Re: Using word generators (was Re: Semitic root word list?)

On Tue, Jan 09, 2007 at 09:13:40PM +0100, Jörg Rhiemeier wrote:
> Hallo!
>
> On Tue, 9 Jan 2007 06:19:32 -0800, "David J. Peterson" wrote:
[...]
> > The only problem I have found with this approach is that it can
> > lead to an unbalanced phonology.
>
> First, few natlangs have "balanced" phonologies - some phonemes occur
> more frequently than others.  Second, you can easily avoid and correct
> imbalances by looking at what you have already invented, and use the
> underrepresented phonemes more frequently and the overrepresented ones
> less frequently as you progress.
I agree. English itself shows this: J, Z, and X occur very rarely
compared to, say, E. This does not seem to be a problem in practice. :-)
In fact, I would tend to think that "unbalanced" phonologies are more
realistic, due to Zipf's Law (cf. Benford's Law).


> > For example, especially with my language Njaama, the bilabial and
> > palatal click (which, admittedly, were not in the phonology from the
> > beginning) rarely make an appearance (this became glaringly apparent
> > when I participated in the current relay with Njaama.  Throughout
> > the entire relay text [which was very long for a relay--38
> > sentences], the bilabial and palatal click appeared once each [well,
> > the palatal click occurred twice, but that was because when I
> > noticed, I coined a word using it]).  Of course, when it comes to
> > letter/phoneme frequency, some should appear more often than others,
> > and there should be some rare phonemes, but they shouldn't be *that*
> > rare.
Perhaps Jorg's approach would fix this: decide beforehand roughly which
phonemes would "dominate" the phonology of the language, and keep that
in mind when coining new words.


[...]
> > As a result, if I haven't got a good idea how I want a word to
> > sound, I tend to look around and see what phonemes are
> > underrepresented, and make sure they pop up in the word I'm
> > creating.  It's not perfect, but it does help to prevent the same
> > phonemes from being used over and over again.
>
> Yes.  You should regularly check what you have done so far, in order
> to avoid excessive homonymy and phonemic imbalance.
[...]

I wouldn't be overly concerned about this, though. IMHO natlangs do tend
to have less "well-balanced" phonologies than one would expect ideally.

A greater concern, I think, is how a word sounds within a sentence (as
opposed to in isolation).  Many times, a nice-sounding word becomes
rather awkward when put together with other words, whereas a word that
may sound ugly in isolation may turn out to be quite mellifluous in
actual usage. I don't know about anyone else, but I do find myself
plagued by this frequently in my own conlanging.


T

--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.

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