Re: Danish: tonal suffices?

Oskar Gudlaugsson skrev:

>>From: Kristian Jensen <kljensen@...>
>>Subject: Re: Danish: tonal suffices?
>>Date: Fri, 30 Jun 2000 18:45:14 +0200
>
>>I think your perception of tone here is actually stî ‰'m sure that a
>>glottal-catch could in certain circumstances be perceived as a falling
>>tone to the untrained ear. When you add '-e', stød dropped; <dreng>
>>[drEN?] becomes <drenge> [drEN@].
>
>I'm not very good with vowel phonetics, but I really don't perceive the
>vowel in 'dreng' as an [E]...is that what the dictionary gives? I perceive
>it closer to [a] (closer, not exactly equal to) or even the diphthong [ai].
>But then [E] is pretty close to [a] already, so perhaps I'm wrong. As I say,
>vowel phonetics is not my thing; I'm more into consonants.
Actually, you are right. Its [A] phonetically. But it is /E/ underlyingly.
The phoneme /E/ becomes coloured by /r/. After /r/, /E/ becomes [a], unless
it precedes a peripheral (labial or dorsal) consonant where it becomes [A]
instead.

>Furthermore, the [@] often assimilates
>>to the preceding voiced continuant (if any), so you'd have [drEN?]
>>becoming [drENN=] -- utterances that sound almost identical except for
>>the presence or absence of stਯr to the untrained ear; the presence
>>or absence of a falling tone <-- Hint hint: there's an idea for a
>>conlang!)
>
>What is [=]? Length?
No, it means syllabic. Length is [:].

>I'll very well accept the [NN] transcription; what I
>perceived as a long vowel is much rather a long final continuant. As to the
>hint, well thanks, I'm already into it! :)
Strictly speaking, it isn't a long *final* continuant. The continuant is
long but is distributed over two syllables, not one syllable, hence
the transcription [drENN=] not [drEN:]. There are no phonologically long
consonants in Danish.

>Sometimes I perceive Danish phonology as so unusual that I get doubts that
>its phenomena can be transcribed with IPA, or even described by conventional
>phonetics at all! I know it must be possible, but it's just like a feeling,
>you know :) And I'm definitely not the only one; my fellow countrymen often
>joke that it can hardly be a human language at all! (Icelandic has a very
>different phonetic character to that of Danish - perhaps analogous to that
>of French vs Spanish and Italian). The Icelandic slang for 'speaking Danish'
>is "speaking with the potato in your throat" ;)
Its not only Icelandic, I've heard other Scandinavians say that too. ;)

-kristian- 8)