Phonology Research Group

People

Academic Staff:		John Harris Moira Yip
PhD Students:		Mariam Almihmadi Eric Carlson
		PhDs completed since 2001

About the Phonology Research Group

The Phonology group consists of researchers working in the field of theoretical phonology. A variety of theoretical approaches are discussed and employed by the researchers in the group. Students are introduced to current trends in phonological theory and given training in research methods and the scholarly presentation of ideas. We have links with other research groups in the Division of Psychological and Language Sciences as well with other phonologists in the Greater London area, including Queen Mary College and SOAS.

John Harris's main research interests lie in phonological theory, the phonetics-phonology interface, phonological impairment, and variation and change in English. His publications include papers on lenition, sonority, element theory, and English phonology. He is the author of English Sound Structure, 1994, Oxford. Blackwell (see publications page).

Moira Yip has focused on a wide range of issues in theoretical phonology including the phonology of Chinese and tonal phonology. Her publications include papers on reduplication, morpho-phonology, root-and-pattern morphology, secret languages, prosodic phonology and feature theory. Having trained in the Chomsky and Halle model of phonology, she was part of a group of phonologists who questioned this approach and who eventually rejected the rule-based approach in favour of a model using constraints. She is currently working in the framework of Optimality theory. In 2002 her book entitled Tone was published by Cambridge University Press. (see publications page) As well as her work in the Phonetics and Linguistics department, she is also co-director of the Centre for Human Communication in UCL which encourages links between departments that are involved in research concerning communication.

MA (Phonology) students, PhD students and staff meet regularly on UCL research-level courses and in meetings of the London Phonology Seminar. The seminars feature talks by visiting phonologists, discussion of newly circulated or published papers, and presentations of research students' current work. Topics covered in recent seminars include the relation between tone and voice contrasts, vowel reduction, vowel length, derivational opacity in OT, statistical evidence in phonology, and information theory. The seminars provide research students with an opportunity to try out papers or posters they are planning to present at conferences. Conferences at which the group's research students have recently presented papers include the Manchester Phonology Meeting, CamLing, (Cambridge, UK), Strength Relations in Phonology (Sendai, Japan), Language Variation and Change (Lancaster, UK), Gender and Language in an African Context (Leeds), Language Documentation and Linguistic Theory (SOAS).

Collaborators from other departments/institutions

Faculty members who work in phonetics and speech science and who have related interests in phonology include Michael Ashby, Volker Dellwo, Bronwen Evans, Valerie Hazan, Jill House, Paul Iverson, John Wells and Yi Xu. Several of these members have research interests in second language acquisition. The faculty also includes Neil Smith, renowned for his work in the area of phonological acquisition.

The group has links to colleagues in other UCL Departments, particularly Heather van der Lely, Peter Howell and Sophie Scott.

PhDs completed since 2001:

Joanne Chapter (registered at Cambridge University) Dorota Glowacka Gloria Malambe Mary Pearce Eirini Sanoudaki Toyomi Takahashi Nina Topintzi

Recently published work:

• Gallon,N., Harris,J.,& van der Lely,H. (2007) . Non-word repetition: An investigation of phonological complexity in children with Grammatical SLI. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics 21(6), 435-455. ISSN: 0269-9206
• Harris,J. (2007). Representation. Chapter 6 in de Lacy,P. (ed.) The Cambridge Handbook of Phonology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 119-138. ISBN: 9780521848794.
• Kuo,Y. C., Xu,Y., Yip,M. (2007) . The phonetics and phonology of apparent cases of iterative tonal change in Standard Chinese. in Gussenhoven,C., Riad,T. (ed.) Tones and Tunes Vol 2: Experimental Studies in Word and Sentence Prosody . Phonology and phonetucs series. Series edited by A. Lahiri. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 211-237
• Yip,M. (2007). Tone. in De Lacy,P. (ed.) The Cambridge Handbook of Phonology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 229-252. ISBN: 0521848792
• Harris,J. (2006). The phonology of being understood: further arguments against sonority. Lingua 116, 1483-1494. ISSN: 0024-3841. [Online] [DOI link]
• Harris,J. (2006). Wide-domain r-effects in English. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 18, . ISSN: 0956-7194.
• Pearce,M., Remijsen,B.,J.van Heuven, Vincent (editors) (2006). The Interaction between metrical structure and tone in Kera. Special Issue of Phonology: Between Stress and Tone (23.2), 259-286.
• Yip,M. (2006) . Phonology in the Smith era. Lingua 116, 1470-1482. ISSN: 0024-3841
• Yip,M. (2006) . The search for phonology in other species. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10(10), 442-446. ISSN: 1364-6613 [ DOI link ]
• Yip,M. (2006) . The symbiosis between perception and grammar in loanword phonology. Lingua 116, 950-975. ISSN: 0024-3841 [ DOI link ]
• Yip,M. (2006) . Is there such a thing as animal phonology? Chapter 15 in Bakovic,E., Ito,J., McCarthy,J. (ed.) Wondering at the natural fecundity of things: Essays in honor of Alan Prince . Linguistic Research Center series. UC Santa Cruz [ Online ]
• Yip,M. (2006) . Tone: Phonology. in Brown,K. (ed.) Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics . Oxford: Elsevier, 2nd edition, 761-764. ISBN: ISBN 0-08-044299-4
• Harris,J. (2005). Vowel reduction as information loss. Chapter 7 in Carr,P., Durand J. & Ewen,C. J. (ed.) Headhood, elements, specification and contrastivity. Amsterdam: Benjamins, 119-132. ISBN: 1 58811 617 4.
• Yip,M. (2005), Tonal languages. In Microsoft ® Encarta ®. 
• Yip,M. (2005), Tone,Peking, China: Peking University Press. ISBN: 7-301-07992-3. 
• Yip,M. (2005). Variability in feature affiliations through violable constraints: The case of [lateral]. in van Oostendorp,M., van de Weijer,J. (ed.) The Internal Organization of Phonological Segments. Studies in generative grammar series. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 63-92. ISBN: 3110182955.
• Harris,J. (2004). Vowel reduction as information loss. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics. 16, 1-16.
• Harris,J. (2004). Release the captive coda: the foot as a domain of phonetic interpretation. Chapter 6 in Local,J., Ogden,R., Temple,R. (ed.) Phonetic interpretation: Papers in Laboratory Phonology. Papers in Laboratory Phonology series. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 103-129. ISBN: 9780521824026
• Pearce,M., Neeleman,A. (2004). UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 16, . ISSN: 0956-7194.  [Online]
• Yip,M. (2004). Lateral survival: an OT account. International Journal of English Studies 4(2), 25-51. ISSN: 1578-7044
• Yip,M. (2004). Phonological markedness and allomorph selection in Zahao. Language and Linguistics 5(4), 969-1001. ISSN: ISSN 1606-822X.
• Harris,J. (2003). Grammar-internal and grammar-external assimilation. Proceedings of the 15th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, Barcelona:Causal Productions, 281-284
• Marshall,C.R., Harris,J., van der Lely,H.K.J. (2003). The nature of phonological representations in children with Grammatical-specific language impairment. Proceedings of the CamLing First Postgraduate Conference in Linguistics, Hall, D., Markopoulos,T., Salamoura, A., Skoufaki,S. (ed.) Cambridge:Cambridge Institute of Language Research, 511-517
• Yip,M. (2003). Casting doubt on the Onset/Rime distinction. Lingua 113(8), 779-816. ISSN: 0024-3841.[DOI link]
• Yip,M. (2003). Reactions to April MacMahon's paper. Lingua 113(2), 117-121. ISSN: 0024-3841
• Yip,M. (2003). Some real and not-so-real consequences of comparative markedness. Theoretical Linguistics 29(1), 53-64. ISSN: 0301-4428.
• Yip,M. (2003). What phonology has learnt from Chinese. GLOT International 7(1), 26-35.
• Yip,M. (2003). Feet and tonal reduction at the word and phrase level in Chinese. in McCarthy,J. (ed.) Optimality Theory in Phonology: A reader.. Oxford: Blackwell, 228-245. ISBN: 0-631-22688-5.
• Yip,M. (2003). Phonology: Long-distance processes. in W. J. Frawley (ed.) International Encyclopedia of Linguistics (Second Edition). Oxford University Press, 3rd edition, 326-327.
• Harris,J., Gussmann,E. (2002). Word-final onsets. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 14, . ISSN: 0956-7194.
• Marshall,C., Ebbels,S., Harris,J., van der Lely,H.K.J. (2002). Investigating the impact of prosodic complexity on the speech of children with Specific Language Impairment. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 14, 43-66. ISSN: 0956-7194.
• Yip,M. (2002). Necessary but not sufficient: perceptual influences in loanword phonology. The Journal of the Phonetic Society of Japan. Special issue on Aspects of loanword phonology 6(1), 4-21. ISSN: 1342-8675 
• Yip,M. (2002). Non-arguments for sub-syllabic constituents. Journal of Chinese Phonology: Special Issue 11, 49-72
• Yip,M. (2002), Tone,Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN: 0-521-77314-8. 341pp. 
• Yip,M. (2002). The role of markedness in onset change. in Tang,S.W., Liu,C.S. (ed.) On the formal way to Chinese languages. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications, 213-232. ISBN: 1-57586-370-7
• 
  
• Harris,J., Urua,E.-A. (2001) . Lenition degrades information: consonant allophony in Ibibio. Speech, Hearing and Language: work in progress , 13, 72-105. ISSN: 1470-8507
• Yip,M. (2001). Tonal features, tonal inventories, and phonetic targets. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 13, 161-188. ISSN: 0956-7194
• Yip,M. (2001). The complex interaction of tones and prominence, Kim,M., Strauss,U. (ed.) Amherst:GLSA, U. Mass., 31, 531-545
• Yip,M. (2001). Segmental unmarkedness versus input perservation in reduplication. in Lombardi,L. (ed.) Segmental phonology in Optimality Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 206-230. ISBN: 0-521-79057-3
• Yip,M. (2001). Dialect variation in nasalization: Alignment or duration? in Xu,D.-B. (ed.) Chinese phonology in generative grammar. London: Academic Press, 163-192. ISBN: 0-12-767670-8