Phonation or Register Tones (was: Trial of the century?)

John Fisher wrote:
>
>Great!  A conlang with tones!  Off-hand, I can't think of any other
>that has been mentioned here...  Unless I'm wrong?
>
Boreanesian does not have tones per se, at least not in the sense of
tones found in most languages where varying pitches play a phonemic
role. In Boreanesian, it is *not* the movement of the glottis that
is phonemic, rather it is the degree of constriction in the glottis
that is phonemic. Some call this register tones, but I prefer to use
the term phonations because I don't feel the word 'tone' is really
applicable.

It appears that tonal conlangs are common enough. But I dare say
that there are not many conlangs with contrastive phonations. Some
languages contrast creaky voice, modal voice, and breathy voice at
the syllable level. I have heard that many Austro-Asiatic languages
do this as well as a few Amerind languages. In any case, it is quite
rare the world over. Could this account for why this might be rare
among conlangs? AFAIK, these languages don't have what I'd call
phonemic phonation 'glides' in the sense that a phonemic change from
one phonation to another occurs within the syllable. This must be
even rarer - only Danish comes pretty close to mind.

Boreanesian has contrastive 'phonation glides'. Every heavy syllable
is articulated with one of two contrastive phonation glides. One,
which I call creaky, starts out with regular modal voice and quickly
changes to a creaky voice at the syllable coda and ends in a glottal
stop [?]. This quite reminiscent of the Danish 'stoed'. The other,
which I call clear, starts out with regular modal voice and quickly
changes to a slightly breathy voice at the syllable coda and ends in
a voiceless consonant (or glottal fricative [h]).

Anyone else dare challenge the uniqueness of Boreanesian? 8-)

Regards,
-Kristian- 8-)