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400
4th century BC
Phonology may seem to be a modern practice all about comparing Geordies with Scousers but it can actually be traced back to the 4th Century BC when a grammar of the ancient Indian language "Sanskrit" was composed. This was one of the first steps into phonological research, but there were many more developments to come before linguists reached the stage that we are at today. -
Introduction of the Phoneme concept
The Polish linguist Jan Baudouin de Courtenay introduced the concept of the phoneme. This is unofficially thought to be when the modern study of phonology started. -
The Prague Shool
The Prague School became one of the most influential schools of its time. of linguistics. It consisted of a circle of linguistics including Nicolai Trubetzkoy and Roman Jackobson. -
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Natural Phonology
David Stampe wrote his dissertation on Natural Phonology. In it he contests the idea that the phonological system is built on a system of rules and instead he says that phonological adquisition is a matter of suppressing habits that we are born with. -
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Government Phonology aims.
Government Phonology aims to provide an account for phonological phenomena by replacing the rule component of phonology with a restricted set of universal principles and parameters -
Optimality theory
Optimality theory was proposed by Alan Prince and Paul Smolensky. -
Today
Today Government Phonology is still considered in th UK whereas Optimality theory has a wider following in North America.
