Supakit Buakaw

Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia, Mahidol University

The Phonetic Realization of Denasalized Final Nasal Consonants in
No Lae Palaung

In No Lae Palaung, a northern Mon-Khmer language of the Austroasiatic language family, nasals are denasalized in word final position. This paper investigates the phonetic realization of denasalized final nasal consonants in Palaung dialect spoken in No Lae village, northern Thailand. Since nasal consonants are voiced before denasalization, denasalized final nasal consonants should also be voiced. However, based on acoustic evidence, it has been demonstrated that denasalized final nasal consonants in No Lae Palaung are realized by stops with voiced homorganic nasal release, which exhibit voicing variation during the moment of oral closure. Such voicing variation supports Blust (1997: 173-174) that perhaps voicing of the preploded nasal is irrelevant in some cases. So, in No Lae Palaung, the voicing of denasalized final nasal consonants might vary.