Re: Tonal inflection?

On Wed, Aug 20, 2008 at 5:14 PM, Dana Nutter <li_sasxsek@...> wrote:
>> [mailto:CONLANG@listserv.brown.edu] On Behalf Of Jim Henry
> I like the idea of tones for the comparatives.  I could do that
> too maybe though I'm leaning toward not having adjectives and
> using stative verbs.
Stative verbs would need to have some way of being compared,
too.  I don't know if languages with stative verbs and no separate
class of adjectives typically have morphological comparatives
or tend to use particles instead.

> This whole thing is just an idea I'm playing with, I don't
> realistically expect the language to be something speakable,
> especially with the huge number of distinctions I'm making. I'm
> experimenting with the idea of economizing speech.  I figure
> tonal contours, roundedness and position alone will give me a
Don't forget nasality and length (maybe three degrees of length
as in Estonian?).

With about 15 basic vowels (not all the ones on the IPA chart, but a subset
that should be comparatively easy to distinguish) times 2 for oral/nasal,
times 3 for length, times ... hmm... let's modestly say 5 tones, you've
got 450 syllable nuclei, not counting possible syllabic consonants
(maybe 5 nasals and 3 lateral approximants, times 3 lengths and 5
tones, another 120 nuclei).

(Could the lateral approximants be nasalized and still sound
distinct from regular nasal consonants in the corresponding POA?)

--
Jim Henry
http://www.pobox.com/~jimhenry/

Reply