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Re: CHAT: Another NatLang i like

From:Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@...>
Date:Monday, June 28, 1999, 10:45
Nik Taylor wrote:
>Christophe Grandsire wrote: >> Consonnant harmony is rather difficult, with three ranks (unvoiced, voiced, >> voiced nasalised) and I won't explain it further (unless you want me to). > >Aack! Don't you know that that's the surest way to get us to *want* to >hear more about it? :-) Please, do share. >
and Raymond A. Brown wrote:
>Oui, oui! Si'l vous plait!
Okay, I'm going to explain it (it always works :) ). But beware, it will be long. The consonnant present in Tj'a-ts'a~n are: stops: unvoiced: p t k voiced: b d g voiced nasalised: ~b ~d ~g fricative: s (pronounced /s/, /z/, /S/ or /Z/ depending on its surroundings) nasals: m n ~n (it's 'ng' in 'sing') approximants: w j r (trilled) 's' is pronounced /s/ or /z/ if near to a front vowel, /S/ or /Z/ if near a back vowel. It is pronounced /s/ or /S/ if near to an unvoiced consonnant and /z/ or /Z/ if near to a voiced or voiced nasalised consonnant. 'sj' is always pronounced /S/, 'sw' is always pronounced /s/. Prefixes and suffixes are uniformly (C')(V')(A) (with at least one), where C' is any consonnant (which undergoes consonnant harmony), V' is any vowel (undergoes vowel harmony) and A is an approximant and never undergoes harmony. So the following rules of consonnantal harmony concern C', which undergoes harmony with the nearest consonnant of the root. If this consonnant is an unvoiced stop, s pronounced /s/ or /S/, sj or sw, C' is 'unvoiced': - stops are pronounced unvoiced (p t k), - s is pronounced /s/ or /S/, - w becomes pw and j becomes tj. - the others don't change. If the consonnant is a voiced stop, s pronounced /z/ or /Z/, w, j or r, C' is 'voiced': - stops are pronounced voiced (b d g), - s is pronounced /z/ or /Z/, - the others don't change. If the consonnant is a voiced nasalised stop or a nasal, C' is 'voiced nasalised': - stops are pronounced voiced nasalised (~b ~d ~g), - s is pronounced /z/ or /Z/, - w becomes mw and j becomes nj, - the others don't change. Here is an example to show how it works: roots: sjem /Sem/: sky, roj /roj/: human affixes: new-: past prefix k'a-se-: gender prefix: human group m-: gender prefix: "material" -mi-ki: case suffix: adlative (place where you come from) ni: attributive affix (can be either a prefix or a suffix depending on whether the attributee is before or after the attributer). And the phrase is: new-k'a-se-m-sjem-mi-~gi-ni ga-so-roj /new-ka-sem-Sem-mi-~gi-ni gQ-Zo-roj/ = new-, k'a-se-, m-, sjem, -mi-ki, ni k'a-se-, roj In the first word, prefixes undergo consonnant harmony with 'sj' and vocal harmony with 'e' and suffixes undergo consonnant harmony with 'm' and vocal harmony with 'e'. In the second word, prefixes undergo consonnant harmony with 'r' and vocal harmony with 'o' (vocal harmony is front unrounded <-> back rounded, with the vowels /a Q e o i u/). That's all (it's complex enough, and the syntax is complex enough too). Christophe Grandsire |Sela Jemufan Atlinan C.G. "Reality is just another point of view." homepage : http://www.bde.espci.fr/homepage/Christophe.Grandsire/index.html