Coda nasals in early Germanic languages

A growing body of research on phonological features claims that they are not universal elements of language. Rather, it argues that they are emergent, meaning that they are encoded based on phonetic cues as well as sociohistorical factors. In emergent feature theory, features are probabilistically encoded. The clearest phonetic cues result in the clearest featural encoding. But phonetic cues can be blurrier for certain segments and in certain contexts. In these situations, multiple feature encodings are possible. Little research has explored the range of emergent specifications that are possible. This paper argues that coda nasals in early Germanic languages were marked with the feature [low], while onsets were not. Due to the lowness specification of coda nasals, the blocking of Northwest Germanic a-umlaut, Proto-Germanic pre-nasal raising, and high vowel lowering conditioned by coda nasals and post-velar fricatives in Old Norse can be accounted for in a novel and straightforward manner.