Re: THEORY: clicks

Christophe Grandsire scripsit:

> Khoisan languages like Xhosa
As I noted, Xhosa isn't Khoi-San: it's a Bantu language that has borrowed
clicks from the Khoi-San languages.

> (although clicks seem a strange thing to borrow ;))) ).
On the contrary.  What possible phonological process could generate clicks
from any other sound?  We more or less understand how implosives and
ejectives form, but clicks???  The surprising thing is not that some
languages borrow clicks, but that there are any click languages at all.
As it is, if the Khoi-San had died out, we would be proclaiming that clicks
in ordinary morphemes (that is, excluding kissy noises and horse-talk)
were a violation of Universal Grammar.

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