Re: CHAT: Blandness (was: Uusisuom's influences)

Wow, this thread's getting really long (or rather, it got really long a
while ago); we should try to split the topics a bit the coming week.

There are a number of things I need to reply to, but I'll have to do
without quoting this time; I know it's uncouth, but I really have to go to
bed soon :)

First, the English vowel system. I don't think I've ever written a letter
on the English vowel system on this list without getting protests :p This
language is just spoken by so many people in so many ways that it's no use
referring to the pronunciation of this and that word. Also, there are
people here who, being native English-speakers, first learnt to phoneticize
English - while I first learnt to phoneticize my language, Icelandic. And I
may get grumpy comments for this: the English vowel system, of almost any
given dialect, really seems quite "marked", in general; so many "weird"
vowel sounds! :p But please don't quote me on that, I'm not being
scientific :) So anyway, I'll leave it to others to conclude what's
pronounced with [Q] or [A] or [V], or whatever.

I overreached myself a bit when I made statements regarding Rumanian; I
wasn't entirely sure, but fired loose anyway, on it having an /M/ phoneme.
Turns out it's not quite true, but almost; it's /1/, that particular sound
I was thinking of (the i-circumflex). I try to disclaim my statements as
much as possible; please don't feel annoyed when I step on your toes with
falsehoods :)

And then there was the typology question. I have never been well convinced
by the rather flat-out statements on front-round vowels (which I
abbreviated "f-r") and back-unround (my abbr. "b-unr") being "highly
marked" in the world's vowel systems. As I said, with my own knowledge of
various vowel systems (which I recounted), those sounds wouldn't seem that
uncommon at all. The replies to my doubts were (as I understood them) that
I am right to doubt, but such sounds should still be considered "highly
marked", and included some recounting of how roundedness is normal for back
vowels and not so for other vowels, which I did know. I should perhaps have
made clear that I'd never argue for classifying f-r and b-unr vowels
as "unmarked"; merely "marked" or "slightly marked", instead of "highly
marked". Perhaps I'm being trivial here.

But what I did find interesting in this f-r/b-unr discussion, an important
observation, is what someone pointed out: we never have only rounded front
sounds, or only unrounded back sounds; they're always a subset of the
unmarked vowel axis (f-unr or b-r). That makes good sense, and is relevant.
I wonder if we can make any generalizing statements about how those marked
sounds generally come about in vowel systems; I see them developing, in
many cases, through some phonological or morphological mechanisms, such as
Germanic umlaut and Altaic vowel harmony. Another common origin is probably
in chain shifts; I suppose French /y/ (from Latin /u/) came about in some
chain shift, where an older /o/ shifted to /u/, pushing the old /u/ onto
the front axis; any thoughts on this?

Regards,
Óskar

Reply