Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread [2011–2018]

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Thrice Xandvii
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Thrice Xandvii »

(The original inventory is still here, for those interested.)
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Davush
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Davush »

I like the vowels too. The consonant inventory is balanced and simple (which I also like... [:D] ). As far as I’m aware, Mandarin’s third (dipping) tone is more associated with creaky voice (and length) and some speakers even insert a glottal stop. Of course this doesn’t mean it can’t be as you described for your language, though.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Thrice Xandvii »

@Davush: I realize now that my wording was somewhat ambiguous with regard to tone. What I should have said was that there were/are three tones in Shitullian: low, dipping, high. The dipping tone is similar to the Mandarin third tone. However, in the modern language, they are more often realized as a plain, lengthened and creaky-voiced vowel phonation. I think my original wording made it sound like all of the tones came from Mandarin, or that the third tone was exactly what was used as the long Shitullian tone when that wasn't precisely what I had intended to say. Basically the "tones" in Shitullian are (now) less tones, and more vowels that take on different phonational qualities.

(Nonetheless, thanks for your feedback! [:)] )
DesEsseintes wrote: 29 Nov 2017 08:27 [...] Perhaps all non-coda /k g/ became palatal?
And... I assume, then later moved to create the series of affricates to explain the current lack of palatal stops? I think that works out well enough.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by DesEsseintes »

Yes, my bad. I meant the palato-alveolar affricates, but I always just think of them as palatal.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by DesEsseintes »

Núta

Núta is my latest pet sketch. The consonant inventory is pretty much exactly Mohawk/Oneida - and Proto-Northern-Iroquoian - if ts kw are considered clusters. The vowels are fewer in number though, and there are no nasal vowels.

/n/ n
/t k ʔ/ t k ‘
/s h/ s h
/r/ r
/j w/ y w

/a e i u/ a e ı u

Vowel length is a feature of some morfofo processes and long vowels are indicated as a· e· ı· u·.

High tone is indicated with an acute: á é í ú
Falling tone is indicated with a grave: à è ì ù
Devoiced vowels are indicated with an overdot: ȧ ė i u̇

Relatively complex clusters are permitted. Here is a table of two-consonant clusters:

Code: Select all

    n   t   k   ʔ   s   h   r   y   w
n   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   ny  nw
t   tn  -   -   -   ts  th  tr  ty  tw
k   kn  -   -   -   ks  kh  kr  ky  kw
ʔ   ʔn  ʔt  ʔk  -   ʔs  ʔh  ʔr  ʔy  ʔw
s   sn  st  sk  -   -   sh  sr  sy  sw
h   hn  ht  hk  hʔ  hs  -   hr  hy  hw
r   rn  rt  rk  -   -   -   -   ry  rw
Any cluster ending in one of n t k s can take a further glide to form a triconsonantal cluster. Furthermore, s r can occur before any cluster starting in t k.

Stress placement is still a bit up in the air, but stressed syllables can cause vowel lengthening, glottal elision and tone.

Just for fun, here is an example of morfofo operating on an underlying form to produce a surface form:

/arkrıwı/ + /hse/
*arkrıwíhse; suffix -hse attracts the accent
*arkrıwì·se; h-elision causes vowel to lengthen and shift to falling tone
arkríwı·se; accent spread occurs over a single resonant
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eldin raigmore
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by eldin raigmore »

DesEsseintes wrote: 29 Nov 2017 17:32 ... Vowel length is a feature of some morfofo processes ....
Never seen this abbreviation of "morpho-phonological" before!
I like it! IMO I've needed one for a while now!

DesEsseintes wrote: 29 Nov 2017 17:32 Any cluster ending in one of n t k s can take a further glide to form a triconsonantal cluster. Furthermore, s r can occur before any cluster starting in t k.
So, is a consonant-cluster's maximal length four consonants? {s|r}{t|k}{n|t|k|s}{w|y} ? (Obviously not all of those! but some?)
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Osia »

DesEsseintes wrote: 29 Nov 2017 17:32 Núta

Núta is my latest pet sketch. The consonant inventory is pretty much exactly Mohawk/Oneida - and Proto-Northern-Iroquoian - if ts kw are considered clusters. The vowels are fewer in number though, and there are no nasal vowels.

/n/ n
/t k ʔ/ t k ‘
/s h/ s h
/r/ r
/j w/ y w

/a e i u/ a e ı u

Vowel length is a feature of some morfofo processes and long vowels are indicated as a· e· ı· u·.

High tone is indicated with an acute: á é í ú
Falling tone is indicated with a grave: à è ì ù
Devoiced vowels are indicated with an overdot: ȧ ė i u̇

Relatively complex clusters are permitted. Here is a table of two-consonant clusters:

Code: Select all

    n   t   k   ʔ   s   h   r   y   w
n   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   ny  nw
t   tn  -   -   -   ts  th  tr  ty  tw
k   kn  -   -   -   ks  kh  kr  ky  kw
ʔ   ʔn  ʔt  ʔk  -   ʔs  ʔh  ʔr  ʔy  ʔw
s   sn  st  sk  -   -   sh  sr  sy  sw
h   hn  ht  hk  hʔ  hs  -   hr  hy  hw
r   rn  rt  rk  -   -   -   -   ry  rw
Any cluster ending in one of n t k s can take a further glide to form a triconsonantal cluster. Furthermore, s r can occur before any cluster starting in t k.

Stress placement is still a bit up in the air, but stressed syllables can cause vowel lengthening, glottal elision and tone.

Just for fun, here is an example of morfofo operating on an underlying form to produce a surface form:

/arkrıwı/ + /hse/
*arkrıwíhse; suffix -hse attracts the accent
*arkrıwì·se; h-elision causes vowel to lengthen and shift to falling tone
arkríwı·se; accent spread occurs over a single resonant
[<3] [O.O] :mrgreen: I'm in love. Beautifully minimalist but with big consonant clusters. I especially love the clusters with /h/ and the glottal stop. The only thing that seems off is having devoiced low vowels /a/ and /e/, but I may be wrong about that.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by DesEsseintes »

eldin raigmore wrote: 29 Nov 2017 18:35
DesEsseintes wrote: 29 Nov 2017 17:32 ... Vowel length is a feature of some morfofo processes ....
Never seen this abbreviation of "morpho-phonological" before!
I like it! IMO I've needed one for a while now!
Lol. Yeah, I’ve been using that for years cos morphophonology, albeit a lovely a word, is a bit unwieldy to type. Glad you like it.
DesEsseintes wrote: 29 Nov 2017 17:32 Any cluster ending in one of n t k s can take a further glide to form a triconsonantal cluster. Furthermore, s r can occur before any cluster starting in t k.
So, is a consonant-cluster's maximal length four consonants? {s|r}{t|k}{n|t|k|s}{w|y} ? (Obviously not all of those! but some?)
Four-consonant clusters are indeed permitted! Examples of valid clusters include skny rtsw. s-initial clusters can occur word-initially whereas r-initial clusters cannot. There should actually be more combinations involving h ‘ but more on that if this ever takes off.
Osia wrote: 30 Nov 2017 00:01 [<3] [O.O] :mrgreen: I'm in love. Beautifully minimalist but with big consonant clusters. I especially love the clusters with /h/ and the glottal stop. The only thing that seems off is having devoiced low vowels /a/ and /e/, but I may be wrong about that.
Lol. Thanks, Osia. I appreciate the love. :mrgreen:

Having said that, I feel a bit awkward at just how close I’m hewing to Mohawk/Oneida here. Although I already know that this language is gonna work quite differently from an Iroquoian language, I still feel like I’m ‘cheating’. Do you ever get that feeling?

/h ʔ/ play a major part in determining stress patterns and tone, so I want lots of clusters involving them.

/a e/ devoice - like all vowels - in certain environments, such as in unstressed syllables before coda s h. However, they are not subject to a further process that causes the syllables hı hu to metathesise when non-initial and unstressed. So in that respect, they are somewhat less prone to devoicing than the high vowels.

Also, credit where it’s due: Lately I’ve noticed Frislander using <‘> in his languages rather than <’>. That’s a rather nice touch, and although I don’t think it suits the aesthetic of my Híí languages, it works perfectly in Núta! u‘yúse, etc. So thanks, Frislander. [:)]

Thanks for the feedback.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Frislander »

/t t͡s k kʷ/
/β s ð/
/m n j/

/i ɨ u/
/ɛ a ɔ/

Vowel nuclei may occur in the following patterns: /V Vː Vh Vːh Vʔ VʔV VʔVh/

Syllable structure is (C)(j)V(C), where vowel-initial syllables are restricted to word-initial position. Furthermore, in word-initial position aspirated vowels take a prothetic [h] and glottalised vowels an [ʔ]. Coda consonants are restricted to /t k s n/.
DesEsseintes wrote: 30 Nov 2017 03:12Also, credit where it’s due: Lately I’ve noticed Frislander using <‘> in his languages rather than <’>. That’s a rather nice touch, and although I don’t think it suits the aesthetic of my Híí languages, it works perfectly in Núta! u‘yúse, etc. So thanks, Frislander. [:)]
Why thank you! Pretty much the main reason I've been using it is because I finally discovered the keyboard shortcut for <‘>, which means I could in theory write texts in a language which uses it using my otherwise English keyboard. Even better this shortcut works on the board too, whereas for some reason the ones for things like the velar nasal and u-tilde output <K> and <i> respectively.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Ahzoh »

Re-did the phonology of Ñúcȁm (/ŋúqàːm/):
/b~m d~n g~ŋ ɡ͡b~ŋ͡m/⟨m n ñ m̃⟩
/p pˤ t tˤ k kˤ k͡p k͡pˤ q qˤ ʔ*/⟨p ṗ t ṭ k ḳ kp ḳp c ċ q*⟩
/t͡s t͡sˤ k͡x k͡xˤ/⟨tz ṭz kg ḳg⟩
/s z x ɣ/⟨s z h j⟩
/l j w/⟨l y w⟩
*In loanwords only.

/a ɛ i ɔ u/⟨a e i o u⟩
/á ɛ́ í ɔ́ ú/⟨á é í ó ú⟩
/à ɛ̀ ì ɔ̀ ù/⟨à è ì ò ù⟩
/aː eː iː oː uː/⟨ā ē ī ō ū⟩
/áː éː íː óː úː/⟨a̋ e̋ i̋ ő ű⟩
/àː èː ìː òː ùː/⟨ȁ ȅ ȉ ȍ ȕ⟩

Syllable structure:
(C)V(p t k kp m n ñ m̃)
Good job me, I accidentally invented almost-Vietnamese syllable structure.

Allophony:
The nasals /m n ŋ ŋ͡m/ become /b d g ɡ͡b/ after adjacent /m n ŋ ŋ͡m/. Example: The name of a city is Kgȁláññók /k͡xàː.láŋ.ŋɔ́k/ [k͡xàː.láŋ.gɔ́k].

Ngucam has pitch accent/tone, with each morpheme or root possessing one of eight contours: long rising, long falling, short rising, short falling, long peaking, long dipping, short peaking, short dipping:

Less than three syllables:
LH
HL
Trisyllable:
LLH
HHL
LHH
HLL
HLH
LHL
Longer than three syllables:
L(...)LH
H(...)HL
LH(..)H
HL(...)L
HL(...)LH
LH(...)HL
H(...)HLH(...)
L(...)LHL(...)
Last edited by Ahzoh on 01 Dec 2017 21:02, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Creyeditor »

I had an idea for a baroque stress system, partly inspired by Sanskrit. Here it is:

There are several kinds of affixes and roots
  • Accented Affixes (ac): Affixes that are always stressed.
  • Accented Roots (ac): Roots that are always stressed.
  • Pre-accenting Roots (pr): Roots that trigger stress on the syllable before the roots, unless they are word initial, where they are stressed.
  • Post-accenting Roos (po):Roots that trigger stress on the syllable after the root, unless they are word final, where they are stressed.
  • Pre-accenting Affixes (pr): Affixes that trigger stress on the syllable before the affix, unless they are word initial, where they are stressed.
  • Post-accenting Affixes (po):Affixes that trigger stress on the syllable after the affix, unless they are word final, where they are stressed.
  • If-Accented Roots (ia): Roots that are stressed, if nothing else is stressed.
  • If-Accented Affixes (ia): Affixes that are stressed, if everything else is unstressed.
  • Never-accented roots (na): Roots that are only accented if nothing else can be accented.
  • Never-accented affixes (na): Affixes that are stressed only if nothing else can be accented.
There is are three hierachies that controll the interactions between these classes of morphemes.
  • Roots > Affixes
  • ac>pr>po>ia>na
  • left>right
[cáca-ca-caca-caca-caca-ca]
/caca-ca-caca-caca-caca-ca/
acc po pr po ia po
DESI-CAUS-COND-sleep-3SG
'If he wanted to make him sleep'

[cáca-caca-caca-ca]
/caca-caca-caca-ca/
pr po ia po
CAUS-COND-sleep-3SG
'If he made him sleep'

[caca-cáca-ca]
/caca-caca-ca/
po ia po
COND-sleep-3SG
'If he slept'

[caca-cá]
/caca-ca/
ia po
sleep-3SG
'he slept'
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Porphyrogenitos »

I was sketching out something but I'm not done with it yet; one interesting thing I thought of is how if you had vowel sandhi but then had a vowel/shift merger the sandhi process could lead to some interesting and unexpected outcomes:

e.g. /i/ + /e/ > /i/ and /u/ + /e/ > /o/, but then /u/ > /i/; leading to certain instances of /i/ + /e/ > /i/ and certain instances of /i/ + /e/ > /o/
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by DesEsseintes »

Porphyrogenitos wrote: 02 Dec 2017 07:29 I was sketching out something but I'm not done with it yet; one interesting thing I thought of is how if you had vowel sandhi but then had a vowel/shift merger the sandhi process could lead to some interesting and unexpected outcomes:

e.g. /i/ + /e/ > /i/ and /u/ + /e/ > /o/, but then /u/ > /i/; leading to certain instances of /i/ + /e/ > /i/ and certain instances of /i/ + /e/ > /o/
Lol. That’s exactly the kind of thing I’m working on in Núta. I have /a e i o u/ → /a e i u y/ → /a e i u i/ and much mayhem ensues. :mrgreen:

I posted about it here.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Frislander »

/t t͡ʃ ʔ/
/ɓ ɗ/
/ⁿd~n/
/w ɾ j/

The prenasalised stop is realised as a nasal before nasal vowels.

/i ĩ u ũ/
/e o/
/ɛ ɛ̃ ɔ ɔ̃/
/ã/

Vowels may occur in high, mid, low, high-fall and low-fall tones.

Syllable structure is CV.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Frislander »

/b t d~l ʔ/
/s x h/
/m n ŋ/

/i ɨ u/
/ɛ a ɔ/
/iɛ ɨa uɔ/

Vowels may occur in either oral or nasal.

Syllable structure is (C)CV(C), where CC clusters are one of s + stop (oral and nasal) or b + d~l and coda consonants are restricted to /ʔ h/.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Porphyrogenitos »

A vowel system:

/i u/
/ə/
/ɛ ɔ/

Stress is word-initial.

There is a system of vowel harmony, termed "feature harmony": Every vowel in a word must share at least one distinctive feature (height or backness/rounding) with the first vowel in the word. That is, words with initial /u/ may also contain /i ɔ/; with initial /i/, /ɛ u/; with initial /ɛ/, /i ɔ/, and with initial /ɔ/, /ɛ u/.

When an affix with an incompatible vowel is added to the end of a word, it is raised or lowered to make it compatible (never backed or fronted). /ə/ is a marginal phoneme that only appears in onomatopoeia and certain exclamations and vocative expressions; otherwise [ə] only appears as the neutralization of unstressed word-final /ɛ ɔ/.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Frislander »

/p t c k ʔ/
/pʰ tʰ/
/ⁿb~m ⁿd~n/
/s x h/
/w ɾ j/

/z̩ v̩/
/e̝ o̝/
/ɛ̞ ɔ̞/
/ã/

/˥ ˧ ˩ ˥˧ ˧˩ ˧˥/

Syllable structure is CV
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Solarius »

Trying to start a new thing, as always. Scrappers never learn :'(

/p t tʷ k kʷ/
/v s sʷ ɕ ɕʷ h/
/m n nʷ ŋ ŋʷ/
/l r w/
/i e a u/

The /l/~/r/ distinction is only barely phonemic. /r/ is pretty rare; the distinction between the two is only contrastive intervocallically as [r] never occurs word-initially and [l] never occurs finally. /r/ is pretty rare, mostly occuring in function words.

Syllable structure is (C)V(V)(C). However, codas only occur word finally and are also just pretty uncommon. Diphtongs are legal, provided the offglide is higher than the onglide; thus /ai/, /eu/, but */iu/, */ua/.

There's a simple two-tone system--high versus low. High tone often coincides with breathy voice. High tone historically comes from vowel length, and due to historic distributions high tone is a lot more common on /e a/ than on /i u/.
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Frislander »

/p t t͡s k kʷ/ <b d c k kw>
/pʰ tʰ/ <p t>
/t͡ɬ’ t͡s’ k’ kʷ’/ <tl' c' k' kw'>
/ɬ s x xʷ ħ/ <l s x xw h>
/m n j w/ <m n y w>

The coarticulation on the aspirated and ejective stops is very strong, to the point that in the former case there may be velar frication.

/i iː/ <i ii>
/eː oː/ <e o>
/a aː ai/ <a aa ai>

In unstressed syllables only the short vowels can occur underlyingly. However, there is syncopation of unstressed vowels and glides leading to long vowels and diphthongs, like so:

Code: Select all

   -a -i
aj a: e:
aw o: ai
ij e: i:
iw o: i:
Syllalble structure is (C)V(p, t, k, ɬ, s, ħ, m, n).

Stress is phonemic, though generally word-final, with a shift to initial stress being characteristic of certain inflected forms. When stress shifts like this, long vowels in the formerly stressed syllable are shortened. This, coupled with the glide syncopation rules, can result in wildly differing inflected forms, e.g. /kawaˈɬeːn/ [koːˈɬeːn] vs. /ˈkawaɬeːn/ [ˈkawaɬen].
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Re: Random phonology/phonemic inventory thread

Post by Porphyrogenitos »

I came up with a phonology sketch based on an auto-generated map from @unchartedatlas on Twitter.

/i y u/ <i ü u>
/e ø o/ <e ö o>
/æ a/ <ä a>

/m n ŋ/ <m n ng>
/t q ʔ/ <t q '>
/b d/ <b d>
/t͜ɬ t͜ʃ/ <tl ch>
/v s ʃ x/ <v s sh kh>
/l r/ <l r>
/w j/ <w y>

Syllable structure is (S)CVC, where C is any consonant and S is a sibilant fricative. Every syllable must begin and end with a consonant.
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