Re: Hello All!!

WOW, man, an "ejective pharyngeal fricative"!! Is it
like a glottal stop with pharyngeal constriction? I'm
trying to make the sound and think I'm close.
    Here is a link with a native speaker of Agul
pronouncing the
sounds:http://hctv.humnet.ucla.edu/departments/linguistics/VowelsandConsonants/appendix/languages/agul/agul.html
    There is also a site using laryngeoscopic studies
of epiglottal articulations, but I can't get the sound
files to
work:http://web.uvic.ca/ling/research/phonetics/jipa26.htm
   I've had a lot of trouble trying to find any real
info on Agul or other Causasian languages, with the
exception of Georgian. What I have found implies that
most of these languages are endangered and
understudied. Everytime I look for languages with
epiglottals, all I come up with is a million and one
links to alternative IPA charts. I'm guessing these
sounds are about as rare as implosive glottal stops,
which I heard are found in only three African
languages.
--- Danny Wier <dawier@...> wrote:
> From: "william drewery" <will65610@...>
>
> > Howdy,
>
> You're not from Texas are ya? ;)
>
> >     I just joined the conlang list, and first I
> would
> > like to thank all of you for making this
> available.
> > I'm hoping this will be quite an enriching
> experience.
> >     Well, I've been working on a language for
> about a
> > few months now that is nearly finished
> grammatically,
> > but I still need the lexicon. It's a polysynthetic
> > language with a very harsh and gutteral phonemic
> > inventory inspired by Klingon (in fact, it
> contains
> > virtually every sound in Klingon, and then some).
> I've
> > been contemplating rounding it out with the
> addition
> > of some epiglottal fricatives, but I have no idea
> how
> > to pronounce these. They are found in Agul and
> other
> > languages of the Caucuses, where they contrast
> with
> > both uvular and pharyngeal fricatives. From what I
> > understand, they are generated by closing the
> > epiglottis and trilling the aryetenoid cartliges
> > against the epiglottal base while laterally
> releasing
> > air from the epiglottis. I was hoping someone out
> > there might have some pointers for the
> pronunciation
> > of these sounds. I never could master pharyngeal
> > fricatives untill somone told me to "grunt while
> > constricting your Adam's Apple". Thanks for your
> help.
>
> Well welcome to the list... epiglottals just happen
> to be the only
> consonants I can't seem to pronounce without great
> difficulty, and I'm
> probably not even doing that right. Even my
> far-from-complete Tech (which
> has the glottal stop, the voiceless and voiced
> glottal and pharyngeal
> fricatives, and even a voiceless ejective pharyngeal
> fricative!) doesn't
> have epiglottals. That would be most like a "grunt
> while constricting one's
> Adam's Apple", though the pharynx is noticeably
> above the larynx.
>
> I had to figure out pharyngeals out by myself while
> listening to spoken
> Arabic. I kept in mind a position between uvular and
> glottal. I finally
> figured out how to tighten up the sides of my upper
> throat region and
> produce a sound more "raspy" and less "rough" than
> the uvular fricatives of
> German Ch and R.
>
> And where can I find a phonological description of
> Agul and any natlang with
> epiglottals? I wanna see!

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