Re: kinsi rorotan: dialects and script

Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@...> writes:

> > [i] > [j] > [J\]* > [C] > [c]
> >
> > ...equivalent to...
> >
> > [u] > [w] > [G]** > [x]** > [k]**
> >
> > *Is this the SAMPA for a voiced, palatal fricative?
>
> Yes (IIRC the voiced palatal stop is [j\]).
Actually, no. [j\] is the voiced palatal fricative. AFAIK there's
no SAMPA for the voiced palatal stop (though you can use [c_v],
where [_v] is the voiced diacritic).

> > Anyway, the way I think about it, palatalization, or palatal-related
> > changes
> > become less likely the further away they get from [i].
Besides Christophe's example ([ka] -> [tSa]), there's Japanese
/tu/ = [tsM]. But you're definitely right (I wouldn't have any of
those in a conlang of mine for fear of being unnaturalistic, if
I didn't know).

I do have a double change related to this in one of the sister languages
of my Senu Yivokuchi: [x] > [s] / _[+front] AND [s] > [x] / _[+back].


--Pablo Flores
  http://www.angelfire.com/scifi2/nyh/index.html
  "The future is all around us, waiting, in moments
   of transition, to be born in moments of revelation.
   No one knows the shape of that future or where it
   will take us. We know only that it is always born
   in pain."  -- G'Kar quoting G'Quon, in "Babylon 5"

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