Rit (Vísindafélag Íslendinga) - 01.06.1970, Page 488

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Historically, Swedish is characterized by a reduction of
the set of initial consonant clusters, losing hr, hl, hv, hj, Ij, slj,
snj, smj, gj, dj, (s) kj, (s) tj, sj. The loss of contrastive possibilities in
initial position has been compensated for almost only by the
appearance of g and /. The shift in the initial position from a
system with long combinations to a system with more con-
trastive single units has had the eífect of concentrating the
contrastive possibilities around the stressed vowel. We might
compare this to the development in Common Scandinavian,
where syncopation, umlaut, and breaking lead to a shift of
the contrastive possibilities from endings to the stressed vowel
position, where a set of new vowels (umlaut vowels) developed
(cf. Sigurd 1961).
One of the tasks of a diachronic study of g and / would
be to evaluate the effect of foreign influence above all in
the development of /. In Modern Swedish, loanwords carry
a large part of the occurrences of /, but clearly the phoneme
has not just been borrowed without any internal support from
changes in Swedish.
(5) A fifth reason is a concern with the simplicity of
morphological representations. Morphophonemic alternations
indicate relations, for instance, between y and n (sen: sinka
[sigka]), between g and n (ságen:ságner [ságner]), between g
and k (kall: köld [göld] : kyla [gy:la]), between / and sk
(skára [Ja:ra] : skar [ska:r]), and between / and st(j) (stjála
[Já:la] : stal [sta:l]). Morphophonemic alternation is normally
handled by rules operating on a common base form, and
morphophonemic arguments are most valid in the discussion
of the possibilities of eliminating y, g, and / from the set of
morphophonemes. Unfortunately, the morphophonemic ar-
guments are scarce in this case, and those belonging in
word formation are somewhat dubious. In addition, alterna-
tion in sandhi, e.g., between y and n in min kamrat may be
used.
The treatment of y, g, and / varies between diflerent
authors, and the principles of linearity, local determinacy, and