The voice onset time of plosives in Brazilian Portuguese in contact with Hunsrückisch and their variable devoicing

Abstract

The study is about the Voice Onset Time (VOT) of devoiced plosives in Brazilian Portuguese (BP) spoken by descendants of German immigrants in Gloria, a rural community in Estrela city, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. In Gloria, BP is in contact with Hunsrückisch, a German dialect. The study aims at (a) showing some acoustic characteristics of BP plosives in the contact variety in order to confirm the variable devoicing perceived by hearing in a sociolinguistic study (LARA, 2013); and (b) verifying whether the VOT values of the plosives conform to the Hunsrückisch VOT pattern or are unique to the contact language (MOHANAN e MOHANAN, 2003). Acoustic analysis of plosives is carried out with the computer program PRAAT (BOERSMA; WEENINK, 2013). Data from an adult informant of Lara (2013) are used. The acoustic analysis confirms the devoicing perceived by hearing. It shows that VOT values of devoiced plosives in the contact language are different from the Hunsrückisch VOT pattern and close to the BP VOT pattern, but are peculiar to the contact language.