The Random Phonology Thread

[Dormouse559]

Oh, yes. I'm sorry if that led to misinterpretation. What I meant is that /y/ was no longer a phoneme represented by the orthography (I think it was already lost in Vulgar Latin, correct me if I'm wrong). So the letter stood there without a real purpose, thus being able to take care of the phoneme /j/.

I would question whether /y/ was ever a valid phoneme in Vulgar Latin. There's a misconception that Vulgar Latin descended from Classical Latin, but in fact Classical Latin was an artificial construct, with Vulgar Latin developing at the same time among the populace.

Anyway, <y> representing the phoneme [ʝ] is only a regional feature. I wouldn't say this happens in Moder Spanish, because in many regions, <y> may represent [ʒ], [ɟ͡ʝ], [ʃ] or the old [j]. The sound the letter represents may also vary depending on the environment, like after a nasal. So, in conlucion, I would say (and that's my inexpert opinion) that <y> represents /j/ and [ʝ] but not /ʝ/.

/ʝ/ is the underlying phoneme. I wasn't making any reference to its phonetic or dialectal realizations.

[linguoboy]

What I meant is that /y/ was no longer a phoneme represented by the orthography (I think it was already lost in Vulgar Latin, correct me if I'm wrong).

Was /y/ ever a phoneme in Latin? Even in words borrowed from Greek?

By the way, I am a native Spanish speaker and I happen to have read a couple of articles about its phonology (mainly Wikipedia, not gonna lie). Anyway, <y> representing the phoneme [ʝ] is only a regional feature. I wouldn't say this happens in Moder Spanish, because in many regions, <y> may represent [ʒ], [ɟ͡ʝ], [ʃ] or the old [j]. The sound the letter represents may also vary depending on the environment, like after a nasal. So, in conlucion, I would say (and that's my inexpert opinion) that <y> represents /j/ and [ʝ] but not /ʝ/.

I don't understand what the variety of allophonic realisations has to do with the question of whether /ʝ/ or /j/ is a better representation of the underlying phoneme. I'd be more inclined to represent it as /j/ if it paired with /w/, but it doesn't.

[Irkan]

I guess it's probably my mistake. Could any you explain what is an underlying phoneme?

That aside, concerning the /y/ in Latin, I really doubt it ever was there, I remember reading somewhere that the population might have approahced it as [ɨ]. Whatever it was, it's my fault again for expressing myself terribly. What I meant with /y/ is that the original <y> was used to represent the Greek sound /y/, and therefore it represented at the very least a certain etymology. I guess we could compare it to Spanish <v>, which represents a sound that has merged with [β] and yet, some people will wrongly pronounce it /v/.

[linguoboy]

I guess it's probably my mistake. Could any you explain what is an underlying phoneme?

I mean the underlying abstraction as opposed to its concrete permutations. The choice of a representation is ultimately arbitrary, but phonologists try to choose symbols which make sense in terms of the featural contrasts of the language.

I guess we could compare it to Spanish <v>, which represents a sound that has merged with [β] and yet, some people will wrongly pronounce it [v].

Fixed.

Technically, both /b/ and /v/ merged into a single phoneme (conventionally represented as /b/) whose default realisation is [β̞]. [v] is actually one of its possible realisations. loqu has posted before that [vː] is the surface realisation of underlying /sb/ in his dialect.

[Irkan]

I guess it's probably my mistake. Could any you explain what is an underlying phoneme?

I mean the underlying abstraction as opposed to its concrete permutations. The choice of a representation is ultimately arbitrary, but phonologists try to choose symbols which make sense in terms of the featural contrasts of the language.

I think I got it now. And I also understand your point about it not pairing with /w/. I really have nothing left to say. Thank you for the explanation.

I guess we could compare it to Spanish <v>, which represents a sound that has merged with [β] and yet, some people will wrongly pronounce it [v].

Fixed.

Oops! Thank you.

Technically, both /b/ and /v/ merged into a single phoneme (conventionally represented as /b/) whose default realisation is [β̞]. [v] is actually one of its possible realisations. loqu has posted before that [vː] is the surface realisation of underlying /sb/ in his dialect.

Yes, that is true. It is realised like this in my dialect, too. But the [v] sound in this case is not represent by <v>. I'll try to put it with two examples.

-Los burros (the donkies) [lɔˈvʰːurɔ] → this one's correct
-Cava (chamagne) [ˈka̠va̠] → incorrect (I don't know if there's any dialect that changes intervocalic instances of /b/ into [v]). This one is the usage of [v] that I was referring to.

[mōdgethanc]

Who doesn't like /c/?

I don't. Palatal stops are a pain in the ass.

Vietnamese has /c/ but not /ɟ/ even though other stops show a voicing distinction.

They do? Vietnamese has two implosives, which are voiced, but I'm not sure if they pair with the voiceless ones. It also doesn't have a voiced velar stop or even implosive.

[Ahzoh]

Who doesn't like /c/?

I don't. Palatal stops are a pain in the ass.

Palatal fricatives?

[Thon]

A palatal fricative would be slightly better (it could be a natural voiceless counterpart of /j/) -- but the same asymmetry problem would arise with the lone uvular stop -- I would have to make "q" stand for something like /ʍ/.

Plus, /ç x h/ would be way too many distinct phonemes. I'd prefer to make two of them allophones, such as xj -> ç (and I can also have kj, gj, nj, lj -> c, ɟ, ɲ, ʎ, as in Greek).

That still leaves the problem of what to do with the letters C and Q. I prefer not to have uvulars in my phonology (they are problematic for most speakers of European languages), but I can't think of any other sensible solution. (I guess I can always use those letters for clicks -- but that's not IPA usage anyway).

[mōdgethanc]

Palatal fricatives?

Easier to pronounce, but I still don't care for them. Velar fricatives FTW.

That still leaves the problem of what to do with the letters C and Q. I prefer not to have uvulars in my phonology (they are problematic for most speakers of European languages)

And clicks aren't?

[Irkan]

So I'm working on a phonology for a new conlang and it has a two-way distinction of t-like sounds. I was wondering, though, which of the following is more natural: [t̺]/[tʲ] or [ʈ]/[tʲ]? I like the second one better, but I'm worried about not having any "pure" (I really can't think of a better way to say it right now) alveolar stop.

[Koko]

If you like the reflexive, you could make it a common realization of alveolar /t/ in most cases it appears. After a rhotic, between vowels, syllable coda, before back vowel, before rhotic. Then you could also make these cases not confined to word boundaries. So if a word before a /t/ ends in /R/, the t is reflexive.

[Irkan]

If you like the reflexive, you could make it a common realization of alveolar /t/ in most cases it appears.

That's great too. Not that /t/ appears very often, though.

[Koko]

Chissà… Is it plausable that /r/ in coda could become [ɣ]? I'm thinking of changing some Isyan phonology so it's less Romance-y. I like the sound of romlangs, truly, but they are kind of overrated for conlangs. Isyan needs a voice of its own.

[linguoboy]

Chissà… Is it plausable that /r/ in coda could become [ɣ]?

Why not? It becomes [x] in some varieties of French and Brazilian Portuguese after all. The latter has regressive voicing assimilation, so there are in fact examples of coda /r/ being pronounced [ɣ], e.g. mármore [ˈmaɣmuɾi] "marble". It's just not a universal change.

[Koko]

Great, thanks linguo!! ^^

[Koko]

I think maybe I will allow semi-affrication of alveolar stops before front vowels . This could happen word finally. Maybe /ɑ/ becomes [ʌ] (though not always or by all speakers) in unstressed closed syllables next to a stressed syllable. I've grown to love this latter vowel that this thought has crossed my mind lately. If not for Isyan, maybe Simdo.

It makes sense that /h/ could be assimilated to [ħ] before /ɑ/, right? IMO I don't see anything wrong considering the voiceless gltotal fricative is notorious for assimilating to the place of a vowel's articulation. Perhaps I could also make it so instead of words starting with a carry an inherent glottal stop, it be a voiced pharyngeal fricative . For some reason I like the sounds of the pharynx .

[Thon]

I just came up with this phonology, for a new conlang:

Vowels:
Close - i y u
Mid - e ø o
Open - a

Consonants:
Plosives: p b t d rt rd k g
Fricatives: f v th dh s z ś ź rs rz h
Affricates: c ç ć ḉ rc rç
Nasals: m n ń rn
Approximants: r j w l

IPA realizations:
a b c ć ç ḉ d dh e f g h i j k l m n ń o ø p qu r rc rç rd rn rs rt rz s ś t th u v w x x́ y z ź
/a b ts tɕ dz dʑ d ð e f g h i j k ɰ~ɰᵝ m n ɲ o ø p kw ɹ ʈʂ ɖʐ ɖ ɳ ʂ ʈ ʐ s ɕ t θ u v w ks kɕ y z ʑ/

There is a length distinction in vowels, marked by doubling.

Retroflex consonants arise from clusters of R and alveolar consonants (hence the spelling). Grammatically they are treated like clusters.

Stress is on the last heavy syllable (i.e. the last syllable containing a long vowel or a nonempty coda or both), unless marked with an acute accent. Syllabification follows the sonority hierarchy:
vowel>approximant>nasal>plosive=fricative=affricate

Unstressed E and O are /ə/ and /ɵ/ respectively.

I plan to include the following in the morphosyntax:

Strict SVO, head-initial syntax;
Nouns inflecting for definiteness, case (nominative, accusative, genitive, lative, locative, ablative, instrumental, abessive, vocative), and number (singular, dual and plural)

[Koko]

I've been thinking about making a conlang with postalveolar plosives (partly so I can have only postalveolar fricatives and not alveolar). I recently started one with an interesting orthography (it's less reliable than every other that I've made), so maybe I could change something there, but I like some things I've done with it. Perhaps I could have a dental-pa contrast. There are languages (looking at you Malayalam [only one I know]) with dental vs alveolar, so making the distance wider would be easier to differentiate. That could be an idea! For some reason I like postalveolars .

[Thon]

I know of only one language with postalveolar fricatives and no alveolar ones, namely Turkmen, and it also has dental fricatives (which no doubt have arisen from fronted alveolars). Do you plan to include them in your conlang?

[Koko]

I have /tS/ and /dZ/, with /Sj/ and /Zj/ phonemic contrasting with /sj/ and /zj/ (written the same). But I decided to keep it the same. If I were to just have postalveolar plosives, I wouldn't have alveolar fricatives, but postalveolar.