CONLANG Digest - 21 Feb 2000 to 22 Feb 2000 (#2000-54)

> > Anyway, my question is:
> >
> > Is there a natlang precedent (and/or existing name?)
> > for the 'hissing'
> > consonant (fricative?) produced by keeping the
> > tongue in a lax / schwa-like
> > position, and producing either voiced or voiceless
> > breath with the teeth
> > together and causing friction?
> > It sounds to me somewhere between /S/ and /f/ (or
> > /Z/ and /v/), but is
> > obviously a totally different sound.
> >
> > Any (more) ideas, anyone?
>
> I can't tell you if there's natlang precedent, not
> having any books with me right now, but I believe it'd
> be called a bidental fricative.
Gotta quote here, from a book quoting a book quoting a couple of other
people...

    "Passy (1899) describes a fricative in the Shapsug dialect of Adyghe, a
Circassian language, which has 'the lips fully open, the teeth clenched and
the tongue flat, the air passing between the teeth; the sound is
intermediate between /S/ and /f/.'
    "This sound was noticed independently by Catford who comments that 'the
Adyghe (Circassian) bidental fricative is, in fact, a variant of /x/,
occurring for the /x/ in such words as /x@/ "six" and /dax@/ "pretty" in the
Black Sea sub-dialect of Shapsug'."

...Is it like that?


    *Muke!