El estatus fonológico de ND y NT en el amuzgo de San Pedro Amuzgos

In the Amuzgo variety of San Pedro Amuzgos, previous studies have postulated a marginal phoneme /d/, which appears only after a nasal, giving rise to a contrast between [nd] and [nt] (Smith-Stark & Tapia García 1984: 204; Buck 2000: 365). Here we propose that [nd] is a post-stopped allophone of /n/ before oral vowels, while the allophone [n] appears before nasalized vowels. We account for the distribution of [n], [nd], and [nt] in various phonological contexts, and show that orthographic tendencies point to an affinity between laryngealization, rising diphthongs, and voicing. We confirm with phonetic data that the primary difference between [nd] and the cluster [nt] lies in the duration of the post-nasal occlusion. Finally, we present morphophonological data that support our analysis while also pointing to the existence of a true cluster [nd], distinct from [nd], created from /nt/ by a contextually restricted rule of postnasal voicing.