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Re: THEORY: more questions

From:Dirk Elzinga <dirk_elzinga@...>
Date:Tuesday, November 25, 2003, 16:07
Carsten:

Others have answered some of these questions, so I'll try to fill in
some holes.

On Tuesday, November 25, 2003, at 06:30  AM, Carsten Becker wrote:

> Hi folks, > > I've got more thinks I don't know what they mean or I just wanted to > know why it is as it is: > > • open/close syllables
Mark and John answered this one (though I would argue with John's characterization of English as "favoring" closed syllables, but that's for another day).
> • oblique (as an aspect or mood or so)
Answered.
> • in my conlang, there's a special mood for purposes, how could this > be called with the grammatical term? I mean, something like > "permittive" for the mood you must use when you ask for something that > must be permitted - still I'm not sure if "permittive" is right there, > but at least it sounds Grammticalese...
'Permittive' sounds fine, though I probably would have used 'permissive'. I have seen 'purposive', but I'm not sure that it's used in the way you describe.
> • I deleted all those "Weekly Vocab" Mails, but then I saw these > mails are aids for inventing words ... a discipline I'm not very good > in, too. How can I tell the server to send me all those first "Weekly > Vocab" mails from 1 to the current number (30)? Or have I to search > the archive and download that stuff by hand? I mean, that's not > difficult, but boring and getting this delivered by email would be > more comfortable.
Don't know. I'd be inclined to just download the posts by hand; you can learn a lot by doing boring, repetitive things (like checking a Hopi vocabulary list for attested forms ... ).
> • Seeing where a consonant is pronounced and how it should sound like > from the chart works pretty well already ... but what about vowels? > How do I know that e.g. the <i> in <feet> is a front and close? Or > that [O] is open-mid back?
Listen carefully to sound files and memorize the vowels. Using articulatory descriptions for vowels is a matter of convenience; unfortunately they give the misleading impression that the vowel sounds can be replicated with any kind of accuracy; they can't. An example springs to mind. When I learned German, I pronounced the long mid vowel (/e:/) as the English tense mid vowel (/eI/), but without the offglide. When I went to Germany, I found that the native pronunciation was considerably higher than I had thought. It was definitely a mid vowel, but not "my" mid vowel. So your best bet for learning and pronouncing vowels is to listen to a native speaker (or IPA demonstration sound files -- there are some on the Web) and imitate.
> • What are "sonorants"?
Mark's characterization of sonorants as "vowel like sounds" and "sounds which can constitute a syllable by themselves" is pretty close. However, the fact that sonorants can be syllabic is language-particular; English allows syllabic sonorants but Shoshoni (for example) does not. Voiced sounds like /b/, /z/, etc require an active vocal fold gesture to bring them into a position where they can vibrate. Sounds like /n/, /l/, and /r/ do not require an active vocal fold gesture; the vocal folds vibrate spontaneously as a result of the articulatory arrangement required to produce those sounds. Sounds produced with this "spontaneous voicing" are sonorants.
> • What is an "umlaut"? I'm German, so there are umlauts in my native > language, but I saw this already in other contexts than German /a/ > > /E/, /o/ > /2/, /u/ > /y/ (a>ä, o>ö, u>ü). How does umlauting work for > other vowels or does it work for other vowels at all?
Answered.
> • The optional question that I actually should be able to look up on > the internet myself if I'd know where: Why is German e.g. <ei> > pronounced [aj], <eu> and <äu> [oj] and <ie> [i:]? Or even more > odd, /a_u/ changes to /oj/ in the plural: [ha_us] > ["hojz@]. Or > sometimes, <chs> is pronounced [k_s], and sometimes [xs]. Is it > because of some sound changes during the middle ages?
John answered this one. Dirk -- Dirk Elzinga Dirk_Elzinga@byu.edu "No theory can exclude everything that is wrong, poor, or even detestable, or include everything that is right, good, or beautiful." - Arnold Schoenberg