Re: Question about vowel harmono

From: "Frank George Valoczy" <valoczy@...>
> front:      y   oe   ae
> neutral:      i    e
> back:       u   o    a
>
> which is basically what Finnish has; Hungarian doesn't have the /ae/, and
> Turkish adds dotless-i to show /W/(?) the back counterpart to /i/
>
> > Are there any other languages that use vowel harmony?  What about a
> > close/open distinction instead of a front/back, so
> >
> > i, u, y would be close
> > o, a, and e would be open
> >
>
> Interesting, tho I've never heard of any langs like this, tho that doesnt
> mean they dont exist...
One of my other conlangs [which does not have believability among its goals] has
a system like this:

"left":               a     ä [&]
"center" (neutral):   e     ë [2]    (also <i> of epenthesis)
"right":              o     ö [u]

[Where <a> corresponds to <o>, and <ä> to <ö>.]

'Left center right' are just labels for where they are on the alphabet chart
[also, if the letters are seen as faces, corresponding left and right vowels are
mirror images of each other facing the relevant direction].  I'm not sure what
the values of <e> and <ë> really are, though I do know <ë> is rounded <e>.

'Left' and 'right' <e> and <ë> may be possible also. Hmm... If I did that, left
<e, ë> would be [E] and [9], and right <e, ë> would be [e] and [2].  And then
that would be a "sort-of" close/open harmony, I guess.


     *Muke!