23.02.2023

The evolution of similar place avoidance: phylogenetic approaches to phonotactic change

Colloquium by Dr. Chundra Cathcart

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Time: Thursday, 23^rd February 2023 at 1pm (sharp)

Location: Rümelinstraße 23, Room 602 or via Zoom

Speaker: Dr. Chundra Cathcart

Title: The evolution of similar place avoidance: phylogenetic approaches to phonotactic change

Abstract: 

The world’s languages exhibit considerable variation in terms of the static sound patterns displayed by individual words. At the same time, a number of recurrent phonotactic patterns are found in a large sample of genetically diverse languages. One such tendency is the statistical underrepresentation of adjacent identical consonants or consonants sharing a place of articulation within uninflected morphologically simple lexical items. While this pattern is likely rooted in pressures toward communicative efficiency, not much is understood regarding the specific diachronic mechanisms that bring it about. A working hypothesis found in the literature but as yet untested is that word usage is involved in its maintenance: language users are less likely to coin or adopt and more likely to phase out words containing similar consonants (Frisch et al. 2004, Martin 2007).

In this talk, I employ a Bayesian phylogenetic model to investigate the evolutionary dynamics that underlie this phenomenon. I additionally sketch out implications of these results for the study of human language at a deep time scale.

References
Blust, R. and S. Trussel (2013). The Austronesian comparative dictionary: a work in progress. Oceanic Linguistics 52(2), 493–523.
Frisch, S. A., J. B. Pierrehumbert, and M. B. Broe (2004). Similarity avoidance and the OCP. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 22(1), 179–228.
Martin, A. T. (2007). The evolving lexicon. Ph. D. thesis, University of California, Los Angeles.

We welcome you all to join us in person or via Zoom. We will send around the specific link on the day before the talk.