Sound Change Quickie Thread

[TurkeySloth]

The changes below involving the ambiguously-rounded high central vowel, cover symbol Ï, are ordered by seniority.

Key
Ö = ambiguously-rounded low-mid back vowel
L = liquid
N = nasal
O = obstruent

[Ï → ɪ] / {L_, _L}
[Ï → ʊ] / {N_, _N}
[Ï → y] / {O_, _O}
[Ö → ɔ]
[ŋ → gn] / #_
[ŋ → g] / elsewhere

[KathTheDragon]

Would a simultaneous lengthening of stressed short vowels and shortening of unstressed long vowels be plausible?

Extremely

[Raphael]

Thank you!

[Zaarin]

Would a simultaneous lengthening of stressed short vowels and shortening of unstressed long vowels be plausible?

Precisely this happened in Ancient Egyptian.

[Raphael]

Thank you, too!

[holbuzvala]

Q1. Is is realistic to have /ʕ/ voicing voiceless stops and sibilants /p t k s t͡s/ when adjacent to them, regardless of whether it follows or precedes?

Or more simply:

ʕC_-v > ʕC_+v = realistic?
C_-vʕ > C_+vʕ = realistic?

Q2. If yes to Q1, would the voicing effect not affect aspirated stops? /pʰ tʰ kʰ/ ?

[Pabappa]

I've done something similar, ... the ʕC version only. I didnt bother to look for attestation, and Im having doubts about it now since I think it might be more likely for the /ʕ/ to become devoiced instead. Even so, my thinking was that ATR can involve voicing and it can also involve pharyngealization. *if* you can get this sound change working, i agree that it would likely ignore aspirates.

[Zju]

Q1. Is is realistic to have /ʕ/ voicing voiceless stops and sibilants /p t k s t͡s/ when adjacent to them, regardless of whether it follows or precedes?

Or more simply:

ʕC_-v > ʕC_+v = realistic?
C_-vʕ > C_+vʕ = realistic?

Q2. If yes to Q1, would the voicing effect not affect aspirated stops? /pʰ tʰ kʰ/ ?

Q1 yes, it's just voicing assimilation. However, I'd expect other voiced obstruents to have the same effect.

Q2 Any of the following could happen, based on a number of factors. Some changes are more likely than others.
1. Nothing
2. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ʕT Tʕ
3. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ħTʰ Tʰħ
4. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ħT Tħ
5. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ʕD Dʕ
6. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > hTʰ Tʰ
7. Any other assimilation with regards to voicing/modality with optional dropping of the pharyngeal element. The change could even be asymmetric with regards to PoA and could be easily influenced by other surrounding sounds.

[Tropylium]

There's not a lot of actual precedents on what pharyngeals in clusters can do; but Chukchi does *Cʕ > Cʔ, *(C)VʕC > (C)ʔVC (with metathesis).

[akam chinjir]

I wonder if it could be a factor that pharyngeal consonants, like voiced consonants in general, tend to lower pitch on neighbouring vowels. Maybe that could lead to the cluster as a whole being heard as voiced? ...If at the same time aspirated plosives tend to raise pitch, you could also see how they'd resist the change.

[holbuzvala]

Q1 yes, it's just voicing assimilation. However, I'd expect other voiced obstruents to have the same effect.

Excellent. I have no voiced obstruents presently, so shouldn't be an issue (other than /ʕ/).

Q2 Any of the following could happen, based on a number of factors. Some changes are more likely than others.
1. Nothing
2. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ʕT Tʕ
3. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ħTʰ Tʰħ
4. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ħT Tħ
5. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > ʕD Dʕ
6. ʕTʰ Tʰʕ > hTʰ Tʰ
7. Any other assimilation with regards to voicing/modality with optional dropping of the pharyngeal element. The change could even be asymmetric with regards to PoA and could be easily influenced by other surrounding sounds.

I think I'll go with #1, as the plan is to lose all the aspirates anyways via fricativisation and such.

There's not a lot of actual precedents on what pharyngeals in clusters can do; but Chukchi does *Cʕ > Cʔ, *(C)VʕC > (C)ʔVC (with metathesis).

Good to know. Leaves me room to improvise.

I wonder if it could be a factor that pharyngeal consonants, like voiced consonants in general, tend to lower pitch on neighbouring vowels. Maybe that could lead to the cluster as a whole being heard as voiced? ...If at the same time aspirated plosives tend to raise pitch, you could also see how they'd resist the change.

A nice way to create an 'explanation' for my intended sound change rule

[Xwtek]

Wait, is tone>voicing attested. I thought it's usually the other way around

[Vijay]

Well, in Vietnamese, the main distinguishing characteristic between the two high (rising) tones is apparently that one is glottalized and the other isn't.

[mae]

-

[akam chinjir]

If the question was about my suggestion, the suggestion didn't really involve tone. The idea was that if lower pitch is one of the phonetic cues to voicing, then if something else results in lower pitch, then that could be misinterpreted as a voicing cue. Or something like that, not really sure how plausible that'd be.

[Ælfwine]

Vinlandic has a sound change in which liquids and nasals were deleted in syllable coda, causing vowel lengthening, lenition, or a combination of both.

So, using a conservative orthography:

barn ['pãː] /'parn/ "child"
barnit ['paː.nit] /'parnit/ "the child"

As shown, the consonants reappear as full consonants when they start a second syllable. Given this, would it be correct to say these consonants are still phonemically present, even though they sometimes surface as nasalization or lengthening? I'm determining whether I should restore the lost coda consonants in the orthography, and need opinions. I am leaning towards now having a unique orthography as I've shown in the Sound Change critique thread, but if it makes more sense to copy Old Norse's orthography like Faroese and Icelandic then that's what I will do.

[Pabappa]

I think you can go either way with the phonemic analysis, but for the orthography you've got French as a precedent for spelling the silent sounds and (i think) Manx as a precedent for not doing so.

A lot of languages allophonically nasalize all vowels before nasals and so you could say that the nasalization is present in both forms if you decide to go that way.

[Ælfwine]

I think you can go either way with the phonemic analysis, but for the orthography you've got French as a precedent for spelling the silent sounds and (i think) Manx as a precedent for not doing so.

A lot of languages allophonically nasalize all vowels before nasals and so you could say that the nasalization is present in both forms if you decide to go that way.

Good idea. This leaves /r/. Mind you, Old Norse did have long vowels but I diphthongized all of them, I could just leave monophthongs in /aː/, /eː/, /iː/ and /oː/ so that they still contrast. (Although diphthongizing /uː/ but not /iː/ might be weird.)

Of course that might be unnecessary. I'll get a second opinion.

[akam chinjir]

Does nʷ → n̪, tʷ → t̪, sʷ → s̪ → θ make any kind of sense?`

[Pabappa]

Yes, labialization of coronals is unstable and could quickly change to velarization. And velarized coronals are often dental.