Re: Distribution of Front Rounded Vowels

On Tue, 24 Aug 2004 12:49:37 -0400, Roger Mills <rfmilly@...> wrote:

>In the sense that front+rounded is considered "highly marked", yes. I don't
>know about the distribution in natlangs.  Perhaps your problem is the
>reciprocality; at least in German, umlaut only works in one direction.
What does "highly marked" mean?

>I've been finding the same process as I work on Gwr, except the outcome in
>both cases is a compromise [1] (high central unround). I was also bothered
>by the prevalence of [1]-- Your question suggests a way around the problem:
>
>Perhaps u...i > y, fine (and I assume [ui] in hiatus does too)...then
>perhaps i...u (and [iu]) might > [1] (barred i) or [M] (unround u) or even
>[i] (deletion of second vowel without affect).
Well, from kingiwa 'awiwasa to nakiw pym wifiw kingewhawwas, both u_i and
i_u produced [y] with the loss of the final vowel.

>Another way:  early, stage 1: u...i, ui  > y, then this [y] and original *y
>> something else, perhaps [i] (or [1]?  I happen to like [1] :-)))  ).
Apparently. ;p

>Yet another way:  u...i > y, fine; i...u > y too, but the preceding
>consonant is palatalized (in particular, td/kg > tS,dZ perhaps.  Perhaps
>too, palatalization could override umlauting. Your rule order would be:
>1. u...i umlaut
>2. palatalization
>3. second-vowel deletion-- this would remove the environments for i...u
>umlaut.
I like the palatalization idea... before I was thinking [y] palatalized like
[i] did, but that sounds like a cool workaround.

I don't quite get the numbered list--is it the higher the number, the
greater priority?

>Not sure I've worked this out; it's a complicated problem.....
Sure is. But I'm simultaneously working on a descendant for the descendant,
and I plan to shift all the [y]s to [i]. Gets rid of them nicely. ;)

BTW, it should have been [nOvOSy], not [novoSy]. The vowels are [a E i O u y
9 @].

And anyway, with all these conlang projects, I've been approaching them with
a natlang goal in mind. For Kimma I was aiming towards Japanese in sound,
for, um, nEdZy pym vivy tSyJ9h9vOs, the daughter lang I'm working on, I'm
aiming towards a Western Germanic sound, somewhere around OE, Dutch, German.

Ben