不充分赋值理论与普通话的元音表达

Underspecification Theory and Vowel Representation in Standard Chinese

不充分赋值理论旨在解释音系不对称现象,但是出于不同的赋值原则,形成了极端不充分赋值法、对比赋值法以及新近出现的对立层级赋值法等观点。对于普通话元音,三种赋值法产生不同的底层表达式。虽然极端不充分赋值法具有更大的理论优越性,但是从普通话元音的儿童语言获得、类型学等外部证据,尤其是强制曲折原则等内部证据来看,对比赋值法具有更大的实证优势。

The Underspecification theory aims to account for phonological asymmetry ;but by different princi- ples of specification, it divides into three propositions ： Radical Underspecifieation, Contrastive Specification and the recent Contrastive Hierarchy. Applying them to the vowels in standard Chinese yields different underlying repre- sentations. While Radical Underspecification is more desirable theoretically, Contrastive Specification seems more correct empirically, both from external evidences in language acquisition and typology, and from internal evidence of the Obligatory Contour Principle.