Re: vowel harmony

Quoting JS Bangs <jaspax@...>:

> Andreas Johansson sikyal:
>
> > Quoting BP Jonsson <bpj@...>:
> >
> > > This assymetrical system was made symmetrical by merging /i y/, /e
> 1/
> > > and
> > > /o Q/, giving the symmetrical:
> > >
> > > i    1    u
> > > &    a    Q
> >
> > Isn't there supposed to be a universal saying that the number of
> back-front
> > distinctions is never greater than the number of height ones? If so,
> do you
> > have any justification for breaking it, or do you just live by my
> maxim that
> > rules wouldn't be any fun without exceptions?
>
> Under most analyses (perhaps all, actually), central vowels are not  a
> separate backness from back vowels. In terms of features, I would
> describe
> this system thus:
>
> -back  |  +back, -round  | +back, +round
> ------------------------------------------
>  i     |       1         |      u
>  &     |       a         |      Q

What do you do about (my dialect of) Swedish's [y: }: u:] triad?

> But maybe this universal is referring to something else, i.e.
> "apparent"
> frontness distinctions, rather than feature-based frontness
> distinctions?
The piece on it I found on my HD doesn't say, but it does add the note "fairly
rough", so apparently it's not a universal universal.

                                                       Andreas