Re: Romanization Challenge Thread v2.0
Posted: Thu Nov 19, 2020 8:00 am
Kalam
This is an interesting one. Phonemically, the consonant inventory is pretty simple:
/p t tʃ k/
/ᵐb ⁿd ᶮdʒ ᵑɡ/
/s/
/m n ɲ ŋ/
/l w j/
Phonetically, however, there is quite a bit of allophony. Firstly, the voiceless stops have several allophones depending on their position within the word:
Additionally, /tʃ s/ can become voiced medially and finally, while the prenasalised stops become voiceless finally, and lose their nasal after /p tʃ k ᵐb ⁿd ᶮdʒ ᵑɡ/.
Also of note are the semivowels /w j/. These have several allophones as well, which if my transcription is correct are:
I don’t have any sample text, but luckily Pawley does quote the phonetic transcription of a few phrases:
/jaⁿd wj mⁿdenᵑɡajn/
[jaⁿt wij mɨⁿdenɨᵑɡajɨn]
/mⁿdp kotp bjaŋ/
[mɨⁿdɨp koɾɨp bjaŋ]
/… mⁿdnknŋ/
[… mɨⁿdɨnɨɣɨnɨŋ]
/woᵑɡ ᵑɡdj ownᵑɡajn/
[woᵑk ᵑɡɨⁿdij ownɨᵑɡajɨn]
This is an interesting one. Phonemically, the consonant inventory is pretty simple:
/p t tʃ k/
/ᵐb ⁿd ᶮdʒ ᵑɡ/
/s/
/m n ɲ ŋ/
/l w j/
Phonetically, however, there is quite a bit of allophony. Firstly, the voiceless stops have several allophones depending on their position within the word:
Phoneme | Word-initial | Word-medial | Word-final |
p | ɸ | β | p~b |
t | t | ɾ | ɾ |
k | k | ɣ | k~ɡ |
Additionally, /tʃ s/ can become voiced medially and finally, while the prenasalised stops become voiceless finally, and lose their nasal after /p tʃ k ᵐb ⁿd ᶮdʒ ᵑɡ/.
Also of note are the semivowels /w j/. These have several allophones as well, which if my transcription is correct are:
- [w j] initially and in environments C_V and V_V
- [ʉ ɪj] before palatal consonants (as well as velars for /i/)
- [u i] before other consonants
- [uw ij] finally
- [ə~o] when C_C(C)oC#
- [ɐ~ə] when C_C(C)aC#
- [e~ɛ~ə] when C_C(C)eC# or C_Cj
- [u] when C_CwC# or C_w or #w_[+velar]
- [u~ʉ] when #w_[-velar]
- ∅ when (C,V)w_C, though in this case /w/ is realised as [u~ʉ]
- ∅ when C_j, though /j/ is realised as [ɪ~i~ij]
- [ɨ] when #j_C
- [∅~ɨ] when (C,V)j_C
- [ɨ~ə] otherwise
I don’t have any sample text, but luckily Pawley does quote the phonetic transcription of a few phrases:
/jaⁿd wj mⁿdenᵑɡajn/
[jaⁿt wij mɨⁿdenɨᵑɡajɨn]
/mⁿdp kotp bjaŋ/
[mɨⁿdɨp koɾɨp bjaŋ]
/… mⁿdnknŋ/
[… mɨⁿdɨnɨɣɨnɨŋ]
/woᵑɡ ᵑɡdj ownᵑɡajn/
[woᵑk ᵑɡɨⁿdij ownɨᵑɡajɨn]