Re: Some Boreanesian Phonological History

Jörg Rhiemeier wrote:
> Kristian Jensen <kljensen@...> writes:
>
> > [...]
> >
> > Proto-B had a phonemic system of consonants and vowels like the
> > following:
> >
> >   *p  *t  *c  *k  *q
> >   *b  *d  *j  *g  *G
> >   *f  *L  *S  *x  *X
> >   *B  *l  *y  *Y  *R
> >   *u  *r  *i  *@  *a
> >
> > That is, a system with the following phonemic places of articulation (POA):
> > labial, apical, palatal, dorsal, and radical. Each of these with a series
> > of voiced and voiceless obstruents and continuants, and vowels roughly
> > matching the POA of consonants.
>
> This looks neatly symmetrical, though somewhat unnatural.
Naturalness is not at all necessary for reconstructive purposes. The
reconstructed system is extremely theoretical and only helps to explain
the relationships found between vastly divergent languages. There isn't a
lot of material that linguists in the Boreanesian universe could use to
reconstruct the proto-language. Boreanesian is effectively a language
isolate, all other related languages became extinct years ago. The last
speaker of a non-standard Boreanesian language died some time in the
1950s.

One unusual characterisic you perhaps noticed in the above inventory is the
complete lack of nasals. But this in itself is not unusual nor unnatural in
languages with nasal harmony. All languages in the Boreanesian family had
nasal harmony. Although I should have of course added a series of nasal
vowels in the Proto-B's vowel inventory:

   *u~ *r~ *i~ *@~ *a~

Sorry... kinda forgot that. ;)

> [Some of the lines in the following text were a bit long,
>  hence I reformatted it.]
>
> >       Modern standard Boreanesian has
> > merged dorsal and radical consonants, and *r and *@, while the palatal
> > series are now laminal (except for *y which is still
> > palatal).
>
> What has become of the apicals?  I assume that they remained intact
> except *r which became /@/.
Yes, the apicals are completely intact except for *r.

> >       Nasality was suprasegmentalized so that the voiced
> > segments became coresponding nasals or nasalized segments.
>
> By which rules?
Sorry, I guess I phrased that in the wrong way. I meant to say that nasality
was _already_ an autosegmentalized feature in Proto-B. Like I said, nasal harmony
was certainly a part of Proto-B. In most languages, nasality is an integral
part of phonemes. However, in a few languages like Boreanesian, this feature is
extracted from the segmental tier and placed on the suprasegmental tier so that
it characterizes entire syllables, entire morphemes, or even entire words.
Nasal-harmony in Boreanesian is characterized by foot-level (or stress-group-level)
specifications for [- nasal] or [+ nasal], and certain segments (lenis stops,
approximants, and vowels) surface differently in oral and nasal feet.

> > Nasal harmony was certainly a part of Proto-B. But as the time went by,
> > nasality was not the only thing that was suprasegmentalized.
> > Vowel features of rounding and fronting became compatible with
> > peripheral (labial, dorsal/radical) and laminal/palatal consonants
> > respectively.
>
> While the apicals remained neutral, thus co-occuring with both sets.
> And if I understand it correctly, *a and *@ evolved front unrounded
> and back rounded allophones (something like [E]/[O] for /a/ and
> [e]/[o] for /@/)?  Or am I completely misled here?
No, you're not misled at all. Although in standard Boreanesian, its more
like [a]/[Q] for *a, and [i]/[u] for *@. Proto-B *a was more than likely
/A/, being radical rather than palatal. Proto-B *@ merged with *i and *u
in front and round contexts respectively. Proto-B *r retained its neutral
status, even after merging with *@.

> >       Notice that the POA of vowels match the POA of
> > consonants, and this has certainly influence how the
> > suprasegmentalization of vowel features is applied in the
> > language. In the present language, one may profitably speak of vowel
> > harmony for both frontness and roundness.
>
> I.e., they are all either front unrounded or back rounded, or what?
Not all. Some! Remember (see below) some consonants are opaque to rounding
but are hosts to fronting, while some are opaque to fronting but are hosts
to rounding. Apicals, being as you said "neutral", are opaque to both.

> >       However, the vowel harmony
> > in Boreanesian is complicated by the fact that peripheral consonants
> > are hosts to roundness but blockers of fronting, while laminal/palatal
> > consonants are hosts to fronting but blockers of rounding.
>
> Now I am completely lost.  Which factors govern the quality of vowels?
> Are vowels phonemic at all?  For some reason, all this sounds as if
> the quality of vowels was determined by the adjacent consonants
> according to some kind of rules, but I might be entirely off the mark.
Vowels are phonemic. But not all are used in different types of syllables. Only
heavy syllables have the complete inventory. Light syllables have only /i u @/,
and some light syllables are even vowelless at the underlying level -- having
only epenthetic [i u @]. It is these epenthetic vowels that are subject to vowel
harmony. Now as for whether the quality of these vowels is determined by adjacent
consonants or not is difficult even for me to say. The statement for spreading of
front or rounding is quite complex and requires specifying both the vowels and
consonants involved. Personally, I go for a more autosegmental or prosodical
approach.

> > All of these developments must have already occured some time before
> > the Austronesian influx. Austronesian and Japanese loanwords are
> > subject to the whims of nasal and front/rounding harmony -- at least
> > in the standard language.
> >
> > If it sounds complicated, well... that's because it is.
>
> Indeed!  A few examples would help.
Okey dokey! Here are some made-up examples just to keep things simple.

   /su + diw/             > sudiw
   /su + kay/             > sukway
   /pkway/                > pukway
   /si + pkway/           > sipukway
   /T@ + pkway/           > T@pukway
   /d + pkway/            > dupukway
   /d + Tway/             > d@Tuway
   /d + pkway + Tway/     > dupukwa:cuway
   /bkwi + T + pkway/     > bukwicupukway

Hope that helps.

-kristian- 8)