157 Phonology - Phonetics The Greek Rhotic in /rC/ Sequences: An Acoustic and Electropalatographic Study Katerina Nicolaidis and Mary Baltazani Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, University of Ioannina knicol@enl.auth.gr, mbaltaz@cc.uoi.gr Abstract This paper analyses acoustic and electropalatographic data to examine rhotic production in /rC/ sequences in Greek. The rhotic was typically produced with a single constriction phase and a vocoid following the constriction and preceding the consonant. The duration data showed that the vocoid was longer than the constriction with formants similar to the nuclear vowel but more centralised. The articulatory analysis showed an alveolar rhotic with variation in place and degree of constriction (ranging from fully constricted to more open articulations) due to context and speaker. The data indicate tap production superimposed on a vocalic gesture which is necessary for the ballistic movement to occur. 1. Introduction Rhotic production has been reported to vary within and across languages. Previous literature has documented variation in manner and place of articulation due to factors such as context, position, speech rate and dialect (Lindau 1985; Inouye 1995; Ladefoged & Maddieson 1996; Recasens & Pallarès 1999; Recasens & Espinosa 2007). Variability in rhotic production has also been reported for Greek. Descriptions of the Greek consonantal system mainly based on impressionistic auditory categorization have classifed it as a trill (Φιλιππάκη-Warburton 1992; Nespor 1996) or as a tap (e.g. Arvaniti 1999). Experimental studies have verifed tap production but have also shown approximant articulation (Nicolaidis 2001; Baltazani 2005, 2009). Variation in the place of articulation of the rhotic has also been reported ranging between alveolar, retracted alveolar and postalveolar productions (Nicolaidis 2001; Nicolaidis and Baltazani 2011; Baltazani and Nicolaidis (2012)). Further context-based variation has also been reported. In particular, tap productions have been described to occur in initial and intervocalic position (Arvaniti 1999; Nicolaidis 2001; Baltazani 2005, 2009) while in clusters with stops or fricatives there is evidence of the production of a vocoid between