tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Mar 09 13:11:40 2003
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: {oy}, diphthong or V+C
ja' Sangqar:
>There is a parallel situation with the letter "l" in Brazilian Portuguese.
>Syllable-final versions create a diphthong: "final" is pronounced as /finaU/
>(excuse lack of IPA), for example. The letter "l" is obviously a consonant
>orthographically, but the final sound in that word is definitely a
>diphthong.
Thank you. I now believe understand what you mean when you talk about
diphthongs. Even though you didn't directly answer my question about
"level" etc., it seems that you think the last sound in such words is a
diphthong.
I disagree -- for the simple reason that the "dark l" at the end of "level"
is *defined* as a consonantal sound.
>>For our purposes, phonetics and orthography are the same thing. While
>>there are allophonic variations between syllable-initial and syllable-final
>>pronunciations of certain consonants, the writing system we use is intended
>>as a strict representation of the sounds of the language.
>
>If you're talking about allophones, then you're talking about phonemics and
>not phonetics.
I'm not "talking about" allophones. I merely mentioned them in passing, as
a caveat to the direct mapping between spoken sound written symbol. I'm
acknowledging that there are sounds in Klingon, like {y} and {r} and {l},
which aren't always pronounced identically at the start and end of
syllables.
>For those who don't know, the sound made by "y" in the English word "yes" is
>generally transcribed "j"., and the sound of "oy" in "boy" is "oI", with the
>"I" often superscripted. So in Klingon the phones [j] and diphthongizing
>[I] are both allophones of the phoneme /j/.
Either you're using a transcription system that I don't recognize, or your
pronunciation of the word "boy" is very unlike mine. I don't put a short
"I" sound in it anywhere, which is the sound I associate with a capital /I/
in IPA (incidentally, the IPA symbol is the reason for Klingon {I} to be
uppercase).
To keep this on topic for *Klingon* pronunciation, I don't pronounce
English "boy" and Klingon {Hoy} to rhyme with each other. "Toy" has a
single "oy" diphthong. {Hoy} has {o} followed by a {y}, as two distinct
sounds. There is some definite blending between them, as the mouth moves
from one position to another without a break in producing sound, but it's
just a transitional step between the two sounds.
>To sum up my position: the combination {oy} (in the same syllable) is
>orthographically (and most likely phonemically) a vowel followed by a
>consonant, but phonetically, it is almost certainly a diphthong.
Maybe your knowledge of what "oy" does in other languages is getting in
your way. When I'm in full-Klingon-speaking mode, *I* pronounce it as a
vowel followed by a consonant.
[SuStel, are you following the discussion? I'd like to hear what you have
to say.]
-- ghunchu'wI'