Re: IPA griefs

On Sun, 22 Oct 2000, H. S. Teoh wrote:

> OK, I've just been listening to some of the IPA sound clips I got off
> Taliesin's FTP site, and found out that 5 of the IPA symbols I put on my
> conlang's webpage were totally wrong. In fact, the IPA transcriptions I've
> been using in my posts are wrong, for these 5 sounds...  but the worst
> part is, I don't know what the right symbols might be! :-(
>
> So I need some help here, to get the right IPA sounds.
>
> What I labelled the "palatals" on my webpage turned out to be not palatals
> at all... at least as far as I can tell from the sound clips. In
> particular:
> 1) _C_ is the ch sound in English "chance" -- is that /tS/ or something
>   like that?
Based on your descriptions, this should probably be [tSh]--the alveolar
voiceless stop [t] plus the aveolo-palatal voiceless fricative [S], and
aspirated.  IPA doesn't have separate symbols for aspirated sounds, but
uses the symbol of a superscripted [h] to indicate aspiration (in e-mail I
generally just use [h]--not sure what the ASCII equiv is.)

> 2) _c_ is the non-aspirate version of _C_. I don't even know if IPA has a
>   different representation for this sound; but my conlang definitely makes
>   a clear distinction here.
This would be [tS], w/o the aspiration.

> 3) _j_ is the voiced version of _c_, and is like the English "soft g"
>   (such as in "germaine"). Unlike the English 'j', this sound is more
>   palatal than alveolar (and definitely not dental). What could the IPA
>   symbol be?
I'm not sure where you get the idea that it's "more palatal than
alveolar", but you're describing [dZ], again unaspirated.  Your variation
may be slightly retracted, but the symbol is still [dZ].  In real IPA
you'd write this with a diacritic to indicate retraction, but in e-mail
that gets too messy.  Stick with [dZ]

> 4) _jh_ is the fricatized version of _j_. I don't know offhand of
>   any natlangs I know that has this sound, so I can't give an example.
How 'bout English?  The symbol is [Z] and it occurs in English, French,
some dialects of Spanish, Romanian, and others.

> 5) _ch_ is like the English "sh"... and is basically the fricatized
>   version of _c_, or the unvoiced version of _jh_.
This is [S].

>
> Somehow, my ears tell me that these consonants belong to the same type
> (dental, labial, ...) but I must be misunderstanding something here...
>
> So... please help a conlanger in distress :-P
These sounds *do* all belong to the same type, but it's not one with a
consistent name.  I prefer "post-alveolar", since they all occur mostly
behind the alveolar ridge, but you'll also so alveolo-palatal used.  (Or
palato-alveolar, but that's technically something else.)

Some notes to aid your confusion:

IPA doesn't have separate symbols for dental and alveolar /t/--a major
flaw, IMO.  So don't be confused by the fact that your /j/ "isn't
dental" because the symbol [d] can be used for the more retracted,
alveolar sound as well.

Also, your L1 is Taiwanese, right?  I think that Taiwanese maintains a
distinction between aspirated and unaspirated sounds, something which is
totally lacking in English.  You're correct in your assessment that the
sound in English "chance" is aspirated, but that aspiration isn't really a
feature of the English phoneme as much as the fact that all initial
English stops are aspirated.  The fact that your conlang contrasts [tSh]
and [tS] is great, but don't expect to be able to find IPA recordings (in
English) that show the same distinction.  (And don't expect English
speakers to be able to hear the difference.  Aspiration is one of my
persistent bugaboos.)

>
>
> T
>
Jesse S. Bangs jaspax@u.washington.edu
"It is of the new things that men tire--of fashions and proposals and
improvements and change.  It is the old things that startle and
intoxicate.  It is the old things that are young."
-G.K. Chesterton _The Napoleon of Notting Hill_