Re: Maximal flexibility with self-segregating morphology

On Mon, Sep 8, 2008 at 1:01 PM, Logan Kearsley <chronosurfer@...> wrote:
---SNIP---
> Gary Shannon scripsit:
>>...
>> I've always favored open syllables. They are neat and
>> tidy and east to synthesize. But there's a parsing
>> probelem with the spoken language.
> [...]
>> So here's the solution that occured to me as I was
>> dozing off last night:
>>
>> Words take the form CVV or VCVV or CVCVV or VCVCVV or
>> CVCVCVV or VCVCVCVV, etc., where the final syllable
>> must always have a vowel pair and no other syllable in
>> a word is permitted to have a vowel pair.
>
> This sounds like a good plan. And since it depends entirely on a
> marking at the end of a word to accomplish word-segregation, there's
> no inherent restriction on consonant clusters internal to the word,
> which provides a bit of extra freedom.
I am working on a conlang right now that does this. It's looking very
promising. I know, I know, I said I was going to set auxlanging
aside... that's why this one is a conlang that just LOOKS like an
auxlang.

> But what if we *want*
> word-internal vowel sequences?
Try separating them with a glottal stop? Or using only a subset
(perhaps easily diphthongised) for the word-ending markers?

>
> It occurs to me also that the final-pair marking system without
> initial vowels is essentially equivalent to a surrounding-vowel
> system, where all words start and end with a vowel, except that each
> initial vowel is shifted backwards by one word.
Correct. Saves a syllable per word, too, if the vowel pair can be
pronounced as a diphthong.

>
> Altogether, this results in the most flexible self-segregating
> morphological system I have yet seen (although, it only addresses
> segregating words, rather than individual morphemes, but a
> word-internal segregation system could be superimposed fairly easily).
I've also done this. I'd be happy to send you a sample if you'd like.
I think your overall design is very different from what I'm doing, but
I'm happy to share examples if you think they'd be fruitful for you.

--larry

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