Re: First post & three questions

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 04:21:05PM -0700, dirk elzinga wrote:
[snip]
> > 1. What semivowels are there other than y and w?
>
> It seems to me that any high vowel may have a semivowel partner,
> so just as /y/ is /i/'s semivowel partner and /w/ is /u/'s, you
> can also have a high front rounded semivowel as a partner to /ü/
> (u-umlaut), and a high back unrounded semivowel as a partner to
> /ï/ (i-diaresis). This is the so-called 'velar glide' of
> Axininca Campa.
Is it possible for other vowels to be semi-vowelized as well? 'cos my
conlang has "smooth vowels": smooth /i/ --> [ji], smooth /u/ --> [wu].
How would this generalize to other vowels such as [a] or [e]? I pronounce
a smooth /a/ almost like [Qa] (Q = velar fricative) except that it's a
very weak [Q], almost non-velar-like. How would you classify something
like this?


T

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