Re: Language "laws"?
| From: | J. 'Mach' Wust <j_mach_wust@...> |
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| Date: | Tuesday, October 12, 2004, 9:58 |
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On Tue, 12 Oct 2004 07:07:46 +0100, Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> wrote:
>I can think of languages that have /s/ but no other fricatives; but I
>cannot think of any with just /T/. However, I don't see why at some stage
>a lonely [s] could not have changed to [T] (maybe a monarch or ruler had a
>lisp, and courtiers/followers/sycophants copied him/her and then it became
>a mark of 'polite speech' and so eventually spread to all layers of
>society) - in fact I would not be unduly surprised if a language were
>found with /T/ as its only fricative.
I would be very surprised. Actually, I think I can explain why I'd be
surprised and you not: Because you're speaking an exotic native language
that has this unusual /T/ ("exotic" and "unusual" as compared to the
majority of world's languages). :) The exotic native language I speak
has /pf/ and /kx/ and four vowel heights.
gry@s:
j. 'mach' wust