Nasalization in Balinese Verbs

Abstract

Balinese has two forms in relation to nasal prefixes. First the initial segment of the verb root can be assimilated with the homorganic nasal and both coalesce. Second, the nasal prefix still assimilates with the first segment of the verb root but forms a CC cluster. By using the data source from Balinese dictionaries and using OT theoretic analysis it was found that the affix nasal that did not form a cluster with the first segment of the verb root uniformly occurred in verbs where the first segment is obstruent both voiced and voiceless while the one forming the cluster is the first segment of a verb root which is realized by a sonorant. The first paradigm can be handled by the constraint * NC (obs) while the second one clearly violates linearity constraint, namely, Align-L (root) constraint. OT analysis also predicts that the ungrammaticality of an output verb structure ngmaang ‘to give’ due to fact that the correct underlying form baang is confused with its corresponding surface form.

Keywords: nasalization, obstruent, sonorant, OT analysis