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Jacqueline Hubbard*, Kailey Nelson, Emily Silber Dr. Yun Kim Emory Department of Linguistics Emory University 532 Kilgo Circle, Suite 202C Atlanta, GA 30322
This study aims to analyze the environments in which vowels in Farsi are lengthened. Previous work indicates that there are unstable vowels (/e/, /o/, and /æ/), which are lengthened in informal words and closed syllables, and stable vowels (/i/, /u/, and /ɑ/, which are not affected by their environments. By eliciting words from a 20-year-old female American heritage Farsi speaker containing varying vowel distributions, we measured the variability in vowel length using Praat software. The changes in length for unstable vowels were not statistically significant; however, there were statistically significant differences in vowel length for stable vowels. This finding directly opposes the conclusions drawn by previous research. We were unable to elicit a distinction between formal and informal words and therefore were unable to delineate a lengthening pattern within these contexts. Further analysis of vowel lengthening in modern Farsi is needed to better understand the environments in which it occurs and how it is evolving with the language and the introduction of a heritage speaker population.
Presenter: Jacqueline Hubbard
Institution: Emory University
Type: Poster
Subject: Linguistics & World Languages
Status: Approved
