Finding minimal pairs in protactile language

Minimal pairs have played an important role in documentation and theoretical work on signed and spoken languages. however, they have been difficult to find in emerging languages. This raises the question: Where and how can we expect minimal pairs to emerge, and under what conditions? In this paper, we analyze some of the first minimal pairs to emerge in Protactile Language (PT), a language found in DeafBlind communities where reciprocal, tactile communication practices have been in place for the last twenty years. We present two studies of data collected over twelve years to investigate the diachronic changes taking place in this language. We observe that: (i) the development of minimal pairs requires established, formal coherence in the system, and (ii) nearly all minimal pairs emerging in PT are within semantic classes, rather than across unrelated semantic classes. We argue that these contrasts are arising earlier because there is significant pragmatic pressure to distinguish between closely related meanings (e.g. dollar amounts and days of the week), and we show how iconicity catalyzes that process. In more established languages, such as American Sign Language (ASL), too much time has passed to know which contrasts came first, or what conditions enabled their emergence.