Re: Personal langs and converse of aux

> > I'm totally lost on tones. I also have problem with nasal vowels (sorry
>you
> > French folks but words like "Enghien" are unpronounceable!).
> >
> > I'm pretty good at long clusters I think, but that's because nice
>Swedish
> > forms like _spotskt_ and _Ernsts_ ([E:n`s`t`s`] where the "`"s mark
> > retroflex consonants).
>
>Trills and tones are difficult.
>
>I'm not really familiar with any lang. with long consonent clusters <shrug
>/>
>
Well, it's always a question of definitions. Many people'd tell you English
is a lang with long consonant clusters. It's got lots of words like "sprint"
and "mixed" (/-kst/), while there's many langs that have no or very few
clusters.

My personal bottom record for lengthy clusters must be Swedish _Ernstskts_
[E:n`s`t`s`kts], which's the genitive of a nominalized adjective based on
the name _Ernst_. Note that it's a monosyllabic word. But I'm sure one could
dig up even nastier exampels from some lang or another!

                                             Andreas

PS In earlier Swedish, before _-r-_ merged with following dentals to produce
retrofexes, I assume they could have [Ernstskts] with a full EIGHT
consonants in a row.
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