Den historiske utviklinga til preaspirasjon i samiske språk

Preaspiration of voiceless stops is a well-known feature of the phonological systems of the Sámi languages,as in Northern Sámi [jahki] jahki ‘year’. In some form, it is found in all Sámi varieties that we have records of, with the sole exception of Inari Sámi. We also possess a good understanding of how Sámi preaspiration is related to the consonant gradation systems of other Uralic languages, in particular those of the Finnic varieties. Present-day Sámi languages differ somewhat in the role that preaspirated stops play in their phonological systems. In this paper I outline how this variation arose in the course of the historicaldevelopment from Proto-Sámi to the present-day languages. I propose a scenario grounded in the life cycle of phonological processes (Kiparsky 1995, Bermúdez-Otero 2007, 2015). I argue that this framework is especially well suited to clarifying diverse developments of phonetic and phonological patterns from acommon historical source, and is applicable also to Sámi material. I justify this approach by tracing the development of preaspiration from a phonetic rule of Proto-Sámi to the various outcomes attested in the present-day languages.