Phonetic synonym

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Anonymous999
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Phonetic synonym

Post by Anonymous999 »

Here I will explain about a sound that is different but has one meaning, such as synonyms for vowels/consonants.
The following are examples of synonyms:

English: /l ʌ/ and /ɫ ə/
French: /ʁ/ and /ʀ/
Hindi: /c ɟ/ and /t̠͡ʃ d̠͡ʒ/
Japanese: /ɯ̟ᵝ/ and /ɨᵝ/
Korean: /ʌ̹/ and /ɘ/

There are more? Please complete further.
Capital letters of ⟨β ɘ ɸ ɪ ɟ ʎ ɹ ɾ ⱱ ʍ χ⟩ are ⟨Ꞵ ∃ Φ Ɪ Ⅎ ⅄ ꓤ ꓩ Ѵ 𐊰 Ꭓ⟩.
⟨ꞵ ꭓ⟩ (Latin) are alternate forms of ⟨β χ⟩ (Greek).
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Re: Phonetic synonym

Post by kiwikami »

If I'm understanding your question correctly, it sounds like what you're looking for might be allophones. Those are sounds that, for a particular language, are considered the same phoneme. They might, like Hawaiian [t] and [k], be freely interchangeable - or instead, like English [l] and [ɫ], they might appear in different contexts.
Edit: Substituted a string instrument for a French interjection.

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Anonymous999
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Re: Phonetic synonym

Post by Anonymous999 »

Add more
Cherokee: /t͡s w/ and /d̠͡ʒ ɰ/
Chinese: /ɻ/ and /ʐ/
Hawaiian: /k/ and /t/
Malay: /ɾ/ and /r/
Turkish: /ɰ ɯ ɑ/ and /. ɨ ä/
Vietnamese: /kʰ/ and /x/

Anything else?
Capital letters of ⟨β ɘ ɸ ɪ ɟ ʎ ɹ ɾ ⱱ ʍ χ⟩ are ⟨Ꞵ ∃ Φ Ɪ Ⅎ ⅄ ꓤ ꓩ Ѵ 𐊰 Ꭓ⟩.
⟨ꞵ ꭓ⟩ (Latin) are alternate forms of ⟨β χ⟩ (Greek).
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Re: Phonetic synonym

Post by Salmoneus »

Every language has allophones. There are literally billions of them.

Except that there aren't: there's an infinite number. Because no, Hawai'ian doesn't have /k/ and /t/ as allophones; Hawai'ian has [k] and [t] as allophones of a single phoneme. That matters, because while a language has a finite number of phonemes, it has an infinite number of allophones, because every instance of a phone is going to be very slightly different - the tongue will be slightly further forward or further back, more or less tense, more or less palatalised, etc etc. The number of phones is essentially uncountable - which is precisely why phonemes exist. All phones in a certain area are grouped under a single phoneme; but the boundaries between phonemes are arbitrary and vary between languages.

So English /t/ can be [t͇] or [t̪] or [t̠], it can be [tʰ] or [t] or...
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Re: Phonetic synonym

Post by Creyeditor »

@Sal: Do you think there could be a finite list of allophonic patterns? Where a pattern would include information about the dimensions and the extent of the allophonic variation, but not a set of discrete phones (which I agree would be infinite).
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Re: Phonetic synonym

Post by Salmoneus »

Creyeditor wrote: 06 Aug 2021 14:44 @Sal: Do you think there could be a finite list of allophonic patterns? Where a pattern would include information about the dimensions and the extent of the allophonic variation, but not a set of discrete phones (which I agree would be infinite).
In practical terms in human languages, yes. Whether such a pattern could be finite depends on a) whether all values a phone could have fall into a boundable dimension (that is, to coin a term, a continuum of values distinguished by a dimensional property, such that the continuum can be divided into two by the selection of a single point), and b) whether the number of boundable dimensions is itself finite. Since human language only relevantly involves mechanical motions of the vocal tract, which take place within the three boundable physical dimensions, human languages can for all practical purposes have a list of finite allophonic patterns - phonemes can be seen as selections from that hypothetical list. However, in theory anything COULD be relevant to communication, including not easily bound qualities, like "an alveolar stop while smelling of cabbage" and so on. Then again, materialists could assume that all such qualities are ultimately physical in nature, and ultimately describable through finite dimensional properties, so, yes, this should be possible even in theory, though in theory it would be wildly impractical in practice.

Except.... that's all not true, come to think of it. I've assumed there that all allophonic patterns would only involve contiguous regions of dimensions, but of course allophony can be non-contiguous (you could have a dental stop as an allophone of a velar stop, but the alveolar stop be a different phoneme). And if you allow any non-contiguous range of a dimension to be a pattern, then the possibilities are infinite again, at least if we assume both that the universe is infinite and that the universe is infinitely divisible (or that there are no definable smallest dimensional divisions, if we want to get all quantum about it). In theory, you could divide the roof of the mouth into an infinite number of points, and arbitrarily create allophonic domains from random assemblages of those points. But then again, if we assume a human tongue and brain, there must be practical constraints on how precisely a POA could be specified, which artificially imposes indivisibility (this doesn't matter for allophones themselves because they don't have to be contrastively defined within ranges, but non-contiguous allophonic ranges would have to be, if that makes sense). So... yes? Probably you CAN have a list of finite allophonic patterns?

But again, only for practical purposes, given the observed limitations of human language. In theory, you'd still have the problem of complex actions (like chemistry experiments) being phonemic, and I don't think there's any way to constrain them. If nothing else, a phoneme could last an arbitrary length of time, and if time is infinite there could be an infinite number of such phonemes. Indeed, even within the human mouth, there's no theoretical limit to how complex a phonetic gesture could be (though there's probably a practical, neurological/anatomical limit to how complex such a gesture could be within a given segment of time). Except, wait, no, there's going to be a theoretical limit to how complex a phonetic gesture can be recognised by a human brain, given its limited memory capacity - not to mention social limits (a language whose phonemes take longer to pronounce than the possible lifespan of a human could not actually be learnt, and hence could not be a human language, at least as humans are currently defined).

So yeah. In theory, you can't have a list of finite allophonic patterns of any possible language, unless we assume a set of precise things about the universe (it is both finite in all dimensions, including time, and non-analogue (definable quantisable in all dimensions)). But you could have a list of finite allophonic patterns that can be used in human language as we understand it!


...sorry, philosphy instinct triggered!
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Re: Phonetic synonym

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Salmoneus wrote: 06 Aug 2021 17:36 ...sorry, philosphy instinct triggered!
That's why I was asking you specifically [:D]
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