Reanalyzing the Phonemic Status of the Portuguese Palatal Nasal Consonant

Resumo

The phonological status of the Portuguese palatal nasal consonant [ɲ] remains controversial. Wetzels (1997, 2000) observed that it differs from the nasal consonants /m, n/ in several respects. First, it is the only nasal that occurs exclusively in intervocalic position (e.g. manhã ‘morning’, canhoto ‘left-handed’); second, it nasalizes the preceding vowel more easily than /m, n/ (e.g. canhoto [kɐ̃ˈɲotu] ‘left-handed’, but caneta [kaˈnetɐ] ‘pen’, camada [kaˈmadɐ] ‘layer’); third, it is the only nasal absent after a complex rhyme (e.g. queima [ˈkejmɐ] ‘burns’, boina [ˈbojnɐ] ‘beret’, but moinho [moˈiɲu] ‘mill’, and never *[ˈmojɲu]); and fourth, it is the only nasal that cannot occupy the last onset of a proparoxytonic word (e.g. átomo [ˈatumu] ‘atom’, máquina [ˈmakinɐ] ‘machine’, but façanha [faˈsɐ̃ɲɐ] ‘exploit’, and never *[ˈfasɐ̃ɲɐ]). This behavior led the author to propose that [ɲ] is a phonological geminate consonant, i.e. /ɲ.ɲ/. However, considering its high frequency of vocalization in Brazilian Portuguese (Cristófaro Silva, 2009), the resistance of geminate segments to leniting processes (Hayes, 1986; Kirchner, 2000), and the language’s tendency to privilege open syllables (Veloso, 2008), I propose a new phonological analysis in which the palatal consonant [ɲ] is the realization of an underlying phonological diphthong whose glide is resyllabified in the following empty onset.