Re: Syllabic consonants (was: Re: Beek)

At 05:36 PM 9/15/03 -0500, you wrote:
>Nik Taylor wrote:
> > There are two underlying phonemes, /m/ and /m=/.  /m/ becomes [m=] when
> > required by phonetic rules, but underlying /m=/ *never* becomes
> > non-syllabic.  Thus, the form realized as ['m=ta] is underlyingly
> > /'m=ta/, but the form realized as [m='ta] is underlyingly /'mta/.
> >
> > So, when you add emi-, you get a minimal pair between [emi'm=ta] and
> > [emim'ta].
>
>To make it worse, you could have minimal pairs that are homophonous in
>their dictionary form, e.g., in addition to /'m=ta/ vs. /'mta/, you
>could have:
>
>/m='ta/ = [m='ta] -> /emim='ta/ = [emim='ta]
>/'mta/ =  [m='ta] -> /emi'mta/ = [emim'ta]
And then, for even more fun...if you noticed in an earlier post, there is a
minimal pair of verbal suffixes in the language: stressed -i and unstressed
-i.  When you add stressed -i, any minimal pairs determined solely by
stress suddenly go homophonous on you.

Isidora