Re: Irish Gaelic is evil!

Stephen Mulraney wrote:

>>  > <c>  -  [k_-]  -  [k_j]
>>  > <g>  -  [g_-]  -  [g_j]
>>
>> "_-" means "retracted" -- does that mean I have to pull back
>> my tongue a bit?
>
>
> Yes, well, as I suggested, you can take the broad consonants as
> simply "plain", so that broad <c> is just /k/ rather than /k_-/.
> I decided to give a bit more detail, though, and I had a choice
> of how to transcribe it: I wanted to avoid the obvious /k_G/ since
> that's what I was trying to explain, so I described another way
> (probably implicit in the /k_G/) in which the broad <c> actually
> differs from /k/. It probably caused more confusion, though.
> Basically, the [k_-] needs to be distinguised from the [k_j],
> and if you keep that in mind, then you'll probably find a natural
> strategy for doing it. I think my own impressionistic trascription
> of what I think is going on in my own mouth might only confuse!
> But it feels to me as if my tounge is a little bit further back
> that for an English [k]. It's probably just the (in Irish,
> phonologically salient) accomodation of the [k] to the back vowel.
> (The whole point about palatalised vs non-pal. consonants is that
> a broad vowel accomodates to a back vowel, even if there's actually
> a front vowel in the environment :))
In Icelandic there is simply a distinction between /k/--/c/ and
/g/--/J\/(*) and I always assumed the Irish distinction was the
same(**).  Not so?

(*) In Icelandic /c/ and /J\/ can occur before any vowel, while
/k/ and /g/ occur only before back vowels, so a phonemic analysis
where [c] before back vowels is /kj/ may be possible.
(**) Icelandic also has a /t/--/tj/ (with /tj/ being [ts\] or
[tC], analogous to, thought I, /t/ [t]--/t;/ [tS] in Irish.

--

/BP 8^)>
--
Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se

         Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant!
                                             (Tacitus)

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