Re: laterals (was: Pharingials, /l/ vs. /r/ in Southeast Asia)

>> Why having symbols for the alveolopalatal
>> fricatives at all, is there a language where those
>> contrast with palatalized [S] and [Z]?
>
>Polish, IIRC.
No, I said with _palatalized_ [S] and [Z]; that
is, a contrast between [s\] and [S_j] and between
[z\] and [Z_j], so as to justify having [s\] and
[z\] as individual symbols. In all the languages
I'm aware of, [s\] and [z\] do not contrast with
[S_j] and [Z_j].


>The traditional phonematization is /S/ vs /C/ vs /rs/. I'd rather like to
>write that /x/ vs /S/ vs /rs/ because my pronunciation is [x] vs [S] vs
[s`],
>but the point is that there's little reason to analyze [s`] as
monophonemic,
>and I've never seen a book doing that. Similarly, I've never ever
seen /x\/ in
>phonemic rendering, not even in books that pretend that [x\] is the normal
>pronunciation of that sound.
You said it: You've never seen /x\/ in _phonemic_
rendering, therefore its only use is to indicate
the _phonetic_ level. Therefore it contradicts
that supposed design principle of the IPA alphabet
of providing symbols only for those distinctions
that are phonemic in some known language.


>A stop sans complete closure ought to be impossible. Are you saying a stop
>with lateral release is a stop that's simultaneously released centrally
and
>laterally? Besides that sounding pretty hard to pull off, it probably
could
>use some terminological reform, if so.
Not simultaneously, but sequentially. A central
stop with a lateral release is a double articulation.
The same for a central stop with a nasal release,
which is different from a nasal stop proper:
[d_n] =/= [n]; similarly [d_l] =/= [K_r] (*).

Although theorically it is possible to think of
an "anular" kind of plosion where the release
is produced simultaneously at the central and
lateral levels, but I find that would be a really
tough one (I think I can manage to pronounce it
in isolation, but I doubt I could manage to
intregrate it into fluent speech).

--
(*) BTW, come to think of it, using the diacritic
for "raising", which applied to consonants has the
function of 'raising' the degree of closure by one
level (from approximant to fricative, from fricative
to plosive), we may be able to represent the lateral
stop accurately: [K_r] (i.e. 'raising' the lateral
fricative into a lateral stop).


>Additionally, you were denying that [tK] was a true lateral affricate.
Since
>at least what I understand it to mean has central closure thru-out, I
still
>don't understand why.
I meant a _literal_ rendition of [tK]. [t] is a
central sound, not a lateral, thus in a sequence
[t]+[K] you not only vary the degree of closure
but also change from central to lateral, a change
that cannot occur in the middle of a true
affricate, just like changes in voicing or in
place of articulation cannot occur in the middle
of a true affricate. For the true lateral affricate,
you need a lateral plosive followed by a lateral
fricative, i.e. [K_rK], not a central plosive
followed by a lateral fricative.


>I _can_ produce a [t] with a following [K] with a break of central
closure in
>between, but integrating that into fluent speech seems like a very tall
order.

That's the literal rendition of [tK], which as
you say it's not precisely easy to pronounce.

A different thing is using /tK/ as a _phonemic_
transcription, which then does not imply that
the /t/ part is a central sound, but may stand
for a lateral plosive allophone [K_r], so that
/tK/ would represent what phonetically is [K_rK].


>I normally maintain central closure thru English and Swedish sequences
>like /lt/ and /tl/, even when they've got a word break in them.
Yes, I've noticed a frequently lateralization
of /t/ when in a lateral environment in Spanish
too, resulting in a lateral stop allophone [K_r]
at the phonetic level.

Cheers,
Javier

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