Karnuugaan phonology

Well, here's the first installment of my latest lang,
Karnuugaan:  the phonology.

The back-story on the Karnuugkun (speakers of
Karnuugaan) is that they are an alien race fleeing the
destruction of their homeworld, and Karnuugaan is the
language that was developed as an auxlang so that they
could communicate among their space fleet.

Some weird sounds (the double stops), and some weird
romanisations, but "weird" is what I'm aiming for
here.
There are no labials or labiodentals, because
Karnuugkun don't have lips.  However, their dental
arrangement is much more flexible than the human
equivalent.
In addition, they have 6 fingers on their left hand
and 7 on their right hand, making for a base-13
counting system.

CONSONANTS

Kar.	CXS
(Stops)
t	/t/
d	/d/
k	/k/
g	/g/
q	/q/
p	/G\/*
н	/?/
(Double Stops)**
tt	/tt/
td	/td/
tk	/tk/
dd	/dd/
dt	/dt/
dk	/dk/
dg	/dg/
kk	/kk/
kg	/kg/
kt	/kt/
kq	/kq/
gg	/gg/
gk	/gk/
gt	/gt/
gd	/gd/
gq	/gq/
gp	/gG\/
qq	/qq/
qp	/qp/
qk	/qk/
pp	/G\G\/
pq	/G\q/
pk	/G\k/
pg	/G\g/
(Nasals)
n	/n/
y	/N/***
(Fricatives)
f	/f/****
v	/v/****
s	/s/
z	/z/
š	/S/
j	/Z/
x	/x/, /X/
ğ	/G/, /R/
h	/h/
(Liquids)
r	/r/, /4/
l	/l/, /L/
(Other)
m	syllabifies following consonant*
'       used to separate modifiers from root sequences

VOWELS
a       /a/
aa      /a:/
e       /E/
i       /i/
ii      /i:/
o       /O/
u       /u/
uu      /u:/

*       I hate digraphs, and there were all of these
unused labial symbols lying around... :)
**      The Karnuugkun vocal tract allows doubling of
stops between POAs only a single place or less apart.
The resulting double stops are viewed as a single
letter, and are quite difficult for humans to
pronounce properly.
***     I did y for /N/ once before, in Noygwexaal, so
_I'm_ relatively used to this, but it's still a little
odd.
****    /f/ and /v/ are approximations of consonantal
sounds that the Karnuugkun make by blowing through
their teeth.

All consonantal letters except for the stops, double
stops and r can be pronounced syllabically. l is
(almost?) never used except syllabically.  It may be
that r becomes lateralised when used as a syllabic
consonant. (How likely is this?)

More to follow...

Geoff

=====

One by one the penguins are stealing my sanity
-Graffitum spotted on a bridge in England


		
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