[coronal]

Counterpart

Feature System

Definition

The feature [coronal] describes phonemes that are produced using the front part of the tongue (i.e., the tongue tip and tongue blade). This includes sounds articulated at the denti-alveolar region and sounds articulated just behind the alveolar ridge (Hall 1997:4).

Purpose

The feature [coronal] creates a natural class of six subplaces of articulation: interdental, dental, alveolar, retroflex, palatoalveolar, and alveopalatal (Hall 1997:5).

History

The feature [coronal] was originally conceptualized by Jakobson and Lotz (1949) as the opposition [grave] vs. [acute]. The feature [acute] was defined as “the upper formant is prevalent and has in addition a greater perceptibility because of the specific sensitivity of the ear” (Jakobson & Lotz 1949:429).

Later, Jakobson, Fant, and Halle (1952) discussed the production of [grave] vs. [acute] sounds. They said that “acuteness originates in a smaller and more defined cavity” than phonemes with gravity. “Hence gravity characterizes labial consonants as against dentals, as well as velars vs. palatals” (Jakobson et al. 1952:30).

The opposition [grave]/[acute] was replaced by [coronal]/[noncoronal] in 1968 by Chomsky and Halle. They defined [coronal] as being “produced with the blade of a tongue raised from its neutral position.” This would include dental, alveolar, palato-alveolar, liquids articulated with the blade of the tongue, and retroflex vowels, excluding uvulars, labials, glides, nonretroflex vowels, and consonants articulated with the body of the tongue (Chomsky & Halle 1968:304). Along with [anterior], [coronal] helps to classify the four major places of consonants: bilabial, coronal, postalveolar, and velar.

There has been controversy in the field as to whether or not palatals should be considered [coronal], though the majority of phonologists now agree that palatals are [coronal] because in many languages, they pattern with the alveolars, which are [coronal] (Hall 1997:6).

The feature [coronal] is now usually considered privative, and the absence of coronality is unmarked entirely (Hall 1997:23). Clements (1985) introduced this idea, claiming [-coronal] as unmarked and [+coronal] as marked. The feature [coronal] under the V-place in feature geometry system can be used to describe vowels (Hume 1992:124).

References

Hall, T. Alan. 1997. Phonology of Coronals. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Hume, Elizabeth Valerie. 1992. Front vowels, coronal consonants and their interaction in nonlinear phonology. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Jakobson, Roman; and John Lotz. 1949. Notes on the French phonemic pattern. Word 5.151-158. Reprinted in 1962 in Selected writings: Vol. 1: Phonological studies, ed. by Roman Jakobson, 426-434. ’S-Gravenhage: Mouton.

Jakobson, Roman; Gunnar Fant; and Morris Halle. 1952. Preliminaries to speech analysis: The distinctive features and their correlates. (MIT Acoustic Laboratory Technical Report 13). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Author

Ainsley Graf