Phonemes

國

立 政 治 大 學

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N a tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

Chapter 2: Grammatical Profile

This chapter presents basic grammatical characteristics of North Jinfeng Paiwan. Section 2.1 gives an overview of phonology. Section 2.2 deals with word structure and word

formation. Section 2.3 discusses categories of roots, stems and words. Section 2.4 presents the argument structure.

2.1 Phonology

This section consists of three parts. Section 2.1.1 treats phonemes, with some notes on distinction between North Jinfeng Paiwan and other dialects. Section 2.1.2 describes syllable structure, including syllable combinations, some restrictions on consonant clusters and vowel sequences. Section 2.1.3 discusses stress.

2.1.1 Phonemes

Paiwan has a large number of consonant phonemes. In contrast with other Formosan languages, Paiwan does not show extensive mergers and splits among PAN stops. Ferrell (1982:1) mentions that “Paiwan is the only Formosan language having a phoneme inventory directly comparable to the PAN inventory proposed by Dempwolff and emended by Dahl’s (1973:101)”. There are at least 22 native consonant phonemes in any dialect investigated in previous studies (Ferrell, 1982:7; Chang, 2006:21; Chen, 2009:595; Yeh, 2011:9; Huang, 2012:11; Chang, 2016:9).

As shown in Table 2.1, there are 22 native consonant phonemes in North Jinfeng Paiwan.

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Consonant inventory of North Jinfeng Paiwan²²

Labial Dento-Alveolar Retroflex Palatal Velar Glottal

Stop voiceless /p/ /t/ /c/ /k/ /ʔ/

My survey has found no overt phonemic distinction among the dialects spoken in

sinapayan (正興), kaʔaluan (嘉蘭) and sapulju (新興). A subtle distinction is that speakers in sinapayan and kaʔaluan tend to pronounce /-v/ instead of /-w/, whereas in sapulju, some preserve /-w/ and some do not. This finding corresponds to Lee’s (2011) research.²³

The contrast of consonant phonemes is proved by minimal pairs or near minimal pairs in Table 2.2. Among the 22 native consonant, there are 14 obstruents, containing 10 stops, 4 fricatives and 1 affricate. All obstruents besides the affricate /ʦ^h/ are unaspirated. Onset obstruents are all released, whereas coda obstruents except /ʔ/, /s/ and /ʦ^h/ do not have audible release. /h/ is a loan phoneme that occurs only in the position of onset.

There are three nasals, three liquids and two glides. The underlying word-internal onset

22 The loan phoneme is shown in parenthesis.

23 Paiwan residents in sapulju migrated from the tribes in the upstream region of Jinlun River, including tjudjaas, segadu, djumulj, vikidj and putung (see Section 1.6.1). Thus, the dialect in sapulju exhibit a mixture of accents originating from different tribes. In Lee’s (2011) survey, the sound change /-w/ > /-v/ is found in speakers from putung but not in speaker from tjudjaas. As for my research, one of my informants in sapulju belongs to the system of segadu and pronounces /-v/, the another one came from djumulj and pronounces /-w/.

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labiovelar glide /σ.w-/ and the word-initial palatal glide /#j-/²⁴ occur only in loanwords,such as /w/ in taiwan [taj.wan] ‘Taiwan’ and /#j-/ in yuziru [ju.zi.ru] ‘roselle’.²⁵

Table 2.2

(Near) minimal pairs of consonant phonemes Phoneme (Near) minimal pairs

p b /p b/

pai [paj] ‘please; well’ bai [baj] ‘daughter; wife

The dento-alveolar fricatives /s/, /z/ and affricate /ʦ^h/ in North Jinfeng Paiwan are palatalized to the palato-alveolars [ʃ], [ʒ] and [tʃ^h], respectively, before the high front vowel

24 No word-initial /w-/ is found in North Jinfeng Paiwan.

25 The phonetically surfaced glides are not counted here (e.g. [w] in kavuavuan [ka.vu.wa.vu.wan] ‘field;

garden’, [j] in nutiav [nu.ti,jav] ‘tomorrow’).

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/i/. This sound change is quite common in other dialects as well (Chen, 2006:64; Yeh, 2011:9). Young speakers of Paiwan may sometimes palatalize the voiceless /s/ and /ʦ/ into the alveolo-palatals [ɕ] and [tɕ], of which the mid body of tongue is used in articulation.

Examples are given in (2.1).

(2.1) Spelling UR²⁶ SR Meaning speakers of North Jinfeng Paiwan, as is the case in the central piuma dialect and some other central and southern dialects investigated in Chen (2006:61-62,67). The palatals /c ɟ ʎ/ after

26 UR (Underlying Representation) is the phonological representation of a word postulated to have before application of phonological rules. SR (Surface Representation) is the phonetic representation of a word.

27 Both avai (阿拜) and cinavu (奇拿富) are aboriginal dumplings popular in southeastern Taiwan. Both of them are mainly composed of millets, taro or some meat, and wrapped with leaves of Shell Ginger. Their difference is the form of millet. In avai, the millets are ground into stuffing like rice cake; in cinavu, millet grains are intact.

28 The superscript symbol [ʲ] indicates a secondary palatal articulation, which is a slight superimposition upon the primary sound. Bateman (2007:235-248) did an elaborate research on the secondary palatalization pattern.

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the high vowel in the final position are fronted as well.

/q/ does not exist in North Jinfeng Paiwan. The sound has changed into /ʔ/. In southern Paiwan region the east coast region (e.g. tjavualji), /q/ is well preserved (Cheng, 2016).

The liquids /r ɭ ʎ/ are unaspirated and released. In North Jinfeng Paiwan, no allophones are attested for the trill /r/, whereas in some central and southern dialects it may have the allophonic alternation of voiced velar fricative /ɣ/, voiced uvular fricative [ʁ] or voiced glottal fricative [ɦ] (Chen, 2006:45,48). /ɭ/ is a lateral retroflex, whereas in some northern dialects it may be an alveolar flap /ɾ/ (Chang, 2006:21). Similar as tjaylaking and vecekadan dialect investigated in Chang (2000), the word-final /ɭ/ may become aspirated, as shown in (2.3).

(2.3) Spelling UR SR Meaning

kipucemel /ki.pu.ʦ^hə.məɭ/ [ki.pu.ʦ^hə.məɭʰ] ‘undergo treatment’

kudral /ku.ɖaɭ/ [ku.ɖaɭʰ] ‘big’

(2.4) Location Root Derived Form

sinapayan, kaʔaluan, sapulju-1 ʔadav ‘sun’ kina-ʔadav-an ‘weather’

sapulju-2²⁹ ʔadaw ‘sun’ kina-ʔadav-an ‘weather’

The glides /w j/ are phonemically distinct from the high vowels /u i/. Like other dialects (Ferrell, 1982:10; Chang, 2006:40), there is morphophomenic alternation between the

labiovelar glide /-w/ and the labiodental /-v/ in the final position in North Jinfeng Paiwan. By an evidence given in the morphological process in (2.4), we can firmly state that the direction of sound change is /-w/ to /-v/.³⁰

29 Two informants in sapulju pronounce ʔadav and ʔadaw, respectively.

30 However, this alternation operates at word-level domain only. The is first proposed by Lee (2012:8), showing that the appending of enclitics is not a factor that causes the alternation.

‧ 國

立 政 治 大 學

‧

N a tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

There are four vowel phonemes in North Jinfeng Paiwan: /a/, an open back unrounded vowel, /ə/, a schwa, /i/, a close front unrounded vowel, and /u/, a close back rounded vowel.

Table 2.3

Vowel inventory of North Jinfeng Paiwan

Front Central Back

High (Open) /i/ /u/

Mid /ə/

Low (Close) /a/

The schwa /ə/ may change into the apical [ı] when preceded by the voiceless dento-alveolar /t/, /s/, /ʦ^h/, or velar /k/ and not followed by any coda. Sometimes, the high vowel /i/

is slightly apicalized under the same environment. Examples are shown in (2.5).

(2.5) Spelling UR SR Meaning

kitekulj /ki.tə.kuʎ/ [ki̺.tı.kuʎ] ‘go across’

seʔu /sə.ʔu/ [sı.ʔu] ‘odor; smell’

ceva /ʦə.va/ [ʦı.va] ‘cliff’