The Phonological Relevance of Spelling Pronunciation

Abstract

Although commonly viewed as an isolated, haphazard, and hit-or-miss, chancy affair, spelling-pronunciation is in fact capable of patterning and may yield profound phonological effects in at least two ways. It may induce the restructuring of the underlying form of morphemes within an orthographic paradigm, and thus trigger a redistribution of functional loads in the phonemic system; this often happens through a "reversal" of historical changes that are no longer operative. Spelling-pronunciation may also repeatedly block (and hence weaken) synchronic phonological rules, thus often resulting in the phonetic surfacing of underlying or near-underlying phonemic forms; in this way it not only slows down phonological change, but may in the long run alter the phonetic character of a language. Although it commonly obliterates etymological distinctions, as a mechanism of iconicity spelling-pronunciation promotes spelling-sound isomorphism and thus tends to reduce purposeless variety in language. Widespread literacy has rendered the influence of orthography on phonology a significant external variable which linguistic description can no longer ignore.