Re: new Unnamed Conlang
| From: | Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Saturday, September 18, 2004, 6:13 |
|---|
On Friday, September 17, 2004, at 06:18 , Rodlox R wrote:
>> From: Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>
>> Reply-To: Constructed Languages List <CONLANG@...>
>> To: CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU
>> Subject: Re: new Unnamed Conlang
>> Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 13:08:20 +0200
>>
>> It's in general tricky to figure out exactly what's meant when the sounds
>> of one
>> language is described in the terms of others,
>
'generally' is being a bit kind. The '..is like..' method may be OK for
helping tourists wit the odd phrase, but it's too imprecise for a proper
description of a language.
> Whose language is X-Sampa ? :)
No one's. You might as well ask whose language is the Roman alphabet's or
Cyrillic etc. Whose language is Pitman shorthand's or Gregg shorthand's?
These are methods of *transcription*.
X-SAMPA is a method of transcribing the sounds of a language in an
_unambiguous_ way if you cannot use the International Phonetic Alphabet
(IPA) because you are restricted to ASCII characters.
>> > kh (like "KHaan" in Mongolian)
>>
>> Mongolian might be a poor example, since very few people speak it.
>
> you never heard of Gengis Khan? :)
I think we've all heard of Genghis Khan. But that's what we call him in
_English_. The first name can also be found written 'Chinggis', 'Jenghiz',
'Jinghis', 'Chinghiz' and 'Chingiz' and probably some other variants. I
don't know what it is in Mongolian.
As for Khan, I have always heard the Kh in Khan pronounced exactly like
the k in kangaroo; even the students I've taught with the surname Khan
have pronounced it that way.
We assumed you actually meant the way 'Khan' is pronounced in the
Mongolian language.
>
>> > jy (like "DJoser" in Ancient Egyptian)
>>
>> I don't know how AE sounded, and I doubt anyone else does for sure
>> either.
>> What's
>> worse, I don't even know what the conventional pronunciation of 'dj' is
>> for
>> it.
>
> ˝n X-Sampa - J\
Actually the conventional pronunciation given by Anglophones is usually
[dZ]; but [J\] is probably what is actually was, tho I think some consider
it was a palatalized [d].
Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
ray.brown@freeuk.com
===============================================
"They are evidently confusing science with technology."
UMBERTO ECO September, 2004