Re: Unilang: the Phonology

On Tue, 17 Apr 2001, David Peterson wrote:

> If you're looking for opinions, I have one (among several).  First off, I
> think if you really truly wanted to make a truly universal language for
> everyone, you'd have to leave all liquids out completely.  In languages that
> have some sort of a trill or flap (or approximant), the pronunciation is to
> varied to give it one orthographic representation.  But, you did mention
> this, so let's say that's all right.  What about native speakers of Chinese
> and Korean whose closet approximation is [l]?  And then what about the
> languages that have no [l], where the sound [l] has changed to [d] over time
> or [w] or even [n] I've heard of?  I would leave [f] out, too, due to its
> odd, labio-dental nature.  But, that's just me.
I know for *Korean* speakers [f] is often rendered as [p] or [h] (there's
possibly some sort of rule, but I don't know offhand).

Minor factual correction, though: Korean has an alveolar tap *and* [l],
and I've heard both used for the American (and other?) English
approximant "r"; the [l] is a somewhat less frequent sounds that mostly
happens due to certain mutations.

YHL