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On Syllable Division in Phonemics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

Norman E. Eliason
Norman E. Eliason*
Affiliation:
University of Florida
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Information

Type
Miscellanea
Information
Language , Volume 18 , Issue 2-Part1: April-June , June 1942, pp. 144 - 147
Copyright
Copyright © 1942 Linguistic Society of America

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References

1 The Syllabic Phonemes of English, Lang. 17.223–46 (1941).

2 Studies for William A. Read 144–5 (Baton Rouge, 1940).

3 Proceedings of the Second International Congress of Phonetic Sciences 44 (Cambridge, 1936). While it is true of course that Brøndal's conception of the phoneme is different from that of Trager and Bloch, his view about syllabication, like that of Malone, seems relevant as evidence showing how controversial or doubtful is the matter about which Trager and Bloch feel free to make an assertion.

4 O. Jespersen, Mod. Eng. Gram. I4 §16.44 (1928); E. Kruisinga, Introd. to the Study of Eng. Sounds6 §§56 ff. (1935).

5 Mod. Eng. Gram. I4 §16.44; Outline of Eng. Phonetics5 §212; Amer. Pron.6 §§20, 93, 377.

6 Provided that it can be demonstrated that this difference in contact after long and short vowels actually and regularly obtains, I would suggest that it might then be described as a variety of unphonemic ‘open juncture’ (Trager-Bloch) or ‘aphonematisches Grenzsignal’ (Trubetzkoy). But I doubt that it is properly the concern of the phonologist at all.

7 The Effect of Stress upon Quantity in Dissyllables 39 (Bloomington, Indiana, 1939).

8 Archives Néerlandaises 3.86, 88, 172; similarly in Proc. Sec. Int. Cong. Phon. Sciences 245 ff. It is true that Stetson shows that there may be a relationship between the vowel duration and the manner in which the syllable ends, but I doubt very much that this can be utilized to prove Trager and Bloch's contention about the difference in syllabic structure in present-day English.

9 Surely Trager and Bloch do not want to add rate of utterance to their list of ‘suprasegmental phonemes’.