9-phoneme IAL (was Re: Chinese-based IAL?)

Andreas Johansson <and_yo@...> writes:

[problems with Chinese roots in 9-phoneme IAL]

> A 9-phoneme lang! That's a bit extreme ...
Yes, it is, it was inspired by last year's discussion of such systems,
and is an attempt to build a "minimal consensus" phonology.  It is also
inspired by Pitakosilano (the same 9 phonemes with one exception: I have
/u/ where Pitakosilano has /o/).

>       Now what ARE these 9 phonemes?
> Seeing that you've got 21 possible syllables, I'd say you've got three
> vowels, six consonants and uses (C)V syllables. Dare I guess that the vowels
> are /a i u/? Hmm, what consonants? /k/ and /t/ seems likely, as do /m/ and
> /n/, perhaps /s/ and /l/ too? How many rights did I get?
Very close.  The vowels are guessed correctly; the consonants are
correct save one: they are /p t k s n l/, though I now tend to represent
the stops as voiced: /b d g s n l/.  Syllable structure is indeed (C)V.

This is not meant to be a serial auxlang proposal, rather my personal
indulgement with IAL design goals.  For fun, I have tried to squeeze
some conlang names into the 9-phoneme system in order to try out how
well they are recognizable.  They are:

Piritiniki (or Pirisiniki)
Paraanaka
Ini
Linia
Nulilini
Silinaniki
Sipilakisi
Tiliki
Tiunakata
Tukana (not very difficult to guess, I think)
Uatakasi (also easy)

Who can guess them?  (They are all from list members.)

Hint: these are the names of the authors, in the sequence of the langs:

Anatulu Sinisi
Supu Iti
Nikulu Pilini
Tanaili Anatalasunu
Iluku Linaila
Iluku Linaila
Iunu A Li (not very hard to guess, I think)
Nalakusu Sinisi
Sali Kipisi
Natiu Pilisunu
Niki Tiluru

> PS if anybody wonders how I landed on the 3-vowel, 6-consonants, it's very
> simple: 21 factorizes as 3*7. That means that there's only two "slots" in
> syllable, which points strongly towards a CV syllable structure, and as
> 3+7=10, one of these slots can be empty, almost certainly consonant slot.
Exactly!

> Three vowels and six consonants seems alot more likely than seven vowels and
> two consonants.
Hey, that'd be cool!  Of course, those two consonant phonemes could have
quite a number of allophones conditioned by the adjacent vowels.

>       The actual sounds I suggested are mere guesses of course
> (tho' I've guessed on common sounds of course).
Yes, and they were good guesses, missing only one.

Jörg.

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