An Optimality Theoretical Analysis Of The Syllabification Of The Consonant Clusters With [S] Sound

The syllabification of the consonant clusters with [s] sound in English has been a challenge in the study of English syllable. Although a variety of syllable theories try to make a reasonable explanation, it is not ideal enough. This paper aims to explain the syllabification of the consonant clusters with [s] sound in English based on the optimality theory. In English,[s] sound exists in three positions. It can be in word-initial position, word-final position and the position between vowels in a word. This paper studies the combination of the [s] sound and other consonants when it appears in the word-initial position and word-final position and the syllabification of the [s] sound when it appears in the position between vowels in a word.Firstly, this paper analyzes the combination of sC in the word-initial position in the aspect of optimality theory. It can be found that constraint OCP and constraint AGREE play a very important role in the optimality theoretical analysis. Then through the optimality theoretical analysis of the combination of Cs in the word-final position, we found that [ps, ts, ks, fs, ns, Is, rs] should be the optimal candidates because they violate the lowest-ranking constraints and satisfy the higher-ranking constrains.Then based on the optimality theory, this paper discusses the syllabification of the [s] sound when it appears in the position between vowels in a word from four aspects. In different phonetic environments,[s] sound belongs to different syllables. It is found that it plays an important role whether sC is a valid word-initial consonant cluster, i.e. constraint LOI&LOF is significant for the syllabification of the [s] sound. The ranking of constraints LOI&LOF^ONSET, NoCODA≥*COMPLEX determines the syllabification of the [s] sound in English.