The CBB

Some of you may remember that I posted a conlang called ‘mhm̋ on the old CBB. I haven't worked much on it since, actually I've gone back a bit from there. The phonology hasn't changed; it's still an all nasal conlang:

Phonology

Consonants

Glottal
Plosive - ‘
Fricative - h

Velopharyngeal* (the opening from the mouth to the nose)
Plosive - k
Unvoiced Fricative - x
Voiced Fricative - g
Unvoiced Affricate - kx
Voiced Affricate - kg

Nareal (in the nostrils)
Unvoiced Fricative - f
Voiced Fricative - v

Allowed clusters
kf, kv

Allophones
k voices to match other consonants in clusters.
kg may be realized as a voiced k.

Vowels

There is only one now three vowel qualities [m̩], [ɲ͡m̩] and [ɴ͡m̩]; vowels are distinguished by tone and length only too. The four tones are: 0 low; 1 high; 2 rising; 3 falling. And there is two-way length distinction. Blue is the computers preferred romanization (ascii) and were chosen for their likeness to the numbers 0, 1, 2 and 3, red is my preferred romanization (unicode but more transparent).

Short
Low - o - m (plain m)
High - i - m̅ (m with overline/macron)
Rising - a - ḿ (m with acute)
Falling - e - m̀ (m with grave)

Long
Low - oo - m̈ (m with trema)
High - ii - m̿ (m with double overline/macron)
Rising - aa - m̋ (m with double acute)
Falling - ee - m̏ (m with double grave)

I will use the ascii ones on this board which makes ‘mhm̋ --> ‘ohaa

I think I'll stick to unicode now that I have three times as many vowels, and have no idea how to romanize them otherwise

Phonotactics

(C)V(F) where C is any consonant or allowed cluster, V is any vowel and F is either k, x or f.


Grammar

The language is isolating and uses particles to mark part of speech and case and such. Since all words are marked, word order is very free, but the default word order is VSO.

Particles

Particles are monosyllabic and have one of the following structures: V, V:, CV
Particles precede the words they modify. Here’s the list of particles so far:

Subject particle - ii
Object particle - aa
Indirect object - particle ee

Time particle - kvo
Until particle - ko
From_on particle - vo

Place particle - kxe
To particle - kge
From particle - xe

Verb particle - fa

Modifier particle - oo

Repeat particle - ‘a
Prepeat particle - he

I'll explain those last three:
The modifier particle marks adjectives, adverbs and possesive nouns. Modifiers follow the words they modify, thus: fa X oo Y = "to X Y-ly" and aa Z oo W = "a W-some Z" or "W's Z"
The repeat particle repeats the last particle, so it functions like a sort of "and".
The "prepeat" particle repeats the particle before the article repeated by the repeat particle. Here's an example: aa X oo Y ‘a Z he W = "a Y-some and Z-some X and a W" (the ‘a repeats the oo and the he repeats the aa)

Other words

To distinguish them from particles they must have one of the following syllable structures: VF, V:F, CV:, CVF, CV:F, or be polysyllabic.

Here's the little vocab I have so far:

Before xef
Now kii
Later ak

Rain(-drop) kńkń
Existence/life/exist kfiik
Talk/blabber/mouth ‘iix
Person gii
Nomen agensis prefix gi-
Ear/Listen kfee

Yes - ‘ŋ̋
No - xm̈x

I tried pronouncing some of that.

Holy crap.

That's really difficult and at the same time intriguing! I'm still trying to pronounce the nareals.

Please record a sample in this language .

Wanderer wrote:Please record a sample in this language .

I imagine it sounds something like this.

As for the lang itself, why not distinguish the other points of articulation? As well as all sound comes out through the nose one way or the other I don't see why you can't have n as well or even N/N\.

why the hell would anyone have m=a vowel?

I belive German does

Pe King wrote:I belive German does

seriously? where? All sources I see uses vowel symbols

and even if there is a natlang that does why would you? It is contraproductive because most when they see "m" will think "m" not "o" or whatever

zelos wrote:

Pe King wrote:I belive German does

seriously? where? All sources I see uses vowel symbols

and even if there is a natlang that does why would you? It is contraproductive because most when they see "m" will think "m" not "o" or whatever

Are you talking about the orthography? That is, how it's written? The actual vowel is [m̩], a syllabic nasal. Pronounce it like you would pronounce /m/ in English; that's the vowel.

If you're asking why someone would do that--I don't think the point of this conlang is to be natural or realistic. It's an interesting concept.

Wanderer wrote:Please record a sample in this language .

I'll see what I can do ;-) .

Micamo wrote:As for the lang itself, why not distinguish the other points of articulation? As well as all sound comes out through the nose one way or the other I don't see why you can't have n as well or even N/N\.

I may not have explained that well enough. The thing is that all the sounds are pronounced with the lips shut. So that rules out pretty much all sounds made with the tounge. The sound will still resonate in the mouth, so i guess the tounge could change the vowel quality, but I think the difference is very subtle.

zelos wrote:

Pe King wrote:I belive German does

seriously? where? All sources I see uses vowel symbols

and even if there is a natlang that does why would you? It is contraproductive because most when they see "m" will think "m" not "o" or whatever

Are you questioning the romanization? Well I also prefer the m with different diacritics, because that is more transparent and you have a better chance of guessing how it is supposed to sound. Now the thing is these diacritics are not well supported, so I went searching for alternatives. First I thought of numbers: m0, m1, m2, m3. As the m goes for every vowel I might as well get rid of it: 0, 1, 2, 3. And then I thought numbers would look strange in a text so I chose some letters that look slightly like the numbers: o, i, a, e.

I believe I read it somewere (duh) that the Germans treat it as a vowel with all of their consanant clusters.

CMunk wrote:As for the lang itself, why not distinguish the other points of articulation? As well as all sound comes out through the nose one way or the other I don't see why you can't have n as well or even N/N\.

I may not have explained that well enough. The thing is that all the sounds are pronounced with the lips shut. So that rules out pretty much all sounds made with the tounge. The sound will still resonate in the mouth, so i guess the tounge could change the vowel quality, but I think the difference is very subtle.[/quote]

Almost everyone can distinguish /m/ vs. /n/. I wouldn't call that "subtle."

I do remember you.
I recorded a bunch of words and one phrase. "fakfiik iigii kxekaka vokii" is this correct?
Do the phrases have some kind of specific intonation through the sentence by the way? It sound weird hearing my self pronouncing a phrase with no emotion but with tones at the same time.
Is the natural way of representing time in your language, using the time/until/from_on particles and the words before/now/later?
How do you ask question and negate sentences?
How does the verb particle work? Is fakaka "to rain" or something like "to be rain", if it's the later then is it subjective?

Raydred wrote:I do remember you.

Yay :-D

Raydred wrote:I recorded a bunch of words and one phrase. "fakfiik iigii kxekaka vokii" is this correct?

Yes, if you're trying to say "there is a person in the rain from now on" or maybe rather "a person has just gone out into the rain" (Although we do not know wether he has done so voluntarily). Oh, but i put a space between the particle and the word, so it would actually be like this: "fa kfiik ii gii kxe kaka vo kii".

Raydred wrote:Do the phrases have some kind of specific intonation through the sentence by the way? It sound weird hearing my self pronouncing a phrase with no emotion but with tones at the same time.

I am not quite sure about intonation myself, I haven't much experience with tonal languages. I will try to get around to recording something.

Raydred wrote:Is the natural way of representing time in your language, using the time/until/from_on particles and the words before/now/later?

Yes, the verbs don't have tense, so that is the only way to specify time. It is not mandatory, though, and it'd often be excluded.

Raydred wrote:How do you ask question and negate sentences?

Haven't quite descided on that yet. I mean, I probably will have interrogative pronouns, and for yes/no questions, maybe a different verb particle. Yeah, that seems like a natural way of doing that.

Raydred wrote:How does the verb particle work? Is fakaka "to rain" or something like "to be rain", if it's the later then is it subjective?

It's the first one. The sentence "fa kaka" would read "It rains". Although for some words - like colours - it could act like a copula. For animals it would probably be "to act like [said animal]" or "to use [said animal]". So there isn't really a consistent derivation of noun to verb. But a given verb would always mean the same.

Micamo wrote:

Raydred wrote:I recorded a bunch of words and one phrase. "fakfiik iigii kxekaka vokii" is this correct?

Yes, if you're trying to say "there is a person in the rain from now on" or maybe rather "a person has just gone out into the rain" (Although we do not know wether he has done so voluntarily). Oh, but i put a space between the particle and the word, so it would actually be like this: "fa kfiik ii gii kxe kaka vo kii".

I was thinking about from now on people will be in the rain. I assumed that nouns don't have a defined number? Is this correct?(as I write this I realise I can be repetitive)

Micamo wrote:

Raydred wrote:Do the phrases have some kind of specific intonation through the sentence by the way? It sound weird hearing my self pronouncing a phrase with no emotion but with tones at the same time.

I am not quite sure about intonation myself, I haven't much experience with tonal languages. I will try to get around to recording something.

I have very little experience with tonal languages too. About intonation I have a hard time finding info on languages' intonation, might be related with people not even remember such thing exists.

Oh, and...

Micamo wrote:I haven't worked much on it since, actually I've gone back a bit from there.

One of the few conlang articles I care enough to read about even record phrases. It's probably related to my phonology addiction. What does this mean? It means that you must work on it to feed my curiosity! But I can't blame you, haven't touched my conlang for months even though it is so simple and minimalistic.

Even if it's the only syllabic phonemic in the language, /m̩/ will never be a vowel. It's still a nasal. So call it a syllabic nasal. Cuz that's what it is.

This is... interesting. I wonder how this slipped me by.
Also, it's nice to see someone else working on an isolating language around here .
Even though yours is far more unique. But that can't be helped, I guess.
Probably because my language has "actual" vowels (if one wants to call them that).

Raydred wrote:I was thinking about from now on people will be in the rain. I assumed that nouns don't have a defined number? Is this correct?(as I write this I realise I can be repetitive)

Oh, yes, that's right. No defined number.

Raydred wrote:One of the few conlang articles I care enough to read about even record phrases. It's probably related to my phonology addiction. What does this mean? It means that you must work on it to feed my curiosity! But I can't blame you, haven't touched my conlang for months even though it is so simple and minimalistic.

Heh, I will try to, but I'm a terrible procrastinator. But I am honoured that you find it so interesting.

Oh, and I'm not Micamo ;-)

roninbodhisattva wrote:Even if it's the only syllabic phonemic in the language, /m̩/ will never be a vowel. It's still a nasal. So call it a syllabic nasal. Cuz that's what it is.

That depends on your definition of vowel I guess...

Now I'm feeling pressure to get on with the lang. I'll try to do a video friday afternoon (GMT+1 / CET).

CMunk wrote:Oh, and I'm not Micamo ;-)

Forgive me mate. Those comics keep distracting me damn it.

Raydred wrote:

CMunk wrote:Oh, and I'm not Micamo ;-)

Forgive me mate. Those comics keep distracting me damn it.