Hawaiian Phonology - Phonological Processes

Phonological Processes

Phonological processes at work in Hawaiian include palatalization of consonants, deletion of consonants, raising and diphthongization of vowels, deletion of unstressed syllables, and compensatory lengthening of vowels. Elbert & Pukui have cited Kinney (1956) regarding "natural fast speech" (vowel raising, deletion of unstressed syllables), and Newbrand (1951) regarding Niʻihau dialect (free variation of and, deletion of consonants, allophone of /a/, vowel raising).

Kinney (1956) has studied tape recordings of 13-14 native speakers of Hawaiian. She noted assimilatory raising of vowels in vowel sequences. For example, /ai/ was very frequently pronounced, /au/ was often, and /io/ was often . She cited specific words, such as /mai/ (directional adverb) as, /mau/ (plural morpheme) as, and /lio/ ('horse') as . The pronunciation of the island name Maui, Maui, /maui/, was, with the quality of compared to that of u in English cut. She observed deletion of unstressed syllables, such as /ke akua/ ('God') pronounced, and /hele akula/ ('go') pronounced . She also documented pronunciations of /loaʔa/ ('gotten') as, and /puaʔa/ ('pig') as .

Newbrand (1951) found that a Niihauan wrote ⟨t⟩ and ⟨k⟩ interchangeably, and freely varied the pronunciation of both ⟨t⟩ and ⟨k⟩ as or . She found /ʔaʔohe/ ('no') pronounced, showing vowel raising of /e/ to . She documented /noho ʔana/ ('staying') pronounced, showing deletion of the glottal consonants /h/ and /ʔ/. The vowel quality of stressed short /a/ was noted as .

Palatalization of consonants in Hawaiian is demonstrated by the well known pronunciation of /kaa/ (mood adverb) as .