UCLA

This project looks at loanword adaptation in Finnish, focusing on the role of perception in the adaptation of voiceless stops as geminates. In the Finnish loanword process, non-geminate donor voiceless stops are often adapted in geminated form. This particular adaptation strategy is interesting because it serves a purpose other than to correct a phonological ill-formedness in the borrower language, meaning that it cannot be accounted for by appealing to native Finnish structural constraints. This project will argue that, while there is evidence that word-structure constraints play a role in the adaptation process, gemination is also influenced by perceptual cues. Specifically, I will show using on-line adaptation data that geminates are adapted as such because of two perceptual factors: stress placement in the donor and loan word and the existence of subsequent stops in the donor word.