Re: Futurese

Javier wrote:
> >
> >If I'm reading this correctly, |x| is a voiced palatal fricative! I'd
>find
> >that mightily difficult to distinguish from [j], and I bet I'm not alone.
>I
>
>Well, sorry, I guess I should have offered an ASCII-IPA
>equivalent for each phoneme, so as to avoid misunderstandings
>such as this.
You should have.

>The chart I offered was meant just as a quick
>summary.
>
>Letter <x> would represent not a palatal fricative but a
>postalveolar one, that is /Z/, as in English "meaSure",
>"aZure" or French "j".
Good to hear.

>
> >In
> >addition, any language that uses |x| for anything voiced ought to be
>shot,
> >IMHO.
>
>May I know why on Earth?!
Well, because I've got an irrational personal dislike for the idea, and
because |x| prototypically indicates voiceless sounds.

>According to that, English ought to be "shot", because it uses
><x> for something voiced in some cases (think of "example" and
>"xylophone"), not to mention Albanian, which uses <x> for
>/dz/ and "xh" for /dZ/.
I've never denied I hate English orthography. I don't now much of Albanian
orthography, but the use of |x| and |xh| is at the very least quite
counterintuitive for people used to more mainstream uses of the Latin
alphabet. If I'm correct in assuming you chose said script because it's the
most well-known in the world, one'd expect you to use as "normal" values of
the letters as possible to maximize this advantage.

[snip]
> > except I'd still hate |x| to indicate anything voiced.
>
>I'm waiting for undefeatable arguments against the use
>of letter x for something voiced; I mean, other than your
>personal taste which is of course totally irrelevant.
The "IMHO" rather suggests a personal opinion, doesn't it?

Still, using |x| for something as odd as [Z] does work against the point of
using a well-known alphabet.

One possible rejuggle would be |x|=/S/, |j|=/Z/, |y|=/j/ and |ë|=/@/ (|ë| is
e-diaeresis, in case the mailer mangles it). Would feel rather less exotic
to me, at least.

>
> >It's quite obvious you'ven't tried to achieve a maximally universal set
>of
> >contrastive sounds, but are real sure your IAL ought to distinguish
>'tween
> >/l/ and /r/? And exactly what kind of "r" are we speaking about? From
>your
> >chart above I'd have to guess it's a dental trill.
>
>Well, I've already posted in several other places very
>extensive and detailed arguments to support the choice of
>phonemes, which by no means is arbitrary. If you want I'll
>paste those explanations here.
Well, I don't suspect you of picking phonemes arbitrarily; I'm just curious
as to the justification for including these two.
>
>
> >>4) Syllable structure: (C)V(C)
> >>(glottal stop inherent in syllable-initial vowels)
> >>
> >Does this mean that the glottal stop, in fact, isn't a phonemic
>consonant?
>
>Yes, the glottal stop in fact isn't a phonemic consonant;
>what you have instead is pre-glottalized syllable-initial
>allophones for the vowels.
Which leaves the question why it appeared in the phoneme chart, then. Not to
mention why indicate it in the orthography.

[snip]
> >>Any comment? :-)
> >
> >My initial impression is that this's gonna look like the result of a
> >run-of-the-mill euroclone IAL secretly dating Chinese. :-)
>
>Have you had a look at the sample sentences yet?
>If those sentences look to you like a euroclone IAL, then
>anything will.
You hadn't posted any sample sentences when I wrote the above (or at least
they hadn't rached me). Still, the phonology is quite European (which's of
course not necessarily bad), while the monosyllabicity is reminicent of
Chinese.

                                              Andreas

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