?-Assimilation in Voice Dental Velar Voice Sound in Papuan Malay

Abstract

This paper is meant to discuss correct phonological solutions to assimilation segment at the underlying level of accent in Papuan Malay. The methodology: to explain for ?-assimilation in Papuan Malay, the researcher refers to Halle (2017) theoretical views on Generative Phonology. The ?-sound appears in Papuan Malay, if a word is ended by a consonant /n/ dental velar voice results the process of ?-sound in the environment of cluster in the word-middle and word finally (the tow core of syllablles) and also after vowel. One example, word Teminabuan [t?min?bu?n] (one of village in Papua) is uttered as Teminabuang [t?min?bu??].The conclusions: it is explicit that the ?-assimilation are not only syntactically motivated due such as a phrasal to the occurrence of a word entity in the structure but also phonologically, a word may because there are certain specific environments in which such process take place.
Key Words: Phonological rules, ?-assimilation, Papuan Malay.