Formant measures of vowels adjacent to alveolar and retroflex consonants in Arrernte: Stressed and unstressed position

This study presents formant data for six speakers of Arrernte, a language of central Australia. The focus of the study is the (marginal) phonemic contrast between two sets of apical consonants: alveolar and retroflex. The apical contrast is studied for the stop, nasal and lateral manners of articulation: /t /, /n / and /l /. The apical consonants are examined both in strong prosodic context (preceding a stressed vowel) and in weak prosodic context (preceding an unstressed vowel). Formant data are sampled 10 ms before the onset of the consonant, and 10 ms after the offset of the consonant. Results show no differences in F2 or F4 in the various conditions studied, and results for F1 show differences between obstruents and sonorants. F3 is lower at consonant onset than consonant offset for retroflex stops in the weak prosodic context, and to a lesser extent for retroflex stops in the strong prosodic context; it is also lower for laterals in the weak prosodic context. Other effects on F3 suggest that the apical contrast is most clearly realized for the stop manner of articulation.