Vowel Length Genesis
Vowel Length Genesis
How does it develop?
Primarily, vowel length is seen in Ancient Greek, Latin and Sanskrit. As should be clear, all three are used as liturgical languages. It is clear that vowel length in these languages is a result of the sonorous chanting of clergy and religious professionals, who need to draw out the vowel sounds in order to make them fit the cadence of the chant.
Salmoneus wrote:(NB Dewrad is behaving like an adult - a petty, sarcastic and uncharitable adult, admittedly, but none the less note the infinitely higher quality of flame)
*"Compensatory lengthening"--that is, a consonant is lost, and the preceding (or, occasionally, the following) vowel lengthens to "make up" for the lost segment. For example, in the history of Cayuga (Iroquoian): *íhraks --> iha:s "he eats". Also seen in non-rhotic English dialects (those that drop coda [syllable-final] "r"), e.g. cart = [kʰɑ:t] (I think that's the vowel?)
*Coalescence of multiple vowels (or vowels separated by glides or [h] or something similar) into a single long vowel. For example, in Lakhota Sioux, sequences of vowel+(w,y,h)+vowel often coalesce into a single long vowel whose form is dependent on which the two vowels in the original sequence were; an example is iyáye "he left for there" --> [iyæ:].
*Influence from neighboring consonants; English exhibits this. Vowels before voiced consonants are allophonically lengthened, so bad = [bæ:d] while bat = [bæt]. A loss of the conditioning environment (such as, say, the devoicing of all word-final stops) could lead to the distinction becoming phonemic. For instance, you'd have /bæt/ = "bat" and /bæ:t/ = "bad".
*Coalescence of multiple vowels (or vowels separated by glides or [h] or something similar) into a single long vowel. For example, in Lakhota Sioux, sequences of vowel+(w,y,h)+vowel often coalesce into a single long vowel whose form is dependent on which the two vowels in the original sequence were; an example is iyáye "he left for there" --> [iyæ:].
*Influence from neighboring consonants; English exhibits this. Vowels before voiced consonants are allophonically lengthened, so bad = [bæ:d] while bat = [bæt]. A loss of the conditioning environment (such as, say, the devoicing of all word-final stops) could lead to the distinction becoming phonemic. For instance, you'd have /bæt/ = "bat" and /bæ:t/ = "bad".
AFAIK, influence from neighbouring consonants is a major cause of "compensatory" lengthening which develops in a similar manner to phonemic tone. That is to say that the vowel is already phonemically lengthened before certain consonants with that consonant merging with another or being lost all together rather than the vowel becoming long as a result of this loss of the following consonant.Whimemsz wrote:*"Compensatory lengthening"--that is, a consonant is lost, and the preceding (or, occasionally, the following) vowel lengthens to "make up" for the lost segment. For example, in the history of Cayuga (Iroquoian): *íhraks --> iha:s "he eats". Also seen in non-rhotic English dialects (those that drop coda [syllable-final] "r"), e.g. cart = [kʰɑ:t] (I think that's the vowel?)
*Coalescence of multiple vowels (or vowels separated by glides or [h] or something similar) into a single long vowel. For example, in Lakhota Sioux, sequences of vowel+(w,y,h)+vowel often coalesce into a single long vowel whose form is dependent on which the two vowels in the original sequence were; an example is iyáye "he left for there" --> [iyæ:].
*Influence from neighboring consonants; English exhibits this. Vowels before voiced consonants are allophonically lengthened, so bad = [bæ:d] while bat = [bæt]. A loss of the conditioning environment (such as, say, the devoicing of all word-final stops) could lead to the distinction becoming phonemic. For instance, you'd have /bæt/ = "bat" and /bæ:t/ = "bad".
As linguoboy hinted at, stress can also play a part in the development of phonemic length. For examples, stress may be reinforced by allophonic vowel lengthening which might become phonemic if the stress shifts to another syllable.
Long vowels may also develop allophonically in open syllables but not in closed ones. If geminate consonants occur then reduction of phonemic length in consonants can lead to phonemic vowel length, e.g. /makkar/>[makkar]>/makar/ vs. /makar/>[ma:kar]>/ma:kar/.
Long vowels can arise as the result of collapsing diphthongs, e.g. /uo/>/o:/, /ou/>/u:/, /ei/>/e:/, /ie/>/i:/, etc. where a language with only short vowels and diphthongs shifts to one with length distinction in vowels but no diphthongs (although these may arise from other sources, e.g. /ovu/>/owu/>/ou/ with the last stage occurring after original /ou/ shifts to /u:/ so as to not have /ovu/>/owu/>/ou/>/u:/).
You can tell the same lie a thousand times,
But it never gets any more true,
So close your eyes once more and once more believe
That they all still believe in you.
Just one time.
But it never gets any more true,
So close your eyes once more and once more believe
That they all still believe in you.
Just one time.
Or, alternatively, the exact opposite. Proto-Semitic seemingly allowed a degree of variation in V:C and VC: (ie, length could transfer between a vowel and the preceding consonant), so you could easily have /makkar/ > /ma:kar/ while /makar/ > /makar/. One prominent example is in the D verbal stem (involving gemination of the medial root consonant) – if said consonant is gutteral and therefore cannot be geminated (as was the case in many Semitic languages), the preceding vowel would be lengthened instead. So a root *K-T-B "write" would give kattaba in the D-stem, while P-ʕ-L "do, perform, act" would give *pāʕala.sangi39 wrote:Long vowels may also develop allophonically in open syllables but not in closed ones. If geminate consonants occur then reduction of phonemic length in consonants can lead to phonemic vowel length, e.g. /makkar/>[makkar]>/makar/ vs. /makar/>[ma:kar]>/ma:kar/.
http://www.veche.net/
http://www.veche.net/novegradian - Grammar of Novegradian
http://www.veche.net/alashian - Grammar of Alashian
http://www.veche.net/novegradian - Grammar of Novegradian
http://www.veche.net/alashian - Grammar of Alashian
These long vowels also have falling/rising tone depending on which vowel is stressed. If a word iyáye is stressed on the syllable preceding the deleted glide, the new vowel [æ:] has falling tone; if it is stressed on the syllable following, it will have rising tone.Whimemsz wrote:For example, in Lakhota Sioux, sequences of vowel+(w,y,h)+vowel often coalesce into a single long vowel whose form is dependent on which the two vowels in the original sequence were; an example is iyáye "he left for there" --> [iyæ:].
If the two vowels are identical, the long vowel which is generated from deletion of the glide will not change. The second new vowel is [ɔ:], resulting from such back-vowel sequences as awa, etc. Also, if either of the vowels is nasal, the resulting long vowel will also be nasalized.
There's also the theory that the Proto-Semitic long vowels were originally diphthongs which were simplified to long vowels, with only /aw/ and /aj/ retained longer into development, which themselves simplify in many languages into /o/ and /e/ - this was the case of Sanskrit as well.Mecislau wrote:Or, alternatively, the exact opposite. Proto-Semitic seemingly allowed a degree of variation in V:C and VC: (ie, length could transfer between a vowel and the preceding consonant), so you could easily have /makkar/ > /ma:kar/ while /makar/ > /makar/. One prominent example is in the D verbal stem (involving gemination of the medial root consonant) – if said consonant is gutteral and therefore cannot be geminated (as was the case in many Semitic languages), the preceding vowel would be lengthened instead. So a root *K-T-B "write" would give kattaba in the D-stem, while P-ʕ-L "do, perform, act" would give *pāʕala.sangi39 wrote:Long vowels may also develop allophonically in open syllables but not in closed ones. If geminate consonants occur then reduction of phonemic length in consonants can lead to phonemic vowel length, e.g. /makkar/>[makkar]>/makar/ vs. /makar/>[ma:kar]>/ma:kar/.
In Arabic, many of the long /a:/'s are actually [supposedly] the result of massive vowel+sonorant leveling; i.e. PS */k'awama/ "he stood" > Arabic /qa:ma/, */s'ajara/ "he became" > Arabic /s_?\a:ra/, etc.
لا يرقىء الله عيني من بكى حجراً
ولا شفى وجد من يصبو إلى وتدِ
("May God never dry the tears of those who cry over stones, nor ease the love-pangs of those who yearn for tent-pegs.") - Abu Nawas
ولا شفى وجد من يصبو إلى وتدِ
("May God never dry the tears of those who cry over stones, nor ease the love-pangs of those who yearn for tent-pegs.") - Abu Nawas
- Yiuel Raumbesrairc
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Quebec French went the way of merging vowels that ended up together. Loosing many /l/ phonemes, especially with the definite article, and /r/ in /syr/, many vowels ended up in hiatus. These, in turn, merged into diphtongs that were ultimately monophtongized (with the last vowel being the result, and nasalization being kept if any vowel had it).
(1) Je m'en vais à l'école :
(a) /Z9ma~vAalekOl/
(b) /Zma~vAaEkOl/
(c) /Zma~vE::kOl/
(2) Il est dans les pommes :
(a) /ileda~lepOm/
(b) /jeda~epOm/*
(c) /jede~:pOm/
* "Il" always turned into /j/ before a vowel, preventing long monophtongization.
(3) Elle est sur la table :
(a) /ElesyRlatabl/
(b) /Eesyatab/
(c) /Etab/*
* "Elle est" is always /E:/ for some reason, probably because of an older rule I don't know. There are also theories that QcFr never had "sur" /syr/ and always had "su" /sy/, attested in Middle French and Classical non-Modern French.
In turn, today, some of them might again diphtongize.
(So yes, QcFr is full of long vowels today, and part of morphosyntax, so a lot harder to teach when teaching Norm French.)
(1) Je m'en vais à l'école :
(a) /Z9ma~vAalekOl/
(b) /Zma~vAaEkOl/
(c) /Zma~vE::kOl/
(2) Il est dans les pommes :
(a) /ileda~lepOm/
(b) /jeda~epOm/*
(c) /jede~:pOm/
* "Il" always turned into /j/ before a vowel, preventing long monophtongization.
(3) Elle est sur la table :
(a) /ElesyRlatabl/
(b) /Eesyatab/
(c) /Etab/*
* "Elle est" is always /E:/ for some reason, probably because of an older rule I don't know. There are also theories that QcFr never had "sur" /syr/ and always had "su" /sy/, attested in Middle French and Classical non-Modern French.
In turn, today, some of them might again diphtongize.
(So yes, QcFr is full of long vowels today, and part of morphosyntax, so a lot harder to teach when teaching Norm French.)
"Ez amnar o amnar e cauč."
- Daneydzaus
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Have you seen close transcriptions of casual English? It's just as complex, if not worse. Words are messy in natural speech, without clear boundaries and with lots of featural spreading. This looks perfectly natural to me.Nortaneous wrote:...how do you even pull words out of that?Yiuel wrote:(1) Je m'en vais à l'école :
(a) /Z9ma~vAalekOl/
(b) /Zma~vAaEkOl/
(c) /Zma~vE::kOl/
[quote="Octaviano"]Why does one need to invent an implausible etymology when we've got other linguistic resources to our avail? [/quote]
Agreed completely, I must say.Colzie wrote:Have you seen close transcriptions of casual English? It's just as complex, if not worse. Words are messy in natural speech, without clear boundaries and with lots of featural spreading. This looks perfectly natural to me.Nortaneous wrote:...how do you even pull words out of that?Yiuel wrote:(1) Je m'en vais à l'école :
(a) /Z9ma~vAalekOl/
(b) /Zma~vAaEkOl/
(c) /Zma~vE::kOl/
Dibotahamdn duthma jallni agaynni ra hgitn lakrhmi.
Amuhawr jalla vowa vta hlakrhi hdm duthmi xaja.
Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro.
Amuhawr jalla vowa vta hlakrhi hdm duthmi xaja.
Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro.
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I don't know what the fuck he's talking aboutWhimemsz wrote:"I dunno what (other?) (?) talkin' 'bout"?
at worst, though, I think I'd say something like [ãːɯ̯ɽ̃əʊ̯wɐð̠əfɐkʰistʰɔːkm̩bæə̯ʔ], which isn't too bad (edit: the /r`/ should be nasalized, not the /@U_^/... I don't know why it's doing that)
Siöö jandeng raiglin zåbei tandiüłåd;
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.
Yeah, what they said. But the 2 wasn't supposed to be there in the first one, I just missed the shift key, it should've been @.
I suppose the final [?] could drop out and I bet it would still be comprehensible if [tAg@mbaU] went to [tA(@)mbaU], although I probably wouldn't say that unless I was really tired or something.
But I admit the French example looked crazy to me too, but that's probably because I don't know French.
I suppose the final [?] could drop out and I bet it would still be comprehensible if [tAg@mbaU] went to [tA(@)mbaU], although I probably wouldn't say that unless I was really tired or something.
But I admit the French example looked crazy to me too, but that's probably because I don't know French.
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now that I think of it, there's probably a hell of a lot of prosodic information that these transcriptions are missing (in the case of english, distinguishing long vowels arising from coalescence of vowel sequences from regular long vowels)Mbwa wrote:Yeah, what they said. But the 2 wasn't supposed to be there in the first one, I just missed the shift key, it should've been @.
I suppose the final [?] could drop out and I bet it would still be comprehensible if [tAg@mbaU] went to [tA(@)mbaU], although I probably wouldn't say that unless I was really tired or something.
But I admit the French example looked crazy to me too, but that's probably because I don't know French.
Siöö jandeng raiglin zåbei tandiüłåd;
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.
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- Yiuel Raumbesrairc
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Oddly enough, the odd triply lengthed vowel /E::/ does not seem to show any prosodic difference, except for its length. And quite frankly, I don't know how we can actually take out any meaning from such sentences, even though I can. That can be part of the whole polysynthetic hypothesis of QcFr, where we should analyse all that as a messy phrase incorporating many things.
Indeed, the triple length marks "present-tense to preceeding word WITH dative+definiteness+initial vowel to the following word" That's worse than Spanish's "-í".
Indeed, the triple length marks "present-tense to preceeding word WITH dative+definiteness+initial vowel to the following word" That's worse than Spanish's "-í".
"Ez amnar o amnar e cauč."
- Daneydzaus
- Daneydzaus
[ˈaː õn ˈnoː ˈwʌʔt̚ d̥ə ˈfʌʔk iːsʲ ˈtʰɒkn̩ː ˈb̥ɑ̟̆ŏ̯ʔ]TaylorS wrote:ˈaɛ̯ə̃ˌnːoː wʌ d̪əˈfʌʔk çiːz ˈtʰakʰn̩ ʔbæoʔThe Unseen wrote:"I don't know what the fuck he's talking about"?Mbwa wrote:Yeah, [aU~n@U@42fVgiz tAg@mbaU?].
That could get even worse, too.
I think that this sort of thing is really atypical for English as a whole, and especially North American English, by any means.
(Actually, I do not think that this case is particularly dramatic when it comes to elision and assimilation in English overall by any means.)
Dibotahamdn duthma jallni agaynni ra hgitn lakrhmi.
Amuhawr jalla vowa vta hlakrhi hdm duthmi xaja.
Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro.
Amuhawr jalla vowa vta hlakrhi hdm duthmi xaja.
Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro. Irdro.
Dunno, /Zma~vE::kOl/ is maybe pushing it a bit (wouldn't that be /Zma~vE E:kol/?), but yeah something is up with that particular combination ("va à" and "à l'école), probably because of the high frequency of those words.Yiuel wrote:Oddly enough, the odd triply lengthed vowel /E::/ does not seem to show any prosodic difference, except for its length. And quite frankly, I don't know how we can actually take out any meaning from such sentences, even though I can. That can be part of the whole polysynthetic hypothesis of QcFr, where we should analyse all that as a messy phrase incorporating many things.
Indeed, the triple length marks "present-tense to preceeding word WITH dative+definiteness+initial vowel to the following word" That's worse than Spanish's "-í".
As for the polysynthetic French hypothesis, I think there are some arguments against that - mostly adverbs and adjectives landing in the middle of some of those clusters ("j'ai mangé"->"j'ai poliment mangé" for instance), or prepositions being matched with a too large variety of things to be affixes rather than words ("j'ai une télé pour toi", "je suis pour", "pour que tu viennes", "je suis dessus", "je suis au dessus", "Il parle de pourquoi tu veux pas", etc...)
I've more-or-less got got [æ dənə wɔʔ ðə fʊkiz tɔkɪn əbaʊʔ] in quick speech and [æ dəno: wɔʔ ðə fʊk i:z tɔ:kɪn əbaʊʔ] in slower speech (couldn't be a***d with marking aspriation )Mbwa wrote:Yeah, [aU~n@U@42fVgiz tAg@mbaU?].
That could get even worse, too.
You can tell the same lie a thousand times,
But it never gets any more true,
So close your eyes once more and once more believe
That they all still believe in you.
Just one time.
But it never gets any more true,
So close your eyes once more and once more believe
That they all still believe in you.
Just one time.