zompist bboard

I don't understand. I said that he is right in that people with damaged vocal chords would need to whisper but wrong in that being able to whisper means that one is not mute, hence having damaged vocal chords does not imply muteness since in fact most mute people have intact vocal chords. So are you...

Vowels are voiced too. Yeah, but most languages have no voicing distinction in the vowels - e.g. are distinguished by lip rounding and tongue height, not voice. Tonal languages would be another story, since tonality relies on use of the vocal chords. Of course one can whisper in Chinese - but then ...

So, if this all correct, they should be able to speak, just in whispers... Mostly right, except that mutes usually have working vocal chords - hence someone without working vocal chords would be said to have a speech impediment, not to be mute, since they can still speak. Damaging the vocal chords ...

Guitarplayer wrote:Personally I write time in 24-hour, but tell time in 12-hour.

Me too.

Is there an explanation for why languages with small phoneme inventories seem to also have simple syllable structures? WALS allows an even stronger claim: a small phoneme inventory not only statistically implies a simple syllable structure but there is even stronger evidence for simple syllable str...

I thought I would post here and ask if anyone else would be interested in using this program, and if so, what formats of word-lists they would like to be able to import into it, etc. You probably should create at least a CSV export (one file for phonology, another for the word list) because it's ea...