Katherine Chaloupova
DARE Project: A Contrastive Hierarchy Approach to Vowel Harmony Variation in Turkic
Program(s) of Study: Linguistics
Project Supervisor: Peter Avery
As with all scientific research, this study aims to contribute to the broader understanding of linguistic systems. In particular, it seeks to enhance our knowledge of vowel harmony—a widespread phonological processes across the world’s languages. Additionally, this project will provide valuable linguistic data on several understudied Turkic languages, thereby supporting efforts in language documentation and typological comparison.
Project Description:
This project explores vowel harmony in Central Asian Turkic languages, including Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Bashkir, Yakut, and others. We aim to analyze the vowel harmony systems, their rules, and exceptions through the framework of Contrastive Hierarchy Theory. In addition to theoretical analysis, we test the applicability of the theory through an elicitation study with a native speaker.The Dean’s Award for Research Excellence (DARE) - Undergraduate enables our students to meaningfully engage in research projects supervised by LA&PS faculty members. Find out more about DARE.