Questions tagged [sonority]

For questions concerning the sonority of sounds and the sonority hierarchy.

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Deducing syllable structure from sonority curve and phonotactics

When I take the sonority curve of `Tuesdays' (/tuzdeɪz/) I have a peak at /u/ and another one at /eɪ/. Between the two peaks I have /zd/, why should the /z/ belong to the first syllable and the /d/ to ...
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Violations of sonority sequencing principle in English

What accounts for these violations of the sonority sequencing principle in English: /strɛŋkθ/, /fʌdʒ/ (both have fricatives after stops in the coda) Wikipedia says In native English words, no phoneme ...
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Is /f/ more sonorous than other fricatives?

Tashelhiyt permits any segment to act as a syllable nucleus, regardless of sonority. There's lots of theoretical analyses out there, but descriptively, Tashelhiyt consonant syllabification moves left ...
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Does the English word 'six' violate the Sonority Sequencing Principle?

I'm aware that it's spellt with an X, however phonetically it's [ks]. According to the SSP, plosives should come after fricatives word-finally. Does the spelling with an x stop it from violating the ...
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1 answer
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How to make a sonority curve for a word where a 'syllabic consonant' is followed by a vowel or vice versa

I've learnt that the number of peaks of sonority in a sonority curve determines the number of syllables in a word. The number of syllables depend on the pronunciation. It may also be true for other ...
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2 votes
2 answers
197 views

Is sonority phonological or phonetic?

I've seen several mentions of "sonority" in different works, most of which define it as something like "how loud a particular sound is in relation to other speech sounds". This seems like something ...
  • 58.8k
1 vote
3 answers
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sonority hierarchy within vowel backness

Regarding the horizontal axis, and within the same high, I'd like to know whether back vowels (e.g. /ɤ/) are more sonorous than front ones (e.g. /e/).
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1 answer
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Where does one find data on sonority hierarchies for specific languages?

Sorry for the novice question. I've sincerely been searching, but all I can find are articles/papers exploring very specific topics for mostly unrelated languages. I'm looking for something more basic,...
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2 answers
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English onsets with /s/ and sonority hierarchy

Why are clusters such as /sk/ (as in sky), /st/ (stop), and /sp/ (spill) allowed as onsets in English? The sonority decreases in these clusters and does that not violate the phonotactic rules? On a ...