Re: Unilang: the Phonotactics

On Thu, 19 Apr 2001 13:41:35 +0200, Pavel A. da Mek <pavel.adamek@...>
wrote:

>What is wrong with /m/ and /h/?
>Let it be simple: only stops are not allowed as final C.
Okay, I think I have a solution to this; it's quite intertwined with
morphology, and might perhaps as well be on that thread.

I'd have two classes of morphological items, one of monosyllabics, one of
bisyllabics; and two types of syllable structure, one for accented
syllables, one for unaccented syllables.

The monosyllabic items would have the structure I described earlier, with
only plosives disallowed as final C's; so final /m/ and /h/ would be okay.
Sample sequences: /tres/, /mois/, /glar/, /kim/.

Bisyllabics would have one accented syllable, and one
unaccented, "reduced". The accented syllable may be structured just like
the monosyllabics, except if it's the first in the bisyllabic stem; then it
can only have /n s r l f h/ as a final C.

Reduced syllables are basically the "endings" used in the morphology; they
are unaccented, by definition. They have their own inventory of more
distinctive phonemes: the vowels /a i u/, and the finals /n s r/; if it is
a "stem syllable", i.e. part of a bisyllabic stem, it may have one onset C
from the following list: /p t k m n l r s/. So reduced syllabes are CVC,
and grammatic endings (a subset of reduced syllables) can only be VC.

A further limitation: the following medial combinations (across syllable-
boundaries: the final C of one + the onset C of the next) are legal:
any /n s l r/ + /p b t d k g/; /sm lm rm hm fl fr ns ls rs/. Note that some
of the combinations here are already ruled out by other rules above;
e.g. /lb/ won't occur because only accented syllables can have final /l/ or
initial /b/, and two accented syllables won't coexist in one morpheme.

Okay, this may all seem complicated, admittedly... Let's just look at some
samples:

Final-accent bisyllabics:

/kan'tron ma'frais sin'kuai las'gam mun'dreu a'lah/

Primary-accent bisyllabics:

/'muspin 'koini 'lonkar 'drahma 'nusmus 'tienir 'fanki 'arma/

And the complete list of possible grammatic endings:

/a i u an in un as is us ar ir ur/

Finally, I might add that these rules would mostly apply to the native
words of the language itself; there could be moderations in the rendering
of the names of countries and persons. So "Francois" can be /fran'sua/
instead of /ran'sua/.


Óskar