Kala Phonology in a Typological and Regional Context

Abstract

The Kala language is a Western Oceanic (Austronesian) language spoken in Papua New Guinea. This dissertation provides a phonological sketch of all four dialects of Kala, as well as detailed quantitative acoustic phonetic and phonological studies performed on three dynamic processes found in Southern Kala. These include vowel deletion, vowel laxing, and nasality and nasalization of vowels. All of these processes show unusual and unpredicted characteristics that place them in liminal spaces between cross-linguistic categories. Finally, a wider context is provided through a phonological typology survey of 50 nearby languages, illuminating Kala phonology's unique position amongst its relatives and neighbors.