Phonetic variability of /h/ in Korean: aspiration or tensification

This paper examines variation of the glottal fricative /h/ in Korean: in an innovative form, /h/ triggers tensification to the following obstruent rather than merges to be an aspirated obstruent, e.g, /nahta/ ‘give birth to’ becomes [na.tHa] in a standard form; /nahta/ becomes [nat|.t'a] in an innovative form. Motivations of the variability are accounted for within the modified theory of ‘effective contrast’ (Ussishkin and Wedel, 2002). I argue that sound variability of /h/ is affected by the number of minimal pairs (i.e., neighbors) and FAMIQUENCY, an interaction between token frequency and word familiarity. I hypothesize that the lexical items with low FAMIQUENCY in a relatively dense neighborhood show a great rate of variability. Among three groups categorized by presence of minimal pairs and degree of FAMIQUENCY, Group III that has low FAMIQUENCY with minimal pairs shows a great degree of variability, and the sound change of /h/ in this group seems to be almost completed