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Word Frequency and the Actuation of Sound Change
Abstract
By presenting evidence from three different sound changes within the history of English, this paper demonstrates that sound changes do not always affect the most frequent words first; on the contrary, certain changes affect the least frequent words first. A comparison of sound changes exhibiting each direction of diffusion reveals that changes affecting the most frequent words first are motivated by physiological factors, acting on surface phonetic forms; changes affecting the least frequent words first are motivated by other, non-physiological factors, acting on underlying forms. Thus a direct correlation is drawn between the direction of diffusion and the actuation of sound change.
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Citations
Cited by
Bybee, J. (2010) · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511750526 · Cited by 3,488
Word frequency and context of use in the lexical diffusion of phonetically conditioned sound change
Bybee, J. (2002) · Language Variation and Change · doi:10.1017/s0954394502143018 · Cited by 892
Grammar is grammar and usage is usage
Newmeyer, F. J. (2003) · Language · doi:10.1353/lan.2003.0260 · Cited by 600
PHONOLOGICAL EVIDENCE FOR EXEMPLAR STORAGE OF MULTIWORD SEQUENCES
Bybee, J. (2002) · Studies in Second Language Acquisition · doi:10.1017/s0272263102002061 · Cited by 279
The dynamic interaction between lexical and contextual frequency: A case study of (ING)
Forrest, J. (2017) · Language Variation and Change · doi:10.1017/s0954394517000072 · Cited by 38
Metadata
- Authors
- Phillips, B. S.
- Venue
- Language
- Publisher
- JSTOR
- Published
- 1984-06
- Volume
- 60
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 320
- ISSN
- 0097-8507 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2008863649
- Cited by
- 326
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 21.63
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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- Phillips, B. S. (1984). Word Frequency and the Actuation of Sound Change. Language. https://doi.org/10.2307/413643
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