Re: Circumfixes and syllabic consonants

On Sat, 31 Oct 1998 10:18:53 -0200 Who? <fflores@...>
writes:
>Hi all!
>Also, syllabic consonants: how frequent are they? Have you
>ever used them? By "syllabic consonants" I mean consonant
>sounds that can be treated as vowels, i. e. they can form a
>syllable, and be stressed. I know at least Chinese has a syllabic
>"r". My new conlang is having lots of syllabic consonants; in
>fact, voiced fricatives can all be syllabic.
>--Pablo Flores
I don't really use them that much in Rokbeigalmki - just when the plural
suffix _m_ (or the archaic singular suffix _n_) come after a consonant.
For instance, in _gamnuhm_ (stars) the /m/ isn't syllabic, because it
follows the vowel _uh_ /V/, but in _maldm_ (humans) it is.

In my first conlang, ool-Nuziiferoi, that i started and then aborted with
my brother about 3 years ago, syllabic consonants were used for different
transitive-nesses of verbs:

bobuht = to pour (simple)
m^bobuht = to make pour, cause to pour (causative)
n^bobuht = to be poured (passive)
ng^bobuht = to pour oneself (reflexive)

The /m/, /n/, and /N/ were syllabic.  The circumflex was placed over it
to mark it as a syllabic consonant.  We had planned for all consonants to
be able to be syllabic, but never got around to figuring out uses for
them besides the nasals.  A circumflex over a vowel meant that it was
pronounced as a syllable all to itself.

-Stephen (Steg)

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