So from looking at the results of the poll, I have noticed two issues.
1st is a tie between ergative/absolutive and nominative/accusative so we have to decide which one we want.
2nd is the fact that the majority supports the language being analytical, but everyone voted in at least some way to mark nouns, which would mean we would have to do a fusional or agglutinative language. So which would you guys prefer? I don’t really care which one we do.
Mark nouns with so many particles the language effectively becomes fusional but with spaces?? Have free word order but your place in the sentence decides tense? I have so many dumb ideas please ignore and do something sensible.
That’s actually a pretty good idea! Like each noun is marked with a particle, which is different depending on its tense etc. That would definitely be a cool feature.
okay i think we need a phonology to do actual ideas for individual, uh, anything.
anyone got some ideas for phonology? IPA link pls use IPA so we can know what you mean.
Also i think we agree analytic but with some sort noun marking anyways, for locativity, plurality, and maybe something else, mark verbs for tense, maybe something else, and we’re Nominative/Accusative. any complaints? Have we settled on a tense structure?
Here is the phonology as of now:
Consonants
| Bilabial | Labiodental | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | |||
| Stop | p,b | t,d | k,g | ʔ | |||
| Fricative | f,v | θ | s,z | ʃ,ʒ | h | ||
| Approximate | j | ||||||
| Lat. Approx. | l |
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | i,iː | ʊ,ʊː | |
| Medium | ə,əː | ||
| Low | a,aː | ɑ,ɑː |
Phonotactics
Syllable Structure: CV(C)
Ex: fʊʒ or θaɪ̯
Two sounds clustering distinguished only by voicing is illegal
Ex: jəːʃʒin is illegal, jəːʒʒin or jəːʃʃin are not
ɲ and ŋ are the same phoneme: ɲ is in the onset, ŋ located in the coda
Ex: ɲaŋ is legal, ŋiɲ is not
A voiced and a voiceless consonant clustering creates voiced gemination
Ex: sɑːfvih becomes sɑːvvih
A ʔ preceding a voiceless stop creates gemination
Ex: biʔpaŋ becomes bippaŋ
A voiceless stop preceding an h aspirates the stop
Ex: siːthal becomes siːtʰal
I’d prefer ergative/absolutive, but since it is the majority it’s alright.
From what I got
nouns are marked for plurality, and locativity(?)
verbs are marked for tense(past/present/future) and mood
I added /x/ as an optional variation to /h/. I also changed the font for /a/ and /aː/ in the vowel chart to avoid any potential confusion with /ɑ/ and /ɑː/. Is this okay?
Consonants:
m = /m/
n = /n/
ng = /ɲ/ /ŋ/ (high chance of being changed)
p = /p/
b = /b/
t = /t/
d = /d/
k = /k/
g = /g/
’ = /ʔ/
f = /f/
v = /v/
þ = /θ/
s = /s/
z = /z/
sh = /ʃ/
zh = /ʒ/
h = /h/ (/x/)
j = /j/
l = /l/
Vowels:
i = /i/ | ii = /i:/
u = /ʊ/ | uu = /ʊ:/
y = /ə/ | yy = /ə:/
ä = /a/ | ää = /a:/
a = /ɑ/ | aa = /ɑ/
Examples:
IPA:
/jəːʒʒin/
/fʊʒ/
/bippaŋ/
/sɑːvvih/
RomanizationV1:
jyyzhzhin
fuzh
bippäng
saavvih
Edit: This is not complete and I see that some things will need some further “explanation”, but I’ll wait till your feedback.
Edit: I just realized we have no rhodic. Thrive will not be possible to pronounce in this language. (Unless it’s Thlive or something)
Would foreign words keep their foreign syllabic structure or would they be changed to mach the native one?
Would foreign words keep foreign vowels or would the change to native ones too? I can easily imagine /ε/ turning to /ə/.
I can’t believe that there wasn’t a rhotic. I’m not opposed to a whatever rhotic, though I can also pronounce ʀ.
In terms of the romanization, I would prefer to have š and ž over sh and she simply because it looks less clunky with gemination. For romanization, It is totally fine to split ng into ng and ny if needed, because all a romanization is for is to help pronunciation. I also would prefer to have the a and ä switched.
Doubling the vowels is fine, and I can’t come up with anything better
Edit: romanization if these suggestions are implemented:
jyyžžin
fuž
bippang
säävvih
fuzh
Now that I look at it, this doesn’t look great either
I’ve got an idea: what about the rhodic being a rare sound that mostly comes from foreign words? I think it would sound cool to have it realized as either /r/, /ɾ/ or /ɹ/ with a free-choice allophonic relationship.
For romanization, I think ng can be replaced with ñ.
bippang → bippañ
Honestly I don’t really like the idea of swapping a and ä, as ä feels more fronted than a too me, but that’s just my feelings and if swapping them would make the romanization better then I have no obligation.
I think It’s also important to discuss how “foreign vowels” would be adapted into native ones.
I’m pretty sure on /ε/, /e/, /ɨ/, /ɘ/ → /ə/
but /ä/ is confusing. [1]
It’s similar to how Kashubian ë (/ə/) may be confusing to native Polish speakers, as it sounds like something between Polish e (/ε/) and y (/ɨ/). ↩︎
yes, and ʀ to, because its the only sound besides the american r. I am totally fine with the ñ, but maybe ƞ?
For vowels, it wouldnt be to hard to adapt vowels into our 5. We have yet to discuss diphthongs- here are the ones we have so far: ai, ʊi, ɑʊ, and əi. any additions/subtractions?
I think we can make all the possible diphthongs and the progressively subtract them.
all possibly diphthongs are: əʊ ʊə iə əi ai ia ɑi iɑ aʊ ʊa ɑʊ ʊɑ ɑə əɑ aə əa ʊi iʊ aɑ ɑa
most of these are nonsensical though
/aɑ/ and /ɑa/ are obvious to be removed. /ɑə/, /əɑ/, /aə/ and /əa/ are also kind of meh.
After removing the previously mentioned diphthongs we’re left with this:
əʊ ʊə iə əi ai ia ɑi iɑ aʊ ʊa ɑʊ ʊɑ ʊi iʊ
(It’s just the first phase of the removal)
Id ike to point out what would essentially be duplicates due to sounding similar:
aʊ ɑʊ and ʊa ʊɑ. iʊ, iə, ia, and iɑ as well(in a linear kind of way). so we would have to pick which of these we want
I think /aʊ/ and /ɑʊ/ (ect.) may be allophones, from the other batch I would pick up /iʊ/ and /ia/ (ect.) due to them having least similarity. As I was thinking about it though, /ʊɑ/ and /ɑʊ/ are harder to pronounce and more unnatural than /aʊ/ and /ʊa/.
So, ai ia aʊ ʊa ʊi iʊ?
I also added the rhodic to phonology. Edit: diphthongs too.
Consonants:
m = /m/
n = /n/
ñ = /ɲ/ /ŋ/
p = /p/
b = /b/
t = /t/
d = /d/
k = /k/
g = /g/
’ = /ʔ/
f = /f/
v = /v/
þ = /θ/
s = /s/
z = /z/
š = /ʃ/
ž = /ʒ/
h = /h/ (/x/)
r = /ɹ/ /ɾ/ (/r/) (/ʀ/)
j = /j/
l = /l/
Vowels:
i = /i/ | ii = /i:/
u = /ʊ/ | uu = /ʊ:/
y = /ə/ | yy = /ə:/
ä = /a/ | ää = /a:/ < (possibility of being swapped)
a = /ɑ/ | aa = /ɑ:/ < (possibility of being swapped)
Diphthongs:
ui = /ʊi/ | iu = /iʊ/
uä = /ʊa/ | äu = /aʊ/
iä = /ia/ | äi = /ai/
Examples:
IPA:
/jəːʒʒin/
/fʊʒ/
/bippaŋ/
/sɑːvvih/
RomanizationV2:
jyyžžin
fuž
bippäñ
saavvih
0 voters
I was thinking about /ʊa/ (ect.) and I think that /ʊɑ/ may actually be more realistic than /ʊa/. Maybe they would be allophones?
Consonants:
m = /m/
n = /n/
ñ = /ɲ/ /ŋ/
p = /p/
b = /b/
t = /t/
d = /d/
k = /k/
g = /g/
’ = /ʔ/
f = /f/
v = /v/
þ = /θ/
s = /s/
z = /z/
š = /ʃ/
ž = /ʒ/
h = /h/ (/x/)
r = /ɹ/ /ɾ/ (/r/) (/ʀ/)
j = /j/
l = /l/
Vowels:
i = /i/ | ii = /i:/
u = /ʊ/ | uu = /ʊ:/
y = /ə/ | yy = /ə:/
a = /a/ | aa = /a:/
ä = /ɑ/ | ää = /ɑ:/
Diphthongs:
ui = /ʊi/ | iu = /iʊ/
ua = /ʊa/ | au = /aʊ/
ia = /ia/ | ai = /ai/
Examples:
IPA:
/jəːʒʒin/
/fʊʒ/
/bippaŋ/
/sɑːvvih/
RomanizationV2.5:
jyyžžin
fuž
bippañ
säävvih
Yeah, I think that most of the allophones could switch between an and ɑ. I also thought of another way to display long vowels: ā ī ū ȳ ǟ
This just makes the words look cleaner and easier to understand imo. What do you think?
jȳžžin
fuž
bippañ
sǟvvih
I also thought about macrons, but double diacritics is something I want to avoid. Maybe both ways would fit?
This is the romanization after all, so it’s fine if we don’t decide how we want it to look yet.
On the topic of orthography, what do we want our script to look like? I could go mining in Unicode to find some characters/symbols we could use
I think It’s too early to decide, since we don’t have much grammar nor do we have any words, but looking at the syllable structure I think it would be cool if it was an abugida. Personally I would love do design a writing system for this language, but as I said, It’s way too early. Watching Conlang Case Study series really made me realize how much more important are grammar and the words themselves than the writing system. We need to prioritize grammar and then spam words. Writing system is a finishing touch.
We also don’t have a protolang.
Alright, this is what we have so far: nouns are marked for plurality, and locativity while verbs are marked for tense(past/present/future) and mood
What moods and locativities(for lack of a better word) should we use?
For moods, I think imperative, interrogative, and a “I intend to” subjunctive
For locativity, I think with, in, towards, maybe more but that’s just off the top of my head
—-
I’d rather not do a protolang in full, if at all.I’m okay with some evolution, but I’d rather not do a whole lot
Yeah, I think It should be just basic. Some evolutions won’t be the most realistic ones, but I think it’s ok, this language doesn’t have to be the most realistic one after all.
As for the grammar, I’m a noobie so I can’t really say anything about it.