Re: /H/ (was: An Unknown Conlang)

On Thu, 6 Jul 2000, Christophe Grandsire wrote:

> >You know, I looked hard but found no language that contained the /inverted-h/
> >phoneme outside of French.  Until I discovered it in Abkhaz.  And Abkhaz
> > has ALOT of consonants.
>
> I've heard that some Tibetan languages, and maybe even some Chinese
> languages had it? Am I wrong?
(Standard) Chinese certainly has the sound; whether it is phonemic
depends on your theory of Mandarin phonology, which is rather
over-constrained, meaning that many theories are consistent with the facts.
Anyway, in any syllable for the form {j,q,x}uVN, where V is a vowel, and
N is n or ng or null, the u is pronounced [H].

--
John Cowan                                   cowan@ccil.org
        "You need a change: try Canada"  "You need a change: try China"
                --fortune cookies opened by a couple that I know