Re: A couple questions.

>From: Raymond Brown <ray.brown@...>
>At 6:26 pm -0600 17/2/00, Daniel A. Wier wrote:
>[...]
> >
> >Ouch!  I didn't think about FOUR different phonetic situations!  Really,
> >what I meant was this analogy: [nl?] is to [dl] what [n] is to [d]?
>
>Don't want to be picky, but I'm a bit puzzled.  As [dl] is written above,
>surely it represents two consonants just as. e.g. [bl] and [gl] do.  Indeed
>[dl] was (is?) used in some English Yorkshire dialects where standard
>English has [gl], e.g. 'gloom' [dlu:m].
>
>On that analogy isn't [nl] simply [nl]?
That comment on Yorkshire.  Something similar happens in some or many
Tibetan dialects, where a velar <k> <kh> <ng> followed by <r> becomes a
retroflex (<t.> <t.h> <n.>).  I don't think a velar followed by <l> does
anything, but if it happens in a regional variant of English, why not
Tibetan?  My knowledge of Tibetan is very limited however.

The history of Tech lateral affricates (and affricates in general) is a
confused one.  Many believe that Pre-Proto-Tech (a language spoken over 15
millennia ago!) had palatal or velar stops (<k kh k'> or <c ch c'> but not
<tS tSh tS'>) became variously, retroflex (which were originally palatalized
dental/alveolar), postalveolar and lateral affricates, but how they diverged
is unknown.  Many others believe that this distinction has always existed.
Some postulate a alveolar/retroflex/palatized alveolar (one of the last two
could be postalveolar) system like Mandarin.

In fact, the pronunciation of the alveolar sibilant, retroflex, and
postalveolar (or "palatal") affricates varies among some dialects of modern
Tech!  Most notoriously, the Muslim dialect Ma'ou does not have retroflexes.
  *Note: This leads me to how the mostly Orthodox Christian dialect of
Qotilian (the "King's Tech") as well as Ma'ou have voiced/voiceless/v'less
ejective instead of plain/aspirated/ejective (all voiceless), while some
highland variants have only plain voiceless stops/affricates, but developed
phonemic tones (plain/aspirated/ejective became low/high/mid).  Now back to
our program.

As it stands, the consensus of Techian linguists have:

dental: d t t' (Coptic d th t, Classical Tech t th t')
sibilant affr.: dz ts ts' (written z s s')
retroflexe: d. t. t.'
palatal affr: dZ tS tS'
lateral affr: dl tl tl'
velar: g k k'

>Ah, so what is 'dl'? Is it the voiced lateral affricate?  In which case
>Matt's 'n with superscript l' (SAMPA [n_l]) would seem to be the
>appropriate nasal sound.
True.  Thanks for clearing it up for me.  It's <dl> (voiced lateral-alveolar
affricate) plus nasal mutation (as in Welsh).  It's more like Welsh <l>
articulated as a nasal stop, not <ll> nasalized.  I know it's confusing as
heck.

Danny
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