T'ant'api (comment on my phonology! :D) | Page 1 | Conlang Grammar and Lessons | Guild Forums

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Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:44 am

Okay, I've been actually writing a grammar (mostly according to the Lingua Questionnaire (which I recommend highly) for my new language, T'ant'api. I might actually cough something up about it. xd

EDIT: Okay, phonology's mostly up (except for the hysterical funology). Go comment on it, you bastards. D:

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:46 am

Phoneme Inventory (& Orthography)

The standard transliterations are provided in angle brackets after the phonemes.

Stop: /p t ts) tS) tK) k q/

Ejective: /p_> t_> ts)_> tS)_> tK)_> k_> q_>/
Nasal: /m n/
Fricative: /s S h/
Approximant: /w j/
Tap: /r/
Lateral approximant: /l/

Vowels: /a e i o/

Orthography:

In syllable coda positions (but not intervocalically except after ) /w/ is transcribed as
.
Stressed syllables are always indicated with an acute accent (áéíó). Some words, particularly clitics, have no stress and hence they are not marked. More on stress will come later both in the section on suprasegmentals and in the section on morphophonology. Please note that this does not apply to the actual writing system of the language but only to the English transcription.

Phonotactics

The following consonants and clusters are permitted as follows:

initial: null, any consonant, pr, qu
medial: (u/y) any consonant, mp, nt, nk, nq, nts, nch, ntl, st, stl, xt, xtl, lt, sk, xk, lk, mp', nt', nk', nq', nts', nch', ntl', lt', qu, mpr
final: (u/y) null, t, k, q, ts, ch, tl, s, x, h, y, u, l

This makes the general word structure (I)V(MV/uMV/yMV)(F/uF/yF), where I, V, M and F stand for initial, vowel, medial and final respectively, and are the phonemes /j w/.

As a general rule (due to historic sound changes) the sequences iCo and oCi, where C stands for any consonant or consonant cluster and are the phonemes /i o/, are not permitted except in loanwords. The most notable exceptions use the historical sequence (historic /ew/), pronounced as [o]; the sound change from [ew] to [o] occurred later. More on sound changes will be given in the section on phonological diachronics and more on allophony will occur in the following section.

Allophony

/qi/ > [q1]
/q_>i/ > [q_>1]
/ajq/ > [Eq]
/ajq_>/ > [Eq_>]
/qo/ > [qO]
/qow/ > [qU]
/hi/ > [Ci]
/ow/ > [u ]
/aw|C|/ > /aU|C|/
/|V -o|w|V|/ > [|V -o|B_o|V|]
/ew|C|/ > [o|C|]
unstressed /e/ > [E]
unstressed /aj/ > [E]
unstressed /oj/ > [we]

Word-initial and stress-initial plosives > aspirated (not in clusters)

|C| in this chart means any consonant or cluster and |V| means any vowel. |V -o| means any vowel with the exception of /o/. As is standard, the phonemes are enclosed by /slashes/ on the left whereas the actual phones are enclosed by [square brackets] on the right.

Suprasegmentals

The T'ant'api language does not distinguish vowel lengths or geminated consonants, although the ejectives are from historical gemination. Stress is a very prominent aspect of the language and there are many minimal pairs distinguished only by stress (especially with ergativity).

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Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:47 am

Morphology:

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:48 am

Morephology ( xp ):

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Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:50 am

Syntax:

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:51 am

Vocabulary:

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Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:54 am

All the wuggly bits in between:

Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 7:56 am

Culture:

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Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 4:31 pm

Anything else I might have forgotten:

Posted: Wed Jun 11, 2008 3:09 pm

Okay, I'll make a few more posts just to be safe.

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Posted: Wed Jun 11, 2008 3:10 pm

LA DE DA

ai hoi.

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