Long vowels in Mongolian
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.36505/ExLing-2017/08/0025/000327Keywords:
Mongolian vowel, long vowel, vowel distribution, vowel devoicingAbstract
This paper investigates one of the fundamental and controversial questions in Halh Mongolian: the phonological status of long vowels (VV), especially VV in noninitial syllables and the distribution of VV. This study questions the traditional analysis of vowel quantity based on the single criterion of the realisation of vowel length, which is purely phonetic. This paper takes into consideration the historical development of VV in Mongolian. It demonstrates that, synchronously, the distinction between long (VV) and short vowels (V) should consider the distinct behaviours that reveal the different nature of these two types of vowels.
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Copyright (c) 2017 Yumei Sang (Author)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Articles are published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.