The CBB

I recently feel like making a maximally a-priori "SAE" language (phonology and grammar) which, ironically, is outside of my comfort zone. That got me thinking about a maximally SAE non-SAE phonology. If I've done everything correctly, which I almost certainly haven't, this should score 100 on that ...

Japanese had a lot of /k/s disappear at one point of its development, especially before /i u/ (tho /k/s were reinserted before /u/s in most dialects, or some verbs and adjectives had forms with a /k/ and forms with it dropped). Question: could there be a similar sound change for /t/ in some languag...

So, I noticed some natlangs where /b/ is the only voiced stop. I'm wondering what could have given rise to this asymmetry, as I want to incorporate it into my own phonology. One podcast I listen to says that in Arapaho, it's because the /m/ shifted to /b/ or something like that. Yet, there are some...

How could the three affricates and the three sibilants have arisen? I find Slavic/Romance k => t͡ɕ change a bit boring. High German had t => t͡s but such an unconditioned change doesn't create interesting morphological alterations. Consonants p t t͡s t͡ʂ t͡ɕ k q <p t c č ć k q> s ʂ ɕ <s š ś> m n ŋ ...

There are Polynesian languages whose consonant inventories have been expanded by language contact. Rennellese: /p t k ŋg ʔ s h β~mb l~ð ɣ m n ŋ/. Basic vocabulary in Rennellese has /ʔ h/ but specialized vocabulary doesn't; specialized vocabulary has /ð ɣ/ but basic vocabulary doesn't. Words with /ɣ/...

Since some of the reconstructions for Old Japanese vowels involves both rising and falling diphthongs, I'm considering having palatalization of both consonants before rising palatal diphthongs (I'm not sure I'll do anything with velarization or rounding), and consonants after falling diphthings (wh...

There are Slavic languages that developed front rounded vowels. They can be reconstructed as intermediates in at least Czech and Ukrainian, and are preserved in some present-day Slovenian dialects. Some sound changes that led to the development of front rounded vowels in various Slovenian dialects: ...

wintiver wrote: ↑18 Jan 2020 18:07 If anyone knows of having multiple sibilants like this please let me know. Much appreciated.

some Northwest Caucasian and Qiangic languages have four sibilant POAs - for example, Ubykh and Ersu

In fact, no language written in Cyrillic has such orthographic depth as English or French; the deepest might be Chechen and Ingush, but that could be due to the "deficiency" of their orthographies designed by Soviet experts (i.e. they might've failed to notice some oppositions in the vowel system l...

Ontena Gadsup I... I-... I don't even. I HAVE BEEN LIVING A LIE Papuan languages sometimes get like that. Kobon has a voicing contrast in affricates but not plosives - its full consonant inventory is: tɕ b d dʑ g ɸ s x h m n ɲ ŋ l ʎ w ɾ ɽ j /x/ varies freely between [x kx kʰ], so there's that, but ...

I'm not sure about this, but I seem to remember that no languages distinguishing a front and a central /a/ is precisely the reason why no separate symbols for the two exist in IPA. However, a language that does distinguish them may have been discovered since the invention of the IPA. The Hamont dia...

Solarius wrote: ↑22 Oct 2019 21:49 IIRC there's a Qiangic language which recently underwent monosyllabicization, but in such a way that the permitted clusters were identical in onset and coda--i.e. [ClaCl] was valid but [ClalC] wasn't.

Ronghong Qiang, described in LaPolla's grammar

Allowing /s/ + stop clusters to begin a syllable is actually one of Indo-European peculiarities , since these clusters also go against the sonority hierarchy. In that context Western Romance languages which put a vowel before these clusters are actually making things more normal! It's not that weir...

Vlürch wrote: ↑14 Sep 2019 21:57 The links could be marked with "nostalgia warning (or cringe warning if you're a totes no homo bro)",

Dir en Grey isn't that gay - look up Daigo Stardust

Speaking of which, part 2: /p t k m n j l w h a i u e o d t͡ʃʼ ʙ ŋʘ↑ʼ k͡ʟ̝̊ːʷ gǂ͡˞χˀ ᶣɞ̂ˑ ʬᴙ!!/ Let's keep it simple and assign sounds to letters in alphabetical order: <a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v>. So a hypothetical example sentence /ŋʘ↑ʼuk͡ʟ̝̊ːʷaʙi gǂ͡˞χˀaʬᴙ!!o pi t͡ʃʼehiŋʘ↑ʼu/ ...

the only language I know of with *tʰ > r̥ is Nivkh, and Nivkh doesn't object at all to /r̥/ in clusters

ɶʙ ɞʛ wrote: ↑24 Aug 2019 01:24 Is an /ħ/ vs /ʜ/ distinction even attested?

yes, in Aghul and (according to PHOIBLE) Bats

:eng: quick Old Chinese 霍 /*qʰʷaːɡ/ - quickly, suddenly Maybe it's a bit of a stretch, but they do have similar meanings and velars and uvulars aren't that different. Also, even though I don't know of one, I wouldn't be too surprised if there was some English dialect where "quick" is pronounced [kw...

Is there a way to get [fˠ → ʍ], with [ʍ] being a true fricative? Woleaian had *f *pʷ > f ɸʷ (and Proto-Micronesian *f patterned as palatalized - cf. *f > ɦʲ in Marshallese), and Irish Gaelic has vʲ/w - so yes, you can just do that Does any natlang feature (a set of) preglottalized (voiceless) nasal...