Re: lateral fricative (was: Láadan and woman's speak)

From: "Raymond Brown"

> At 2:18 pm -0500 21/5/00, Matt Pearson wrote:
> >Ray Brown wrote:
> >>Herman Miller replied:
> >>>I've always liked the sound of lateral fricatives. I used a voiceless
> >>>*palatal* lateral fricative in one of my Elvish languages.
> >>
> >>To which at 2:01 pm -0500 20/5/00, Matt Pearson replied:
> >>>Tokana also has this sound.  Actually, it's more of a postalveolar
> >>>lateral fricative (same point of articulation as English /S/).
> >>
> >>That's the Welsh "ll" which I've also heard in Zulu & Xhosa (two of the
> >>Nguni languages).  But I think that Herman is saying he also used a
palatal
> >>variety, not that the Welsh one is palatal (which it most certainly
isn't).

Sorry, I lost the original thread. I speak no Welsh, Zulu, or Xhosa. When I
tried producing the sound described in the Laádan inventory, I got what
sounded like a cat hiss, which is certainly not pleasant to the ear (and
wasn't that the desired effect?), sounds aggressive and confrontational
(adding to the unpleasantness), and _not_ what I imagine the Welsh "ll" to
be at all. I could imagine the hissing-cat / unpleasant-female-perspective
link easily since this is quite traditional, but I really don't know if this
is what Elgin had in mind, either consciously or unconsciously.

Kou