(Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here [2010-2020]

[DesEsseintes]

I'm thinking of the following vowel inventory /a ɛ ɪ o/ with length distinction. Plausible?

[quadrilabial]

Do you have the full inventory of your conlang?

Sure.

Code: Select all

m mʲ mʷ mˤ                n nʲ nʷ nˤ   (~) ɲ ŋʷ ɴ
  ᶮʘ ᵑʘ ᶰʘ     ᶮǀ ᵑǀ ᶰǀ     ᶮǃ ᵑǃ ᶰǃ
                            ᶮǁ ᵑǁ ᶰǁ
p pʲ pʷ pˤ                t tʲ tʷ tˤ   (h) c kʷ q
  ʘʲ ʘʷ ʘˤ     ǀʲ ǀʷ ǀˤ     ǃʲ ǃʷ ǃˤ
                            ǁʲ ǁʷ ǁˤ
                          s sʲ sʷ sˤ
                          l lʲ lʷ lˤ
ʔ j  w  ʕ
ə

[Click]

I'm thinking of the following vowel inventory /a ɛ ɪ o/ with length distinction. Plausible?

Of course.

[QuantumWraith]

My second question has subquestions and an explanatory prologue. My understanding of the articulatory phonetics of clicks is that they all have dorsal holds, like forming a stop with the back of the tongue while some other point of contact is made, followed by a movement of the tongue that rarefies the intervening air, which when released rapidly undoes the pressure differential, causing a pop of varying acoustic qualities depending on the precise motions made. (Wow, that was a mouthful.)

• 1. Is all that correct?
  2. Is it realistic to have /ʘ ǀ ǃ ǁ/ (a bilabial, dental, alveolar, and lateral click respectively) each distinguished three ways by their dorsal hold being palatal, velar (with lip rounding), or uvular? That is, have 12 clicks distinguished independently by anterior place/manner and posterior place/manner, in parallel with the pulmonic consonants and their secondary articulations.
  3. Is there any way to have a 'bare' click in this setup, or is that unlikely given the rough sketch of the phonology I've set up here? Your answer to this question probably depends on what you think I should do for my first question.

The last question is, how 'bad' (i.e. unnaturalistic) is it to have a language with clicks in its inventory that allows codas in its phonotactics? I'm not putting clicks in the coda position, that sounds like bad luck. I just really want codas so that I can get complex vowel quality contours out of the single phonemic vowel.

Sorry, that was a hell of a read.

1. Sure.
2. If by realistic, you mean attested, then no. afaik the rear articulation of clicks is always velar. Never uvular or palatal. Those languages that are said to have clicks with uvular rear articulations are actually exhibiting clustering between clicks and uvular consonants. afaia the same clusters with palatals don't occur. Though, try them out! I can't seem to pronounce them... however.
3. afaict nope.
4. Languages with clicks (i.e. mostly Khoisan and Bantu languages) tend not to have codas at all, so... But hey, I can do 'eʘ. Can you do 'eʘ?

I'm thinking of the following vowel inventory /a ɛ ɪ o/ with length distinction. Plausible?

iirc navajo has /a e i o/ plus length, plus nasality, plus tone. I'm sure there are langs with far worse.

[Micamo]

The last question is, how 'bad' (i.e. unnaturalistic) is it to have a language with clicks in its inventory that allows codas in its phonotactics? I'm not putting clicks in the coda position, that sounds like bad luck. I just really want codas so that I can get complex vowel quality contours out of the single phonemic vowel.

It's not unnaturalistic at all: There are 30 attested natlangs with phonemic clicks. Out of them, there are 8 that allow codas of one or more consonants: !Xoon, Dahalo, Ju|'hoan, Korana, Nama, Sandawe, Xhosa, and Zulu.

[cromulant]

Looking for a primary and secondary stress pattern for Kuty's falling tones, High Falling (43) and Mid Falling (21). Of these two sets of allotones,

54 and 32
53 and 31

which is more acoustically prominent?

The first set has a higher ending pitch (and I am given to understand that this is much more salient to the listener than the starting pitch). The second set has a more exaggerated contour swing. These are both correlates of stress, but unlike in rising tones, I can't have them both together in rising tones.

[DesEsseintes]

I've been reading this thread over on that other board. It's a great thread btw.

I have a question regarding polysynthetic languages with noun incorporation. Let's say my lang uses incorporated nouns as a kind of classifier as outlined in the thread linked to above for Mohawk, where there is an infix for "fish" to refer to fish already mentioned in the discourse.

The example went something like this (greatly simplified):

Man caught-TR a fish.

Man fish-washed-INTR, and fish-cooked-INTR.

My question is whether this fish-infix would most naturally occur next to the verb root in the verb complex, or whether it would be possible/naturalistic to put it elsewhere. My instinct is to glue it to the verb root, and the least likely place for it seems to be the direct object slot, as the purpose of the incorporation is surely to allow valency reduction in the verb and shift of emphasis away from the object. Am I understanding this correctly?

[Micamo]

My question is whether this fish-infix would most naturally occur next to the verb root in the verb complex, or whether it would be possible/naturalistic to put it elsewhere. My instinct is to glue it to the verb root, and the least likely place for it seems to be the direct object slot, as the purpose of the incorporation is surely to allow valency reduction in the verb and shift of emphasis away from the object. Am I understanding this correctly?

Baker claims that the unmarked position of an IN is as a prefix directly adjacent to the verb root, though he uses DM-based arguments to do so. This is the case in most languages that allow for NI that he examines (and seems to be the case in my own experience): He claims that the exceptions are the result of a post-syntactic filter that moves around elements within the affix string in the word, much like what Keren Rice argues happens in Athabaskan languages (and causes the complex verb template). I'm not so sure how naturalistic it is for the IN to be realized as an infix.

As an aside, the picture of IN is more complicated than that thread explains: I believe that what Mithun describes as "Type III" and "Type IV" NI is actually (at least) 6 distinct types, defined by three parameters:

Consistency of Agreement: Can a verb's object agreement agree with its IN? (YES: Nahuatl, NO: Southern Tiwa)

Modifier Stranding: Can ordinarily nominal modifiers appear without a head noun outside the verb, interpreted as modifying the IN? (YES: Mohawk, NO: Mapuche)

Noun Doubling or "Classificatory" Incorporation: Can the clause have an overt NP that can be interpreted as coreferent with the IN? (YES: Mohawk, NO: Chukchi)

There are only 6 rather than 8 possibilities, because the logically available property of allowing noun doubling but not modifier stranding seems to be unattested in natlangs. Finally, there are some natlangs (e.g. Southern Tiwa) that require at least inanimate direct objects to be incorporated at all times.

The point is, NI does not always functionally reduce valency, nor is it always used for discourse functions.

[Dezinaa]

Would it be realistic to have /β/, /w/, /ʝ/, /j/, /ɣ/, and /ɰ/ in the same language, all contrasting?

Also, are these sound changes believable? /qʰ/ > /h/, /q/ > /ʔ/

[Egerius]

Would it be realistic to have /β/, /w/, /ʝ/, /j/, /ɣ/, and /ɰ/ in the same language, all contrasting?

Why not? Spanish has got /β/, /w/, /ʝ~ʎ/, /j/, /ɣ/, /m~ɰ/ and /ð/.

[Micamo]

Would it be realistic to have /β/, /w/, /ʝ/, /j/, /ɣ/, and /ɰ/ in the same language, all contrasting?

Yes.

Also, are these sound changes believable? /qʰ/ > /h/, /q/ > /ʔ/

Also yes. It's actually a rather common fate for uvulars.

[Dezinaa]

Ok. Thanks, Micamo and Egerius.

[quadrilabial]

Thanks, Micamo and QuantumWraith.

[DesEsseintes]

lots of informative cool stuff

Thanks for a great reply, Micamo.

Yes, I do realise that incorporation doesn't always necessitate valency reduction, and that there are lots of yummy options. I do love playing around with valency though and plan to do so with this polysynthetic lang I'm making.

From your answer, I infer that it is probably safest to stick to incorporated nouns right before the verb stem in the verb complex. Does this hold no matter if the lang is primarily prefixing? I'm actually considering both pre- and suffixes but have toyed with the idea of a heavily prefixing lang. Any thoughts?

Another question of very different scope: my lang permits /ɻ/ in coda position. What are likely allophones of /aɻ ɛɻ ɪɻ oɻ ɤɻ/? So far I'm thinking [ɑɻ] or [ɑ˞] for /aɻ/...

[Micamo]

From your answer, I infer that it is probably safest to stick to incorporated nouns right before the verb stem in the verb complex. Does this hold no matter if the lang is primarily prefixing? I'm actually considering both pre- and suffixes but have toyed with the idea of a heavily prefixing lang. Any thoughts?

The IN appearing immediately to the left of the verb stem seems to be independent of whether the language prefers prefixes or suffixes in general.

[eldin raigmore]

... the lang is primarily prefixing? I'm actually considering both pre- and suffixes but have toyed with the idea of a heavily prefixing lang. Any thoughts?

In the interests of naturalism and realism, assuming either of those is a design-goal, you should know:

Among languages-in-general, suffixes tend to outnumber prefixes on average about 5 to 1.
Among SOV languages, suffixes tend to outnumber prefixes on average about 8 to 1.
Among SVO languages, suffixes tend to outnumber prefixes on average about 2 or 3 to 1.
Among VSO and VOS languages, suffixes and prefixes tend on average to be about equally abundant.

Read also http://wals.info/chapter/26.

[hr][/hr]

WALS.info lists 58 languages which are "strongly prefixing" in the sense Matthew S. Dryer means.

So it's neither unrealistic nor unnaturalistic to have a language in which over 80% of affixes are prefixes.
And in http://wals.info/combinations/26A_81A every "word-order" type except OVS and OSV has at least one language in common with every affixing type; and even OVS overlaps with four of the six affixing types (the ones where prefixes don't outnumber suffixes).
Of the four OSV languages Dryer sampled for feature 81A, he didn't include any of them in his sample for feature 26A.

[hr][/hr]

I hope that was helpful, or at least interesting, to someone.

[DesEsseintes]

Thanks for your reply, Eldin. It was indeed useful as it neatly consolidated things I already knew and/or suspected.

I find myself deeply hesitant when it comes to making a heavily prefixing polysynthetic language. It's no problem coming up with a verb template starting at slot -1 and then to just keep adding them in what feels like a "natural" order, but once I actually start coming up with the words, I simply cannot connect to the actual meaning. Aspect, in particular, I find impossible to disassociate from the verb stem itself, and I do think that is somewhat justified by looking at Navajo with all its stem variation. *sigh* Kalaallisut is child's play in comparison.

Does anyone have helpful pointers when it comes to creating a heavily prefixing lang?

[loomy]

Would these sound changes make sense (keeping in mind that /ç/ is a common sound in the language anyway)

ciä -> /kja/ -> /kça/
giä -> /gja/ -> /gça/
tiä -> /tja/ -> /tça/
diä -> /dja/ -> /dça/

The ä is arbitrary and could be any other vowel (including another i, in which case it would be written cí, gí, tí, dí).

[Egerius]

Would these sound changes make sense (keeping in mind that /ç/ is a common sound in the language anyway)

ciä -> /kja/ -> /kça/
giä -> /gja/ -> /gça/
tiä -> /tja/ -> /tça/
diä -> /dja/ -> /dça/

[...]

Palatalization is quite common, this makes 100% sense.

However, /gja/, /dja/ have voiced initial consonants, so /gʝa/, /dʝa/ would be better (/ç/ is voiceless and goes well with /k/, /t/).

[loomy]

Palatalization is quite common, this makes 100% sense.

However, /gja/, /dja/ have voiced initial consonants, so /gʝa/, /dʝa/ would be better (/ç/ is voiceless and goes well with /k/, /t/).

Ahh, understood. Thanks!