Roundings, was: Blandness

On Sun, 8 Apr 2001 04:04:49 -0400, Jeff Jones <jeffsjones@...>
wrote:

>While we're on the subject of rounding ... it has seemed to me for some
>time that the "rounded" vs. "unrounded" distinction is insufficient for
>phonetic description, since there are degrees of rounding. Japanese [i]
>as I know it is "flat" or completely unrounded, while English [i] only
>lacks rounding (usually). Comments?
>
>Jeff
Do you mean E. [i] or [I]?

As for lip involvement with E. [i], it seems the opposite of rounding
to me. That's basically because of the striking diference from Russian:
in Russian, asking people to 'say cheese' is absolutely pointless. No
lip movement towards this smile-like thing, with the Russian [i]. (At
least, in the variety of Russian I'm suited to, which is quite widespread).

There are also various other things with lips. E.g., lip protrusion
without a real 'rounding' (the typical articulation of the Russian [i-]).

Interestingly, such features seem to modify the sound a lot. Any examples
of their use for phonemic distinctions in natlangs?


Basilius