Re: help! phonology...

On Mon, 23 Oct 2000, Yoon Ha Lee wrote:

> I'm working my way through an introductory phonology/phonetics book and
> trying to overhaul the phonology of Chevraqis.  What I have, tentatively,
> is (using Kirschenbaum):
>
> [snipped the vowels]
>
> Consonants:
> (p) b   t d        c   k
>  m      n
>         *
> (f) v   s z  S Z   C   x
>
> Clusters can only be of the form consonant-plus-*, or /tS/ or /dZ/.
> [b] manifests as /p/ in word-final position, /b/ elsewhere.
> [v] manifests as /f/ in word-final position, /v/ elsewhere.
> (I *think* this rule makes some amount of sense but I'm not entirely
> confident.)
This is actually a very nice rule; have you considered applying it to
all voiced/voiceless pairs? There is of course good natlang precedent
for it in Germanic and Slavic (and probably elsewhere).

> (Having heard /c/ I have become rather enamored of the sound).
>
> I've honestly been worrying about this whole symmetry of sound systems
> business.  I keep staring at the IPA chart and I can't figure out how to
> justify the palato-alveolars /S/ and /Z/.
Don't be worried. English hasn't had a really balanced system in quite
a while and we seem to be doing alright.

> Also, (p) b, t d, k
> is pretty unsymmetric, but I really, *really* dislike /g/ aesthetically
> and have been running around in circles trying to figure out if it makes
> sense to not include /g/.  How strict/common is this symmetry principle?
> I'm almost prepared to lose all the voiced versions of sounds, but I
> wanted to keep /t/ and /d/, /s/ and /z/, and /S/ and /Z/ for contrasted
> but easy-to-remember inflections for dynamic-vs.-static conjugations (the
> only thing changing in the inflection would be the voicing).  Can I get
> away with this?
Actually, the system of stops as you have outlined is very much in
keeping with the typology of sound systems around the world. That is,
if there is a voiceless stop missing, it is usually labial; if there
is a voiced stop missing, it is usually velar. There are interesting
articulatory reasons for this, which I'll spare you for fear of boring
the already overloaded list.

> A question on transcription, for those who've made it so far:  I'm
> contemplating using these Romanizations:
>
> tj for /c/
> sj for /C/
> sh for /S/
> zh for /Z/
>
> I think the latter two are fairly "easy" for an English-speaker to figure
> out, but I'm not really sure what to do with /c/ and /C/, especially
> since I'm using "ch" for /tS/.
You could also have <kj> for /c/ and <qj> for /C/ (if you use <q> for
/x/, that is). Hungarian has <gy> for the voiced velar stop so there's
even precedent.

Dirk

--
Dirk Elzinga
dirk.elzinga@m.cc.utah.edu