Re: Unilang: the Phonology

On Wed, 18 Apr 2001 16:31:11 -0700, Tommie L Powell <tommiepowell@...>
wrote:


>I'm the "somebody else" and here's why the instability of such
>sounds (l, r, f) is relevant:
>Oskar's approach (with its focus on "ease" and "renderability")
>works fine for the SPEAKER, but not for the LISTENER.
>If saying an L one way makes it sound like an N to one listener
>and saying it another way makes it sound like a D to another,
>communication fails horribly.  -- Tommie
I'm not quite following that. I quote from my original posting:

"At least two aspects of phonology must be considered while arriving at the
definitions: articulatory (primarily), and acoustic."

Acoustics are certainly a concern of mine. Phonetically speaking, how can
one "say an L" making it "sound like an N"? You must note that under my
scheme, /l/, /n/, and /d/ are all separate phonemes, and should be
perceivably different.

Note, though, that mishearings are common enough in natural languages.

Óskar