Zompist Bboard Again

Max1461 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 24, 2019 4:43 pm After an unfortunately long period of being far too busy/tired to get any conlanging done, I finally have time again, but seem to be stuck with a case of "conlanger's block". I'm looking to derive more complex consonant clusters in a daughter language of Proto-Yonutian, whose syllables are entirely CV(C). Proto-Yonutian primary stress is always penultimate, with (maybe) secondary stress on heavy syllables (those with a coda consonant). The one change I'm more or less settled on is V > ∅ in syllables following the primary stress. But I'm struggling to think up other reasonable conditioning environments for vowel deletion, which are sufficiently "local" that they don't end up creating alternations whereby half the vowels randomly delete when a prefix gets added. That might be a mild exaggeration, but my general problem is that with Proto-Yonutian's extensive prefixal morphology, a lot of potential syncope rules end up creating too many vowel alternations for my liking, and these alternations are unpredictable enough that I'm not sure how analogy might resolve them. Are there examples of syncope, or other cluster-producing changes, from highly synthetic and mostly prefixing languages (Navajo, perhaps?) which might be helpful here?

Max1461 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 24, 2019 4:43 pm Are there examples of syncope, or other cluster-producing changes, from highly synthetic and mostly prefixing languages (Navajo, perhaps?) which might be helpful here?

Knit Tie wrote: ↑Wed Jan 30, 2019 7:38 am How realistic would it be to have a sound shift were /pˤ fˤ bˤ vˤ/ become /kw xw ɡw ɣw/ intervocalically and word-initially, then the latter two clusters merɡe into /ɣw/ and subsequently become /ʕw/, which then simplifies into /w/? Word-initially, the Cw clusters develop a prosthetic /a/ before them to comply with the lanɡuaɡe's phonotactics, while word-finally and in clusters, the pharinɡealised labials simply lose the secondary articulation.

Akangka wrote: ↑Wed Jan 30, 2019 10:01 amAs gw -> ɣw, it's not possible without g -> ɣ.

Knit Tie wrote: ↑Wed Jan 30, 2019 7:38 am How realistic would it be to have a sound shift were /pˤ fˤ bˤ vˤ/ become /kw xw ɡw ɣw/ intervocalically and word-initially, then the latter two clusters merɡe into /ɣw/ and subsequently become /ʕw/, which then simplifies into /w/? Word-initially, the Cw clusters develop a prosthetic /a/ before them to comply with the lanɡuaɡe's phonotactics, while word-finally and in clusters, the pharingealised labials simply lose the secondary articulation.

Akangka wrote: ↑Wed Jan 30, 2019 10:01 amAbout /ɣw/, it can be immediately merged into /w/, without intermediate step of /ʕw/. As gw -> ɣw, it's not possible without g -> ɣ. About /ˤ/->/w/, I don't know, but it looks rather implausible too.

Pabappa wrote: ↑Wed Jan 30, 2019 12:06 pm whats up with your g key? do you have it set that way so you can type IPA? just curious.

mèþru wrote: ↑Wed Jan 30, 2019 12:10 pm Probably a prohibition on initial clusters, and it being /kw/ instead of /kʷ/

Akangka wrote: ↑Fri Feb 01, 2019 7:11 pm How about
d -> r / #_T
t -> s / #_T
k -> h / #_T

But
p -> p / #_T
b -> b / #_T

where T is stop.

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Feb 07, 2019 4:13 am How plausible would it be to have a consonant appear out of nowhere after word-final /u/?