Re: Syllabic consonants (was: Re: Beek)

Isidora Zamora sikyal:

> At 12:20 PM 9/15/03 -0400, you wrote:
> >On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 11:47:12AM -0400, Isidora Zamora wrote:
> > > it, the word <karm>, 'shield" is pronounced in two syllables.  (The word
> > > should properly be written with an accent over the <a> to indicate stress
> > > on the first syllable.)  As a matter of fact, the /m/ is syllabic here
> > > because liquid plus nasal clusters in the syllable coda are illegal, to the
> > > illegal cluster is broken up by making the m syllabic.
> >
> >So the /r/ is not syllabic here?  Is it ever?\
>
> The /r/ *is* syllabic in <karm>, and the word should be divided as
> kar-m.  But if the word were to have a suffix beginning in a vowel added to
> it, then the /r/ would cease to be syllabic, moving into the onset of the
> second syllable.
What??!! Now *I'm* completely confused. How is the /r/ in <karm> syllabic,
if the word is syllabified [kar.m]? Do we have the same meaning for
"syllabic" here. I have always understood syllabic to mean "functioning as
the nucleus of a syllable." Thus, <karm> has two syllabic segments: /a/
and /m/. The /r/ is *syllabified* as a *coda*, but it isn't *syllabic*,
unless I've completely misunderstood you.

> (Is this all as clear as mud now?)
Quite.


--
Jesse S. Bangs jaspax@u.washington.edu
http://students.washington.edu/jaspax/
http://students.washington.edu/jaspax/blog

Jesus asked them, "Who do you say that I am?"

And they answered, "You are the eschatological manifestation of the ground
of our being, the kerygma in which we find the ultimate meaning of our
interpersonal relationship."

And Jesus said, "What?"

Reply