An Effort-Based Approach to Consonant Lenition







Robert Kirchner



UCLA











Despite the pervasiveness of lenition in the sound systems of natural 
 

language, this class of patterns has eluded adequate characterization 
 

in previous theories of phonology.  Specifically, previous theories 
 

have failed to capture formally the phonetic unity of the various 
 

lenition processes (e.g. degemination, voicing, spirantization, 
 

debuccalization, deletion), or to account for the environments in 
 

which lenition typically occurs.







I present a unified approach to consonant lenition, wherein particular 
 

lenition patterns arise from Optimality Theoretic conflict between a 
 

principle of effort minimization (which I style LAZY), and faithfulness 
 

to auditory features, in combination with (perceptually-based) 
 

fortition constraints, building upon the proposals of Jun (1995) and 
 

Flemming (1995).  I further demonstrate that this effort-based approach 
 

straightforwardly accounts for a number of generalizations, drawn from 
 

a survey of 272 grammars:







* Geminate stops never lenite unless they concomitantly degeminate.
 

* Unaffricated stops never synchronically spirantize to strident 
 

  fricatives.



* All else being equal, lenition occurs more readily the greater the 
 

  openness of the flanking segments (the widely attested pattern of 
 

  intervocalic lenition being a special case).



* Lenition occurs more readily the faster or more casual the speech.
 





The approach is illustrated with case studies of lenition in Tumpisa 
 

Shoshone and Florentine Italian.