tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Aug 10 11:51:28 1999
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Re: Vowels
- From: Marc Ruehlaender <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Vowels
- Date: Tue, 10 Aug 1999 13:50:27 CDT
I think the whole discussion is somewhat complicated by the fact
that we don't really know what Klingon linguists consider to
be phonemes, and that we have to base all this phonological
stuff on the artificial non-Klingon writing systems graphemes.
jatlh charghwI':
> Again, when you look at the phonological patterns of Klingon,
> you can either say:
>
> {y} and {w} are consonants which constitute participants in two
> of the three allowable consonant clusters at the end of a
> Klingon syllable.
>
> Or you can say:
>
> {y} and {w} are the only vowels that can begin a word, and they
> are the only vowels that are a necessary part of the only
> diphthongs allowed in Klingon, and they are the only vowels that
> never appear alone in the typical vowel position in a syllable
> and they are the only vowels which frequently behave exactly
> like normal consonants at the beginning or end of a syllable.
>
or I can say that
i) syllables can begin with a consonant
<b,ch,D,gh,H,j,l,m,n,ng,p,q,Q,r,S,t,tlh,v,'>
or with <y,w>
ii) syllables can have a monophtong <a,e,I,o,u> or a diphtong
<ay,ey,Iy,oy,uy,aw,ew,Iw>
iii) monophtongs can be followed by any or no consonant or the cluster <rgh>;
diphtongs can only be followed by <'> or nothing
this does away with the rule that <o,u> cannot be followed by
<w,w'> and may better correspond to the actual pronounciation
of <ay,ey,Iy,oy,uy,aw,ew,Iw> as it is explained in TKD.
(assuming they are not really pronounced, like (IIRC) qa'ral
reported for Russian "i kratkoje", with more friction and TKD's
description is just to make it easier for English speakers to
produce them; but then again, from the tapes, I don't get that
impression)
[snip]
> The exceptions you have
> to make in order to call them anything but consonants is just
> ugly.
>
the only thing remotely "ugly" I see, is that you have digraphs
for vowels now as well as for consonants.
> > > > wind up with the same result, so what's the difference. It's likely
> > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^!!!
>
> The difference is obvious. One explanation is simple. The other
> is wittering, like a string of apologies for why the explanation
> doesn't work very well.
>
apart from being of the opinion that it works just as well as
saying "a syllable can end in no consonant, one consonant other than
<w>, one of the clusters <rgh,y'>, or, if the vowel is not <o,u>,
it may end in <w,w'> as well", the difference _for_the_resulting_
_phonolgy_ is of course = none. The difference for _discussing_
the phonology of Klingon or _explaining_ the phonological rules
to someone is that each person can chose which set of rules she
likes best. In this sense, IMHO, variety is good!
> > what it _should_ sound like, though, is that non-syllable-initial
> > {y} and {w} can (but don't need to) be seen as forming a diphtong
> > with the preceding vowel.
>
> If that is all you say, then you have more explaining to do.
does the above do the cut, or do you need more?
[snip]
>
> You can either say that they always behave as consonants (and
> are exceptional when they behave as parts of specific consonant
> clusters at the end of syllables), or you have to explain why
> they behave as consonants except when they are behave as vowels
> participating in a diphthong, but only as the second member of
> that diphthong and only with certain vowels... Yuck.
>
or you can say that like *<g> behaves differently in <gh> and
in <ng>, or <h> behaves differently in <ch> and <tlh>, the
*<y> and *<w> in <ay,aw> etc. are not really the same as the
syllable-initial <y> and <w>.
and I've already been talking much more than I should've...
Marc Ruehlaender
aka HomDoq
[email protected]