Re: new Unnamed Conlang

Quoting Tamas Racsko <tracsko@...>:

> On 18 Sep 2004 Andreas Johansson <andjo@FRE...> wrote:
>
> > Various 'lects of German and Spanish. Frenchs for /r/ in words like
> > "croissant".
>
>   I do not wat to defend Mongolian as a specification for |kh|, but
> I think, 'lects of better known languages could be equally unknown
> to the general public as a standard of a less known languages.
I believe I've indicated a lack of faith in the utility of such specifications
at all. The question, however, was whether the voiceless uvular fricative
occurs in more well-known languages, which it certainly does.

(Some books give [X] as the value of /x/ after back vowels in Modern Standard
High German, which 'lect I dare claim is alot more well-known than the vast
majority of languages.)

>   French /r/ is the voiced variant of |kh| (that is |g| before back
> vowels is Khalkha). I am not completely aware of French sound
> assimilation rules.  Is /r/ really become unvoiced after voiced
> stops?
French people have told me so. Initial /kr/ is, I'm told, realized as [qX].

> > Well, I'd be more incline to go by Rodlox' statement that it's [J\]
> > than by some reconstruction of AE phonology that might differ from the
> > one he's familiar with.
>
>   IMHO it is not so simple. Hungarian |gy| in phonetically
> affricate [J\j\] but it usually written as a plosive [J\].  This is
> rather about accuracy of the notation and not about different
> phonology.
I do not see why we should be more inclined to trust his statement that it's
like AE 'dj', which certainly is polyvalent, more than his statement that it's
[J\], which only has one reading. Particularly since the later statement came
after the first.

>   And Rodlox used notation |jy|. If we take it serious, this sound
> is somehow a modified |j|. If |j| is to be read as [j] than it is a
> modified _approximant / fricative_.  Approximants (fricatives)
> change more likely into an affricate than into a plosive.  But |ii|
> = [ai] seems to be an English-based solution.  In this case |j| can
> be treated as [dZ] and |jy| is still a modified affricate.
While I do not see any reason to take the notation 'jy' serious in this sense,
I'll have it noted that X-SAMPA thinks that [J\] is a modified 'j'. The IPA
symbol also seems to be based on 'j'.

>   However, there is a third option: notations |jy|, |sy|, |zy| are
> not systematic.  In this case, you are right but we cannot say
> anything about |sy| and |zy|.
No, but orthographic devices that are not perfectly systematic are often
approximately so. It would a priori be unsurprising if all all digraphs in -y
denoted palatals.

> > Since by Rodlox' own words, 'jy' is a palatal, it seems most likely to
> > assume that '-y' denotes palatal POA rarther than palatalization or
> > alveopalatal POA.
>
>   Personally I pronounce different [J\(j\)] sounds before front and
> back vowels.  And the distinction between my [J\(j\)] before
> palatal vowels and alveolopalatal [dz\] is not the place of the
> articulation but the shape of my tongue.
>
>   IMHO "alveolopalatal" is rather a label than a description of the
> exact articulation place.  Therefore I think the term palatal could
> cover also prepalatals e.g. as alveolopalatals.
Certainly possible, but there does not seem to be any specific reason to believe
that they are alveopalatal rather than (normal) palatal.

> > Since you appear to be familiar with EEan languages, do you know any
> > that uses the digraphs 'sy' and 'zy'?
>
>   Originally I did not mean that the notations |sy| and |zy| would
> be Eastern Europish, just the concept they convey.
Rodlox, however, said it was like in EEan languages when describing the
orthograpy, which certainly _suggests_ he believes some or other EEan language
uses them in the same way.

>   But to answer your questions, I see two instances where |sy| and
> |zy| occur in Eastern European orthographies:
>
> 1. Romanizations of Cyrillic script. In a number of these
> Romanizations pre-iotic Cyrillic letters are transcribed by |y| as
> |ya|, |yu|, |ye|, |yo| etc.  It these systems, we get Russian
> |syuda| [s'u_X"da] '(to) here' and |zyat'| [z'at'] 'son-in-law,
> brother-in-law (sister's husband)' etc.
I originally asked specifically about _Latin_ orthographies, but good to know
anyway.

> 2. Some Romany dialects preserved "soft" sibillants. These sounds
> are written as |sy| and |zy| in some Romany orthographies (e.g. in
> the one used in Hungary).  In these systems |y| is a diacritic for
> palatalization, just as in Rodlox's system, e.g. |dy| [J\], |ly|
> [L], |ny| [J], |ty| [c].  In case of sibillants, the result is
> rather an alveolopalatal than a palatal: |sy| [s\], |zy| [z\].
> (They are merged
> into |sh| [S] and |zh| [Z] in the majority the present dialects).
>   (Some other Romany orthographies use |j| instead of |y|, others
> use
> accent marks.)
Cool.

                                                          Andreas