Re: Phonological questions, bunch 2

Hmm, my previous premature reply seems to have now gotten to the rest
of the list even thru the Yahoo interface. Nice to know that this
works too, now :)


--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Tristan Mc Leay wrote:
>
> I always thought that writing (e.g.) /aj/ or by Americans /ay/ was
> just an orthographical habit indicating the nature of the diphthong,
> and it was still considered to be a single nucleus. I'd be
> interested to hear different i.e. that there's a phonemic analysis
> of /aI/ being /a/+/j/, and consisting, as you say, of a nucleus and
> a rime. I'd make for some interesting clusters by our rhotic friends
> e.g. /jrd/ in 'hired'!
Ah, I see. Tho /jrd/ is of course not much when you consider the
consonant clusters arising from American syllabic r (remember the
phrase I posted a few weeks back on the most consonants thread, about
/strdZn trt5z/ or whatever..?)


> I think your original transcription (i.e. /aI/) is the more common
> one (for conservative RP at least) because, as they're considered a
> single unit, the phonemic analysis of the underlying vowels isn't
> that important. I don't think RP has the vowel /a/ separate from
> /aI/ and /aU/, for instance.
True too... but then it's mostly a question of preference whether to
use /i/ or /I/. As I said, when I explained phonemic transcription to
a friend, he was pretty strongly opposed to the latter choice. Seems
that it confuses beginners for the reasons I just wrote.


> > Now, _Finnish_ rising diphthongs are more clearly analyzeable as
> > vowel+glide... the system is completely symmetrical, and syllabe
> > structure also supports this analysis (CVCC and CVVC are allowed,
> > but CVVCC occurs only in loan words.)
>
> That of course doesn't prohibit diphthongs from being classified as
> long vowels (i.e. CVVC). I imagine that it most languages with a
> length distinction in monophthongs as well as having diphthongs but
> without a length distinction, the diphthongs and long vowels behave
> similarly.
Indeed, our long vowels are analyzed as VV too.


> I was of the impression that Finnish diphthongs derive from long
> vowels too. I'd be interested to note how it managed to get such a
> huge collection of vowels: long, short, and a multitude of
> diphthongs!
>
> --
> Tristan.
The *falling* diphthongs /ie y2 uo/ derive from historical /e: 2: o:/.
Present-day /e: 2: o:/ are borrowed phonemes, occuring only in
loanwords, new coinages and simplified former clusters. AFAIK *rising*
difthongs do stem mostly from vowel + glide.
I also recall reading somewhere that long vowels would also be
historically derived from vowel + consonant... maybe /h/ (present-day
coda /h/ would then have to have eveloped from former /x/ or something)

John Vertical

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