Assibilation in modern German

This paper discusses alternations between [t] and [ts] in Modern German which require a process of assibilation whereby /t/ surfaces as [ts] before [j]. Although many German words have surface [tj] sequences which appear to be exceptional, it will be shown that the overwhelming number of these examples are systematic exceptions; by contrast, truly idiosyncratic exceptions to the process are rare. The process of assibilation will be argued to involve the change from [-strident] /t/ to [+strident] [ts]; hence, the German data support the claim in the literature on other languages that affricates are strident stops which have no [+continuant] component. It will be demonstrated that an Optimality-Theoretic analysis of the German data is superior to any possible rule-based one because only the former theory can account for all of the German facts.