Re: Introductions and a question about consonants

On Tuesday 14 January 2003 08:31 am, Peter Bleackley wrote:
        First, welcome to the list from another Peter. Always good to have another
one around (except if you are annoying and besmirch the name. :)

> My question is, how can I put this on a more systematic basis? Making up
> ad-hoc mutations for every possible consonant cluster seem like the wrong
> thing to do!
        My advice: don't. If Wavoragon is a daughter language of Khangathyagon, not
every consonant cluster will "mutate." Rather, if the general trend of the
language is to rid itself of clusters, there will be (in general) three
simultaneous processes:
1. The two consonants may merge, like your above example.
2. A vowel may be inserted between the two. Generally, this is a short or
reduced vowel, something like /a/ or /@/. Study English imports into
Japanese. Because of it's phonological constraints, Japanese doesn't "borrow"
English words; it kidnaps them for immoral purposes. ;> See, for instance,
"risutoappu," which comes from "list up."
3. One of the consonants may be dropped. This might also effect the following
vowel; for instance, if "think" were to undergo such a process, the /N/
(ASCII IPA for "ng") might be dropped, but the /I/ remain nasalized. Thus,
you would end up with two contrastive words: "thick" and "think" would be
identical, except that the /I/ in "think" would be nasalized. Tada! New
phoneme. Currently, nasalized vowels are not contrasted in English, but
through such a process they could become so.

> Any help will be much appreciated. From what I've seen on websites, there
> seems to be a really good conlanging community about.
        Yes, a little too good for its own good. :) Have you ever seen a mail server
groan? We like to talk. A lot. Incessantly. At all hours. We're like your
next door neighbors, who are all really nice and interesting people, except
that we never sleep and that have a mop rag of a dog that never ceases its
yapping and likes to nip at your heels and we all say, "Oh, isn't that cute?
He likes you!" when you stomp over at 3 am to tell us to pipe down and then
you crawl back into bed, thinking that you really ought to call the cops but
we're just such nice people and that we'd be hurt (we really would be) if we
couldn't talk, because you know that we just love to talk, so finally you
manage to shove an entire pillow into your ear canal so that you can go to
sleep, except then you oversleep your alarm and are late for your job and
when you are fired we all come over to your house and say how sorry we are
and then proceed to comment on your lovely furniture, and then someone
decides that what you need is a party to cheer you up, except that everyone
has a little too much to drink, and someone, weaving tipsily, comes up,
clamps a hand on your shoulder, and, waving his arm in a manner that
threatens to send your lamp crashing to the ground, gestures to the crowd and
says, "Welcome to the family, pal." This is the Hotel Conlang: you can check
out any time you like, but you can never leave...
        :Peter

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