Re: Unilang: the Prosodics

En réponse à Markus Miekk-oja <torpet@...>:

>
> So, if people were given time to get used to it, I don't think anyone
> would
> have any problem with the various
> kinds of accent.
>
Indeed. French has neither pitch-accent, nor length distinction, nor phonemic
stress, and yet I don't have any difficulty to recognize these features after a
moment of adaptation. The problem would be to take them into account: since
stress is not phonemic in French, French people usually disregard it even in
languages where it is phonemic. Phonemic stress in Unilang would be problematic
for French speakers. Still, it's more because of their laziness when it comes to
learning another language than because of the inherent difficulty of that
language.

Christophe.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr