Re: Most developed conlang

David J. Peterson wrote:

> This is not so much directly related, but what about words that
> end in [A] in English?  Words like:
>
> law
> saw
> draw
>
> Evidently, there used to be a strategy for taking care of the
> awkward ending vowel when adding /-er/:
>
> law > lawyer
> saw > sawyer
>
> Neither of those today, I think, can be considered productive.
> I doubt anyone on their own would produce "drawyer".  And
> if someone wanted to talk about someone who was sawing,
> they'd probably say "sawer", but, at least in my case, would do
> so reluctantly or uncomfortably.  If "drawer" came from "draw",
> it's seems like the resolution was to radically change the pronunciation
> (/drOr/).  And I don't know if this is a symptom of the same
Perhaps you are aware, but aw in a lot of dialects is phonemically the
exact same vowel as the one in drawer. (Some) Non-rhotic dialects (like
mine) go so far as to make homophones of "draw" and "drawer". Point
being, the change isn't so radical until some variants of US English
merged /O/ and /A/ except before /r/.

drO   > drO  > drA
drO@r > drOr > drOr

In any case, I wouldn’t really consider “drawer” to be draw+er, the
meaning is completely different.

> uncertainty, but when I was in first grade, several of classmates
> would often tell me that I was a good "drawler", because they
> liked the way I drew.
Do you recall if these same people dropped dark /l/? I know that for my
non-rhotic dialect the obvious solution to draw+er is [dZro:r6]
(likewise, “withdrawal” is [wITdZro:r@5]). No special handwavery special
cases necessary! If such people dropped dark /l/, then “drawer” could be
analogous to “caller”... (assuming I guess the pronunciation of “call”
correctly).

> Is this just an unfortunate circumstance that had a resolution
> which has long since been forgotten, and is, perhaps, seeking
> a new solution?
I don’t especially understand what’s wrong with something like [drA.r=]
for you. Something like “draw’re” in “the people who draw’re coming”.

>Does anyone else have purely a vowel length
> distinction between these two?
>
> car
> cawer (one who caws)
>
> I guess this is kind of YAEPT, but it seems interesting to me in
> a morphological way, as well.
Indeed. And No, completely different:
ka:
ko:r6 (if i wanted to say the word at all. which i don’t.)

--
Tristan.

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