(Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Omzinesý »

I'm making a lang with a PIE style ablaut.

Full - reduced - zero
ɑ/æ - ə - Ø
i - ə - Ø
u - ə - Ø

Apparently, the easiest way of deriving it diachronically is that the modern full grade wovel had the primary stress in the proto lang, the modern schwa had a secondary stress, and the modern zero grade had no stress.
But I would like to have words with only schwas. How could that happen?
Can you find up more interesting ways to derive the gradation diachritically?

I'm going to use diachrony to make morphology more irregular.
My meta-thread: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=5760
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Creyeditor »

ATR-vowel harmony can yield a schwa from an /a/, especially in the context of /i,u/, but also close to /e,o/ or schwa itself.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Omzinesý »

But the question was about creating alternation between the grades. The sound changes should be somewhat conditioned.
My meta-thread: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=5760
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Nel Fie »

(N.B. I'm a complete newbie and my knowledge of natural language linguistics is close to zero, so I can only offer ideas from a very dumb and theoretical "what if" perspective.)

Based on what I read, the quality of vowels in some Caucasian languages is affected by the consonants they follow (or are in the environment of?) - to the point that some of them are only distinguished by the vowel, if there is one.
You could have a similar situation in proto, then merge and reduce the consonants involved and lead to splits and other changes in the vowels following them - leaving only the vowel distinction and creating the ablaut system.

To give an example:

twai > twaː > ta
tjai > tje > tə
thai > thə > t∅
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by sangi39 »

Omzinesý wrote: 05 Jul 2022 22:16 I'm making a lang with a PIE style ablaut.

Full - reduced - zero
ɑ/æ - ə - Ø
i - ə - Ø
u - ə - Ø

Apparently, the easiest way of deriving it diachronically is that the modern full grade wovel had the primary stress in the proto lang, the modern schwa had a secondary stress, and the modern zero grade had no stress.
But I would like to have words with only schwas. How could that happen?
Can you find up more interesting ways to derive the gradation diachritically?

I'm going to use diachrony to make morphology more irregular.
One thing I used for Proto-Skawlas (which has a similar ablaut system) was inpsired by something that Nortaneous had posted, I think, over on the ZBB about a South American language(?) where individual morphemes could be "stressed" or "unstressed" and this then affected the stress pattern of whole words, which let me have things like <ṣirṭë> for "fat" and <ṣerḍu> for "fats" (where <ë> is a schwa)

Another thing that might help is having the ablaut pattern conditioned initially by stress, then have the stress pattern change (maybe affected by weight, coda consonants getting lost, final syllables gradually eroding, etc.) and then have more or less the same ablaut pattern apply again, which could lead to words containing entirely schwas, I think
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Sequor »

sangi39 wrote: 06 Jul 2022 13:32One thing I used for Proto-Skawlas (which has a similar ablaut system) was inpsired by something that Nortaneous had posted, I think, over on the ZBB about a South American language(?) where individual morphemes could be "stressed" or "unstressed" and this then affected the stress pattern of whole words, which let me have things like <ṣirṭë> for "fat" and <ṣerḍu> for "fats" (where <ë> is a schwa)
Also true of English and Spanish btw, no need to get "exotic". Think of -ian (which moves the stress to be in the previous syllable) vs. -ite (which largely doesn't move stress). Or Spanish -ico (which moves the stress to be in the prev. syllable) vs. -ita (always stressed on -i-).

Biden /baɪdn/
> "Bidenian" /baɪˈdiniən/
> "Bidenite" /ˈbaɪdn̩ˌaɪt/ (ˈbaɪd - n̩ - ˌaɪt)

Cicero /ˈsɪsəɹou/
> Ciceronian /sɪsəˈɹoʊniən/
> "Ciceronite" /ˈsɪsərəˌnaɪt/

In quotation marks because they aren't normally used words AFAIK. And so also Thátcher, "Thatchérian", Thátcherite, and so on.

alcohol /alkoˈol/
> alcohólico /alkoˈoliko/
> "alcoholita" /alkooˈlita/

For the alternation of vowel qualities as in ṣirṭë ~ ṣerḍu see also English phóto, phótograph, photógraphy, which also shows some consonant alternation in American/Canadian English (the first two get t-flapping but "photography" has [tʰ]). Both phenomena are funnily hidden by the spelling, of course.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Solarius »

Debating the romanization for a the palatal series of a language I'm working on. The current romanization is /t͡ɕ ɲ ʎ j/<tj nj lj y> because I liked the odd and clunky look of the Cj digraphs, but that clunky look makes a lot of words look sort of strange, especially since <i l> are pretty common too, giving it a weird homogeneous appearance. I also don't like the inconsistency of using <Cj> when there's no <j> in the language.

I'm considering either:
/t͡ɕ ɲ ʎ j/<j ñ ll y>
or
/t͡ɕ ɲ ʎ j/<c ñ y j>

Digraphs are totally fine (the syllable structure prevents basically all consonant clusters), so it's really just a measure of phonaesthetics. What do y'all think?
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Creyeditor »

Omzinesý wrote: 06 Jul 2022 10:28 But the question was about creating alternation between the grades. The sound changes should be somewhat conditioned.
I might have misunderstood your question or misformulated my answer. I though you wanted to derive a grade system by stress AND have words with schwa-only. Here is my idea of how to do this:

Stage 1: primary stress on ultima in words, secondary stress on antepenultima, roots are monosyllabic

'sed - cat
sed-'a - little cat
‚sed-a-'na - little cats

Stage 2: vowel reduction in syllables without primary stress, vowel deletion in syllables without any stress

'sed - cat
sd-'a - little cat
‚səd-'na - little cats

Stage 3: ATR harmony applies from left-to-right, changing /a/ to schwa after schwa, iteratively


'sed - cat
sd-'a - little cat
‚səd-'nə - little cats
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Omzinesý »

Creyeditor wrote: 06 Jul 2022 21:18
Omzinesý wrote: 06 Jul 2022 10:28 But the question was about creating alternation between the grades. The sound changes should be somewhat conditioned.
I might have misunderstood your question or misformulated my answer. I though you wanted to derive a grade system by stress AND have words with schwa-only.
Yes, I did misunderstand your first answer. That was what I was after.

Actually, that's a very elegant and simple way to derive words with only schwas. And later, the rule can cease from being productive and sədna be grammatical again too.

I think the lang might well have some sort of a vowel harmony. I thought it would be a back-front harmony between ɑ and æ, but it could well be ATR, at least historically.


Thank you all.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Nel Fie »

I would like to include a voiceless velar/post-velar implosive (ɠ̊, ʛ̥, ʡ’↓) in my inventory. However, I'd like to keep my inventory as small as possible.
What kind of patterns would you expect in the phonology for the presence of one of the above voiceless implosives to be plausible and acceptably stable?

For context, the few natlangs* with any of (ɠ̥, ʛ̥) that I could find have 20+ consonants, and quite a few number of other occlusives - voiced and unvoiced pairs, ejectives, labialized, aspirated, palatalized, nasalised; and also affricates.
That aside, there's the common front-to-back pattern among the implosives themselves.
On the other hand, several of those languages are geographically close or even outright related, and the pool seems pretty small either way. Moreso, sources don't seem to agree on whether the dorsal voiceless implosive is even phonemic, in some cases.

Your thoughts?

* Hausa, Mam, Q'anjob'al, Kaqchikel, Jacaltec/Jacaltek; via PHOIBLE and Wikipedia
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Creyeditor »

I think there's a generalization that back implosives imply front implosives, from what I can find online. Here is a list of the languages claimed to have voiceless implosives with details filled in from Phoible. A relatively robust generalization is that back implosives imply front implosives, at least in the order labial < alveolar < {palatal, velar}. Interestingly, the voicing distinction does not seem to matter. You can also have only voiceless or only voiced implosives, even though voiceless implosives are rarer in general. Also, front voiceless implosives allow back voiced implosives and vice versa.

Isoko: /ɓ̥/
Trumai: /ɗ̥/
Ese Ejja: /ɓ̥ ɗ̥/
Arbore: /ɓ̥ ɗ/
Aari: /ɓ̥ ɗ/
Gamo: /ɓ̥ ɗ/
Jacaltec: /ɓ ʛ̥/
Igbo1: /ɓ ɓ̥ ɗ̥/
Igbo2: /ɓ ɓ̥ ɗ̥/
Hausa: /ɓ ɗ ɠ̊/
Sereer: /ɓ ɓ̥ ɗ ɗ̥ ʄ̥/
Krongo: /ɓ ɓ̥ ɗ ɗ̥ ʄ/
Ngiti: /ɓ ɓ̥ ɗ ɗ̥ ʄ ʄ̥/
Lendu: /ɓ ɓ̥ ɗ ɗ̥ ʄ ʄ̥/

Judging from WALS it seems that uvulars stops do not imply uvular continuants, and --- combining 19A and 6A --- pharyngeals do not imply the presence of other uvulars either. Also, judging from feature 7A it seems to be the norm for implosives to occur without ejectives. IIRC, voicing distinctions in plosives are a relatively good predictor for the presence of implosives. This seems to be true for voiceless implosives, too.

Voicing/aspiration contrast in plosives: Isoko, Arbore, Ari, Gamo, Jacaltec, Igbo, Hausa, Sereer, Krongo, Ngiti, Lendu
No voicing/aspiration contrast in plosives: Trumai, Esse Eja

So my overall idea would be that you:
  • Front implosives, at least /ɓ ɗ/ with whatever voicing you feel more comfortable with.
  • Non-implosive voiced and voicless stops, or at least the minimal inventory /b t d k/
  • Some non-implosive uvular and pharyngeal consonants, probably /q ʡ/, and maybe a glottal stop /ʔ/
  • A very minimal continuant/sonorant inventory, probably /m n/, /l r/, /s h/ or something like that.

This gives you for example the following 18 consonants:
/m n/
/ɓ ɗ ɠ̊ ʛ̥ ʡ’↓/
/b t d k q ʡ ʔ/
/s h/
/l r/

Feel free to change it around or ignore anything you don't like of course.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Nel Fie »

Thank you for the speedy answer - and how in-depth it is!
I'm somewhat surprised by how few restrictions there seem to be, in the end. That said, part of it is because I wasn't sure whether I should assume that voiceless dorsal/pharyngeal implosives would follow the same "rules" as implosives in general - voiced or voiceless.
Your minimal example inventory is very useful, and I think I'll be able to adjust the one I had rather easily.

Before I go any further though, I have a two questions:

1) About uvular and pharyngeal consonants: do you mean that they should be included to stabilize the uvular and pharyngeal implosives /ʛ̥ ʡ’↓/? If so, would that particular point become irrelevant if they aren't present? (e.g. if my implosive row counts only /ɓ̥ ɗ̥ ɠ̥/)
Or would it be more natural to have some uvular/pharyngeal consonants regardless of what my implosives are?

2) On point 4 - is the exact selection and quantity of continuants only relevant to the naturalism of the inventory in general, not to the naturalism of the implosives included in it? I.e. I could choose a very different set than those you did and it would still be fine, yes?

EDIT: Corrected a word and added the second question.
Last edited by Nel Fie on 15 Jul 2022 13:53, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Salmoneus »

Just one additional dimension to consider: implosion can sometimes be allophonic. If what you're really after is the sound of a dorsal implosive in utterances in your conlang, rather than phonemic status per se, you could have allophonic implosion rules without having to bulk up your inventory with phonemic implosives.

That said, I think I've only encountered implosives as allophones of voiced stops, so I'm not sure how likely it is to have voiceless implosives arise allophonically (though it shouldn't be impossible?).
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Post by Nel Fie »

Salmoneus wrote: 15 Jul 2022 13:46 Just one additional dimension to consider: implosion can sometimes be allophonic. If what you're really after is the sound of a dorsal implosive in utterances in your conlang, rather than phonemic status per se, you could have allophonic implosion rules without having to bulk up your inventory with phonemic implosives.

That said, I think I've only encountered implosives as allophones of voiced stops, so I'm not sure how likely it is to have voiceless implosives arise allophonically (though it shouldn't be impossible?).
Funnily enough (and if I understand you correctly), this plays into my own experience with the sound, and what my initial plan for a voiceless dorsal implosive was - to the point that it accidentally caused a bit of a kerfuffle over in the Natlang Q&A Thread.

I stumbled into what I think were (ɠ̊, ʛ̥, ʡ’↓) while trying to produce a pharyngeal stop - which I found very difficult and hard to distinguish acoustically. Trying to include such a pharyngeal stop in a simulacra of running/natural speech, I ended up slipping into those voiceless implosives not knowing what they were, and they seem easier and more audible even now. Since implosives require motion in roughly the same area of the throat for the airstream mechanism, this "slip" didn't seem too crazy that it could also play out naturally.
Long story short, I was thinking of introducing the sound diachronically into the language from the same origin - a pharyngeal stop that slipped into a "generalized" voiceless dorsal implosive over time, while potentially allowing some other sounds in the area as valid realizations as well.

If that's a correct interpretation of what you're saying and would come across as decently stable and plausible, I can keep the idea my back pocket. Though I would ask - how do these "allophonic implosion rules" work and occur in natural languages?

And of course I still want to hear if Creyeditor (or anyone else, for that matter) has any more details on the "phonemic implosives" approach.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Creyeditor »

About uvular and pharyngeal consonants: do you mean that they should be included to stabilize the uvular and pharyngeal implosives /ʛ̥ ʡ’↓/?
Yes
is the exact selection and quantity of continuants only relevant to the naturalism of the inventory in general, not to the naturalism of the implosives included in it?
Yes
Regarding allophonic inplosives: there is also a phonetic distinction between 'weak' implosives and 'strong' implosives. Someone was writing a dissertation on this, but I never found or read it.

The only allophonic implosives that I heard were phrase-initially (in Mee), which is incidentally also a context that favors voiceless sounds for articulatory reasons. So this might be a possible route, where voiced plosives become implosives phrase-initially and all voiced sounds become voiceless in the same context.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Nel Fie »

I see! Thanks for the clarifications!

The example based on Mee is interesting, but probably not something I'd want to use here. By your description, it affects a broad range of plosives, so the allophonic process would likely end up generating the same whole implosive row as in the "phonemic implosives" route anyway; while the required context would actually limit their occurrence more severely.

As for the 'weak' and 'strong' variations - I hadn't heard of it before, but I'm not too surprised. I've recently read that ejectives occur in similar 'strong' and 'weak' realizations, and I've seen implosives described as 'reverse ejectives' several times (though it might not be meant in so literal a sense).

That aside, if I try to adapt my initial sound inventory based on the example you gave, I ended up with this:

/m n ŋ/
/ɓ̥ ɗ̥ ɠ̥/
/b t d k ʔ/
/ɸ β s x ɣ/
/j l/

Changes made are as follows, trying to roughly match them by acoustic similarity:

p > ɓ̥
c > {d, ɗ̥}
ʡ’↓ > ɠ̥

Would that be reasonable?

EDIT: Since voiced implosives are reportedly more stable, I could also trade for /ɓ ɗ ɠ̥/. Might have to rethink the phonaesthetics a bit more though.
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Re: (Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Post by Creyeditor »

I think the inventory looks totally okay.
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Post by Nel Fie »

Very well! Then I'll stamp that with the "Creyeditor Seal of Approval", unless anyone else chimes in.
Thank you very much for your in-depth and step-by-step advisal on the matter!

And thank you, Salmoneus, for the tip-off about allophonic implosion - it's a tantalizing idea, I hope I'll come across more documentation and examples from natural languages in the future!
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Post by Creyeditor »

Here you are [:D]
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Post by Nel Fie »

Perfect! I've no doubt I'll have yet many more opportunities to use it, ha ha!
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