Re: A new Indo-European subfamily in China

E-Ching Ng tleiçeiç:
>
> Hi, I'm new to the list.
Welcome!

> I'm inventing a new Indo-European subfamily for a class project
For a class project?  Awesome!  What's the project?

> It's going to be a tonal language, but I haven't really figured out
> yet how languages become tonal in the first place.
Frequently from lost consonants or lost distinctions, but beyond that
I'm not sure.

Okay, in a discussion in "The World's Major Languages" on Sino-Tibetan
Languages:

Typically, the loss of a voicing contrast in initial consonants results
in a phonemic high/low tone distinction, with earlier voiced initial
voiced syllables developing low tone ... while the depletion of the
inventory of the inventory of possible syllable-final consonants results
in a distinction between open syllables and those ending in a glottal
stop or constriction, with the latter eventually giving rise to rising
or falling tones"

> And out of curiosity, do most of the minority languages in
> China have tone?
As far as I know.  It's an areal feature covering much of East Asia.

> Is there a Sino-Tibetan language that doesn't have tone?
Some of the languages in the Himalayan branch of Tibeto-Burman don't.

> If there are other areal phonological features that anyone thinks
> might be worth including
Simple syllable structure, for one.  In fact, that simplification would
probably be the origin of the tones.

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