made numerous trips to the island and published several general reports on the people, culture and language. These include Boewang (1854), van der Straaten and Severijn (1855), von Rosenberg (1855), Walland (1864), van der Hoeven (1870), and Helfrich (1888). These reports culminated in an often cited
3
This map was created by SIL Indonesia and is used by permission. I added the points to represent the approximate place of each village’s residential area.
6
ethnographic description of the Enggano people, “The Island of Women”, by Italian researcher E. Modigliani (1894). Ethnograpic work continued with more recent work by Tichelman (1942), Keuning (1955), Amran (1979), and ter Keurs (2006). The first linguistic records from Enggano are the brief wordlists found in van der Straaten and Severijn (1855) and von Rosenberg (1855). Both of these wordlists were recorded by non-linguists unfamiliar with the Enggano language, so their accuracy is doubtful. Helfrich and Pieters (1891) published an extensive wordlist, with extensive corrections and additions published a few years later (Helfrich 1916). The complete wordlist contains over 1,000 items, with glosses in Malay and Dutch. Also available is the Holle List for Enggano (Stokhof 1987), which was collected in 1895 and also contains over 1,000 items. These two extended wordlists represent the first substantial records of the Enggano language. The first and only major linguistic analysis of Enggano was conducted by German linguist Hans Kähler in 1937. The results of this research include a published grammar (1940), dictionary (1987), and texts (1955; 1961; 1973; 1975). Kähler’s grammar and dictionary are the sources for most typological and comparative work on Enggano. While the grammar and dictionary are both extensive, the only mention of phonology in either one is a list of consonant and vowel phonemes and a short paragraph describing some basic features. The list of phonemes in the dictionary does not agree with the one in the grammar, and some of the dictionary’s transcriptions are inconsistent. The font used in the publication causes poor legibility for some words. Prentice (1989), among others, questions the accuracy of the transcriptions. The only literature that discusses Enggano phonology is Kähler’s grammar and dictionary, along with Nothofer’s more recent paper on loanwords in Enggano, which has a list of phonemes (Nothofer 1992). Table 1 shows Nothofer’s analysis of the consonant phonemes. 7
Table 1. Consonant inventory from Nothofer (1992) Bilabial Stop Nasal
p
b
Alveolar t
m
Trill
Palatal
Velar
d
Glottal k
n r
Fricative Approximant
ʔ
h w
j
There are extensive differences between this analysis and Kähler’s. Kähler adds /ɲ/ and /x/ as phonemes but does not include /w/. He claims that /t/ and /r/ are marginal, occurring only in certain dialects, adding /tʃ/,4 /dʒ/, /f/, and /l/ as marginal phonemes as well. These differences are summarized in Table 2. Table 2. Difference between consonant inventories p b t d tʃ dʒ k ʔ m n ɲ r f x h w j l
Kähler dictionary √ √ marginal √ marginal marginal √ √ √ √ √ marginal marginal √ √ --√ marginal
Kähler grammar √ √ marginal √ √ marginal √ √ √ √ √ marginal marginal √ √ --√ marginal
Nothofer 1992 √ √ √ √ ----√ √ √ √ --√ ----√ √ √ ---
Table 3 shows Nothofer’s analysis of vowel phonemes.
4
Kähler’s dictionary indicates /tʃ/ is marginal, while his grammar indicates it is not.
8
Table 3. Vowel inventory from Nothofer (1992) Front
Central
Back
High
i
ĩ
ɨ
ɨ̃
u
ũ
Mid
e
ẽ
ə
ə̃
o
õ
a
ã
Low
As with the consonant phonemes, there are many differences between Nothofer’s and Kähler’s analyses of vowel phonemes. Kähler’s dictionary does not include the high central vowels /ɨ ̃/ and /ɨ ̃/. His grammar, on the other hand, includes a set of low mid vowels /ɛ/, /ɛ̃/, /ɔ/, and /ɔ̃/ but does not include /ẽ/, /ə/, /ə̃/, or /õ/. Table 4 shows the difference between the vowel inventories in the same sources. Table 4. Difference between vowel inventories i ĩ ɨ ɨ̃ u ũ e ẽ ə ə̃ o õ ɛ ɛ̃ ɔ ɔ̃ a ã
Kähler dictionary √ √ ----√ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ --------√ √
Kähler grammar √ √ √ √ √ √ √ ------√ --√ √ √ √ √ √
Nothofer 1992 √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ --------√ √
The Kähler grammar also lists seventeen diphthongs as part of the phoneme inventory. All the diphthongs go from low to high, beginning with /a/, /e/ or /o/ and ending with /e/, /o/, /i/ or /u/. Diphthongs are not mentioned in any of the other sources. 9
Besides Nothofer (1992), recent discussion of Enggano has mostly been limited to brief mention of the language in historical comparative and typological work on Austronesian languages. These begin with Dyen’s lexicostatistical analysis of Austronesian wordlists (1965). Dyen’s analysis puts Enggano’s highest percentage of shared vocabulary at 11% with Murut, a language of Borneo. While the lexicostatistical method is not generally considered valid for determining language relationships, Enggano’s extraordinarily low percentage of shared vocabulary still shows that it is not closely related to any of the surrounding languages. The comparative work with the most thorough discussion of Enggano is Nothofer’s article on the Sumatran Barrier Islands languages (1986). Nothofer provides quantitative evidence for subgrouping Sichule (Sikule), Nias, Mentawai, and Simalur (Simeulue). Enggano, however, is included only as a possible member of the subgroup because it is so deviant from the other languages in the Barrier Islands. Other authors take widely differing approaches to Enggano’s classification. Mahdi (1986) groups all Austronesian languages in Western and Eastern subgroups, with most of the Barrier Islands languages in the Western subgroup and Enggano in the Eastern subgroup. Capell (1982) takes a cautious approach, classifying Enggano as a nonAustronesian isolate. He concludes, “Enggano does not in fact belong to the [ProtoAustronesian] group” (p. 4). The Ethnologue summarizes the lack of consensus on Enggano’s classification: “Not closely related to other languages. Not conclusively established as an Austronesian language, rather than an isolate with Austronesian loans.” There are three other studies discussing other aspects of the Enggano language. Nothofer (1992) lists sound changes that occurred in the adaptation of loanwords from Malay/Indonesian and Minangkabau into Enggano. Schmidt (1988) discusses the sound changes that occurred in Enggano over the past fifty years. Enggano is undergoing rapid 10
change under influence from Malay and Indonesian in its grammar, lexicon, phonology and domains of use. A very recent study of bilingualism patterns among the Enggano people by Simanjuntak (2009) shows that Enggano is still a vital language used in conjunction with Standard Indonesian for daily life. Simanjuntak states that attitudes toward both Enggano and Indonesian are positive.
11
CHAPTER 2 RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY The goal of this research is a description of Enggano phonology and phonetics that will be of typological interest and will be useful for language development, with a focus on vocoids and vocoid sequences. To accomplish this, I take what is already known about Enggano phonology and expand on that knowledge with original research. In this chapter I summarize what has been previously published about Enggano phonology. I then sketch out my objectives for further research and the methodology used to accomplish the objectives. As indicated in Chapter 1, the three publications that have information on Enggano phonology are Kähler’s grammar and dictionary and Nothofer’s 1992 paper on loanwords. Following is a summary of the analyses presented there. (a)
Phoneme inventory: twelve to seventeen consonants and six to eight oral vowels with nasal counterparts. Kähler (1940) lists seventeen diphthongs in the phoneme inventory while other sources do not list these.
(b)
Syllable structure: CV and V. Kähler’s dictionary does not list any syllable codas. There are many vowel sequences.
(c)
Stress patterns: The discussion in the 1895 Holle list says, “word stress mostly is on the penultimate syllable; if not it falls on the final syllable” (Stokhof 1987, 189). Kähler’s dictionary also states that stress is penultimate.
(d)
Morphophonology: There are many prefixes and suffixes in the language. As affixation is difficult to decipher in Kähler’s dictionary because of
12
typographical issues, it is difficult to tell whether there is any phonologically conditioned alternation in derived forms. (e)
Dialects: The Kähler grammar lists a few phonological differences between two dialects, and the older Dutch sources also list dialectal differences. There were apparently different speech patterns on several small inhabited outlying islands, especially Pulau Dua. Today the outlying islands are no longer inhabited. In 2007 Enggano speakers informed a sociolinguistic survey team that there was no dialect variation at all in the Enggano language (Aprilani 2007). The same was reported to me during my field research in 2010. Only the northeastern coast of the island is now inhabited.
Based on the goal of a descriptive phonology that is of typological interest, and based on what is already known from the literature, the following objectives guide the research. The focus here is on vowels and vocoid sequences. (a)
Establish the phoneme inventory, specifically by resolving areas of disagreement between the various published phoneme inventories.
(b)
List and discuss basic phonological patterns including syllable structure, stress patterns, allophonic processes and positional neutralization of contrast.
(c)
List and discuss syllabification patterns in vocoid sequences.
(d)
Provide a phonological analysis of syllabification patterns of vocoid sequences.
(e)
Show the acoustic correlates (duration, intensity, formants) of all syllabification patterns of vocoid sequences.
(f)
Show how the vowel system maps out acoustically in the vowel space.
Because of external factors, I was able to spend only two weeks doing intensive data collection in Meok. I was able to collect a large amount of quality data during that time, thanks to the guidance of my advisor and the generosity of my Enggano hosts. However, 13
two weeks is a very short time span for conducting field work, and there are several areas of Enggano phonology that remain unclear because of a lack of time in field research. If more extended visits to Enggano are undertaken in the future, researchers will be able to build on the initial research presented here. I discuss in prose below the methodologies used to accomplish the six objectives presented above. The phoneme inventories in Kähler (1940; 1987) and Nothofer (1992) give a total of fourteen vowels and eighteen consonants, including all of Kähler’s marginal consonants. For each of the vowels and consonants, native speakers were asked to think of words that contained that segment in various positions. Initially, the goal was to obtain ten examples of each consonant in the onset of syllables in three positions: initial, medial pre-stress, and stressed; as well as word-finally. This is shown in (1). (1) Four word positions for consonant elicitation (Example consonant: [p]) Initial /purik/ [purik] ‘grow’ Medial pre-stress /kĩpãʔĩõp/ [kĩpãʔjõp] ‘eight’ Stressed /hãpɘ̃ʔ/5 [hãpɘ̃ʔ] ‘breathe’ Final /kõp/ [kõp] ‘grave’ Each vowel was to be elicited in initial, stressed, and post-stress environments. These parameters were set up with the assumption that, as per Kähler, stress was penultimate and there were no syllable codas. When it became evident that stress was final, elicitation for the post-stress position was discontinued. Since word-initial syllable onsets are mandatory, elicitation for vowel-initial words was discontinued as well. The word positions for vowel elicitation are shown in (2). (2) Three word positions for vowel elicitation (Example vowel: [a]) Pre-stress / tahaʔ/ [tahaʔ] ‘write’ Final closed syllable /poraʔ/ [poraʔ] ‘split’
5
Formant measurements of the mid central vowel show that it is acoustically higher than the other mid vowels /e/ and /o/ (see section 5.2). Perceptually, the quality of this vowel sounds different from that of intrusive schwa (see section 3.3). So the high-mid vowel symbol [ɘ] is used for the mid central phoneme, while the schwa symbol with the breve [ə̆] is used for intrusive schwa.
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Final open syllable
/ kitaha /
[kitaha]
‘centipede’
It also became evident during elicitation that there were many syllable codas in the language, including word-internal codas. This created the possibility of medial consonant sequences across syllable boundaries. Medial consonant sequences are common. Elicitation focused on consonant sequences was therefore not necessary since there were many examples of the sequences in words elicited for other purposes. Examples of each vocoid sequence6 were elicited as well. The goal was to obtain at least five examples of all possible combinations, excluding homorganic sequences. The surrounding environment was not specified as it was for consonants and vowels. Speakers could only think of one or two examples of some of the rarer sequences, especially the nasal and nasalized sequences. A total of six men and two women, all from the village of Meok, participated in the research. All had spent most of their lives in Meok. All were initially thought to be firstlanguage Enggano speakers, although I learned later that one of the women had learned Indonesian as her first language and had learned Enggano while in elementary school. Data contributed by this speaker was not removed from the database since everyone agreed that she spoke Enggano no differently from anyone else, and had been fluent for a very long time. The speakers worked in small groups. Together they filled out paper forms that listed a segment, a specific environment, and ten blank example spaces for examples. The speakers worked in small groups to fill out the forms. One group member was informally assigned as the transcriber. Standard Indonesian orthography was used for
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In this thesis, the term vocoid sequence is used to denote a sequence of underlying vowels. Vocoid sequences have surface realization as either two vowels or a vowel and an approximant.
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transcription, with the addition of the apostrophe
