Many dialects of English flap the /d/ and /t/ intervocalically. However, the role of stress is also important. The vowel preceding the plosive is stressed and the following is unstressed. Flapping occurs in words such as city, hospital, medal, water and wedding.
In certain words, however, flapping does not occur. In the following words, flapping is blocked:
- accommodate
- appetite
- cemetery
- competent
- detail
- hesitate
- Mediterranean
- military
- secretary
- validate
The reason flapping does not apply in words such as accommodate, appetite, cemetery, competent, detail, hesitate, military and validate is that the preceding vowel is not stressed and the following vowel has secondary stress. However, flapping is not always restricted to the environment between a stressed vowel and an unstressed vowel. In the word responsibility, both vowels in the suffix -ity are unstressed.
In the word Mediterranean, M.M. Withgott claims that it can be divided into two feet, [Medi] [terranean] and that the plosive cannot be flapped in foot initial position. Another claim is that flapping is blocked due to paradigm uniformity, an idea advanced by Donca Steriade. The word Mediterranean has the same unit as subterranean, a word in which no flapping occurs.
M.M. Withgott gives the examples [capital], [capital] [istic] and [mili] [tary], [mili] [taristic]. In the word capital flapping occurs, but not in the word military. According to her analysis, capital consists of one foot and allows flapping, but military consists of two feet and does not allow it. In the word militaristic, the plosive [tistic] is foot initial and thus does not allow flapping.
Donca Steriade has another view. In the word capital, flapping occurs. There is no secondary stress following the plosive. To maintain paradigm uniformity, flapping occurs in capitalistic. In the word military, no flapping occurs. Secondary stress follows the plosive and blocks the flapping rule. In militaristic, no secondary stress follows the plosive, but to maintain paradigm uniformity, flapping is blocked.
Both M.M. Withgott and Donca Steriade have analyzed English words in which flapping does not occur. M.M. Withgott claims that the plosive cannot flap when it is foot-initial. This is known as the Withgott Effect. Donca Steriade claims that flapping does not occur when the base of morphologically related words does not allow it and terms this paradigm uniformity.
Regardless of the view which one favours, it is clear that flapping is only categorical between a stressed vowel and an unstressed one. In other cases, the conditions of the flapping rule are more complex. In these cases, flapping is variable.
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