Odd natlang features thread

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

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Does Navajo's verbal system from Hell count as an 'odd feature'?

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by chris_notts »

Theta wrote:Does Navajo's verbal system from Hell count as an 'odd feature'?
Isn't Navajo one of the saner Athabaskan languages?
Try the online version of the HaSC sound change applier: http://chrisdb.dyndns-at-home.com/HaSC

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Atom »

Atom wrote:
Whimemsz wrote:Basically just this, as far as I know
Ah! Thank you.
NO! The google books preview cuts out just before getting into the meat of the evidentiality system! I've been looking for a really good analysis of a natlang evidentiality system for a while. Bother. I must go to the University to find this. Also a tremendously good grammar, well organized and filled with details. It's obvious there's a tremendous amount of work.

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by chris_notts »

Atom wrote:
Atom wrote:
Whimemsz wrote:Basically just this, as far as I know
Ah! Thank you.
NO! The google books preview cuts out just before getting into the meat of the evidentiality system! I've been looking for a really good analysis of a natlang evidentiality system for a while. Bother. I must go to the University to find this. Also a tremendously good grammar, well organized and filled with details. It's obvious there's a tremendous amount of work.
Both Dixon and Aikhenvald (who work together a lot) do tend to write good grammars. I can also recommend Aikhenvald's grammar of Manambu (an Ndu language) and Dixon's grammar of Jarawara (a Madi language). Jarawara has a simple direct/indirect evidentiality system if you're interested.

If you're interested in Evidentiality in particular, have you tried the book "Evidentiality", also by Aikhenvald? It is a typological survey of Evidentiality. She talks about various possible origins, semantic extensions etc. See the Linguist List review here:

http://linguistlist.org/issues/16/16-2547.html

Of course, it's also worth delving into the details of a particular language, to get a better feel for the details.
Try the online version of the HaSC sound change applier: http://chrisdb.dyndns-at-home.com/HaSC

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Atom »

chris_notts wrote:Both Dixon and Aikhenvald (who work together a lot) do tend to write good grammars. I can also recommend Aikhenvald's grammar of Manambu (an Ndu language) and Dixon's grammar of Jarawara (a Madi language). Jarawara has a simple direct/indirect evidentiality system if you're interested.

If you're interested in Evidentiality in particular, have you tried the book "Evidentiality", also by Aikhenvald? It is a typological survey of Evidentiality. She talks about various possible origins, semantic extensions etc. See the Linguist List review here:

http://linguistlist.org/issues/16/16-2547.html

Of course, it's also worth delving into the details of a particular language, to get a better feel for the details.
I haven't looked at that. Thank you.

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Solarius »

Karajá is pretty insane.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

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chris_notts wrote:
Theta wrote:Does Navajo's verbal system from Hell count as an 'odd feature'?
Isn't Navajo one of the saner Athabaskan languages?
Phonologically, it looks like Chipewyan (Dëne Sųłiné) is more insane... but I'm probably wrong.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Herr Dunkel »

Bristel wrote:
chris_notts wrote:
Theta wrote:Does Navajo's verbal system from Hell count as an 'odd feature'?
Isn't Navajo one of the saner Athabaskan languages?
Phonologically, it looks like Chipewyan (Dëne Sųłiné) is more insane... but I'm probably wrong.
But Chipewyan, going by its name, is Dene-Yeniseian, therefore not applicable =/
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Solarius »

Darkgamma wrote:
Bristel wrote: Phonologically, it looks like Chipewyan (Dëne Sųłiné) is more insane... but I'm probably wrong.
But Chipewyan, going by its name, is Dene-Yeniseian, therefore not applicable =/
:? :? :?
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

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Darkgamma wrote:
Bristel wrote:
chris_notts wrote:
Theta wrote:Does Navajo's verbal system from Hell count as an 'odd feature'?
Isn't Navajo one of the saner Athabaskan languages?
Phonologically, it looks like Chipewyan (Dëne Sųłiné) is more insane... but I'm probably wrong.
But Chipewyan, going by its name, is Dene-Yeniseian, therefore not applicable =/
WTF are you talking about? Athabaskan languages are Dene-Yeniseian. Navajo (Dine Bizaad) and Chipewyan (Dene Suliné) are in the same superfamily.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Xephyr »

More to the point, Chipewyan is an Athabaskan Dene-Yeniseian language.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Bristel »

Xephyr wrote:More to the point, Chipewyan is an Athabaskan Dene-Yeniseian language.
Yes, thank you. :)
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Whimemsz »

Besides which, Dene-Yeniseian isn't proven yet, it's just looked on more favorably than most long-distance comparisons because Vaida isn't a crackpot.

Also, Chipewyan isn't really that strange? Compared to Karajá, whose inventory is ridiculously unbalanced.

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

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Laghuu has four lateral affricates, all of which are velar. And it has /ɚ/.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Bristel »

Whimemsz wrote:Besides which, Dene-Yeniseian isn't proven yet, it's just looked on more favorably than most long-distance comparisons because Vaida isn't a crackpot.

Also, Chipewyan isn't really that strange? Compared to Karajá, whose inventory is ridiculously unbalanced.
We were talking about stranger (more strange) Athabaskan languages, though.

I was comparing Navajo to Chipewyan.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

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Solarius wrote:Karajá is pretty insane.
It sorta looks like they ripped off Láadan. :roll:
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

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Image
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Travis B. »

That looks like an Austro-asiatic analogue to what Semitic has... except that the vowels are part of the root too, and insane sorts of infixation are a matter of course...
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Ouagadougou »

Reading about the insanities of Athabaskan tongues makes me wonder how they ever got to be that way in the first place.

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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Shrdlu »

Ouagadougou wrote:Reading about the insanities of Athabaskan tongues makes me wonder how they ever got to be that way in the first place.
Simple. To make the chance of a misunderstanding between two individuals as small as possible.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Herr Dunkel »

Bristel wrote: WTF are you talking about? Athabaskan languages are Dene-Yeniseian. Navajo (Dine Bizaad) and Chipewyan (Dene Suliné) are in the same superfamily.
My bad.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Nortaneous »

Might as well bring this back, since we've got its diachronic equivalent going now also.

Allowed final clusters in Qiang are either the same as or a subset of allowed initial clusters, and the only allowed C1s in a cluster (all clusters are two consonants) are /ʂ x χ/. However, /ʂ/ is realized as [s] before /t d/, and as [ɕ] before /pi pe bi tɕ dʑ/, and there's regressive voicing assimilation. So, you can have both xɬi̯ex (xɬi̯exbuʐ 'loess') and tʂʰexɬ 'sip', both ɣlu 'roll' and əɣl 'upright', etc.

edit: Qiang also has rhoticity harmony:
ʀuɑ + kʰe˞ > ʀuɑ˞kʰe˞
me + we˞ > me˞we˞
(Only /i e ə a/ appear with rhoticity in roots, but all vowels can take it, since the first-person plural marker for verbs is -˞.)
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Tropylium »

Omaha-Ponca apparently did not get the memo about front ejectiv stops being rarer than back ones; it has an inventory of /pʼ tʼ sʼ ʃʼ xʼ/.
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Re: Odd natlang features thread

Post by Drydic »

Nortaneous wrote:Might as well bring this back, since we've got its diachronic equivalent going now also.

Allowed final clusters in Qiang are either the same as or a subset of allowed initial clusters, and the only allowed C1s in a cluster (all clusters are two consonants) are /ʂ x χ/. However, /ʂ/ is realized as [s] before /t d/, and as [ɕ] before /pi pe bi tɕ dʑ/, and there's regressive voicing assimilation. So, you can have both xɬi̯ex (xɬi̯exbuʐ 'loess') and tʂʰexɬ 'sip', both ɣlu 'roll' and əɣl 'upright', etc.

edit: Qiang also has rhoticity harmony:
ʀuɑ + kʰe˞ > ʀuɑ˞kʰe˞
me + we˞ > me˞we˞
(Only /i e ə a/ appear with rhoticity in roots, but all vowels can take it, since the first-person plural marker for verbs is -˞.)
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