Archangeli’s research explores both the fundamental concepts of how phonological systems are organized and the concrete ways in which sounds are used and produced in language.

Her conceptual research, Emergent Phonology (or Minimalist Phonology), asks the question of how much does phonological acquisition rely on innate, language-specific capabilities, and how much can rely on the human’s ability to extract similarities and generalizations from even very small amounts of input data. Diminishing the role of “Universal Grammar” for phonology leads to a different conception of lexical representations and the relations among them. A consequence is the elimination of vexing phonological issues such as abstract underlying representations and opaque surface patterns. (Much of this work is done in collaboration with Douglas Pulleyblank, University of British Columbia.)

This work is a continuation of her earlier work on underspecified representations, which focused on determining the minimal amount of information necessary and sufficient for expressing phonological patterns.

Archangeli also carries out basic research in the field, both documentation and experimental work, in Scotland, Assam (India), and Lombok (Indonesia), as well as looking at English in the United States. These efforts focus on determining the articulation of specific sounds in local languages through the use of ultrasound, and documenting sound systems of lesser studied languages. (Her primary collaborators in this area of research are Jeff Mielke, North Carolina State University (English) and Jon Yip, University of Hong Kong (Assamese & Indonesian languages).)