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Re: Nimrina phonology

From:Herman Miller <hmiller@...>
Date:Friday, August 18, 2006, 1:18
Henrik Theiling wrote:

> I also like the h/f merger leading to h - v alterations. I have > something similar in the current version of the S11 phonology, where f > precedes rounded vowels and h unrounded ones, and in clusters, it is > h, f, or v, depending on phonological context. Hmm, maybe I should > not throw it away (I think the language does not sound nice, as stated > before). Is it also inspired by Japanese (where it is more like h/f > -- p -- b like 'hito' + 'hito' > 'hitobito')?
Japanese to some extent, but also the history of Spanish, where h < f in some words (although the written "h" is now silent). I don't want to borrow too many ideas from one language, but I figure that some relation between /h/ and /f/ is widespread enough that it won't necessarily bring to mind Japanese. I already have one idea borrowed from Korean: /l/ has allophones of [l] and [4], although the distribution isn't exactly the same as in Korean (initial [l] is permitted, for instance). "Minnesota" for esample is borrowed as "Minesóla" [m_jinEsO:4a]!