Voicing specification and the specification of [voice]

The proper characterization of voicing distinctions has long been controversial, a problem that arises in large part because of the unstable phonetic cues that are assiciated with laryngeal oppositions. The articulatory and acoustic cues that serve to signal viced/voiceless opposition appear to vary from language to language. These cues include vocal cord vibration, duration, tenseness, glottal spreading or constriction and articulatory force (see Kohler 1979, 1984; Lisker 1986; Keating 1984, 1990; Doherty 1993). It is my contention that the instability of the cues does not lead to indeterminacy as to the appropriate representation of laryngeal oppositions because the true nature of opposition is reinforced by the phonology. In Avery (1996), it is argued that what has traditionally been referred to as voicing opposition may in fact be represented in three different ways with respect to the specification of the segments involved in the opposition. Voiced obstruents may be marked by the presence of the feature [voice], the presence of the SV node (see Rice & Avery 1989, 1990, 1993; Rice 1992, 1993) or the absence of any laryngeal specification. I refer to the first option as Laryngeal Voice (LV), the second as Sonorant Voice (SV) and the third as Contextual Voice (CV). I further assume that a bare Laryngeal node may be phonetically enhanced through the addition of the feature Spread glottis (SG), yielding voiceless aspirates. This is typically the case in language such as English, German and Turkish, which are analyzed as CV languages