Re: Natlang Help: Do you know of a language that...

Quoting David Peterson <ThatBlueCat@...>:

> I have an idea for a possible paper topic for school, but I need to look at
> languages other than English.   What I'm looking for are languages that:
>
> (1) Allow coda voiced velar consonants (e.g., [g] and [N]), and
> (2) Make a distinction between tense and lax non-low vowels (so, /e/ vs.
> /E/,
> /i/ vs. /I/, /u/ vs. /U/, /o/ vs. /O/).
>
> Do you know of any natlangs that do this?
Swedish, if you feel like treating f'rinstance [u:] vs [U] as /u/ vs /U/ rather
than /u:/ vs /u/ (the traditional interpretation).

Hm, [u\:] vs [8] is perhaps a better example. At least, I've read that this is
the long-short pairing in which length plays the smallest role and quality the
greatest when speakers tell them appart.

Now, we're not going to find any minimal pair involving final [-N], since you
only get short vowels before it. There could be with [-g], but I cannot seem to
think of any right now. At any rate, _mugg_ [m8g:] and _sug_ [su\:g] certainly
don't rhyme. Wait, archaism to the rescue: _hug_ [hu\:g] vs _hugg_ [h8g:].
(_Hug_, meaning something like "mind, inclination", isn't something you hear
with any frequency these days, but the word exists in my passive vocabulary.)

Problems:
i) You could insist that length, not tense~lax is distinctive here. (Some
experimentation on my self however suggests that quality is more important than
length in the cases of [a] vs [A:] and [8] vs [u\:]).
ii) Some will insist that neither vowel length nor quality is distinctive here,
but consonant length. (I'm believe consonant length is purely allophonic here,
but there isn't going to be any agreement here till the language loses either
vocalic or consonantal (phonetic) length.)
iii) Final /-g/ is often only theoretically voiced. What really distinguishes
it from final /-k/ is being lenis rather than fortis.

                                                             Andreas

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