Post your conlang's phonology

Substantial postings about constructed languages and constructed worlds in general. Good place to mention your own or evaluate someone else's. Put quick questions in C&C Quickies instead.
User avatar
Shrdlu
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 485
Joined: Mon Apr 25, 2011 12:29 pm
Location: hinter schwedischen Gardinen

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Shrdlu »

Yeah, gonna work on that part. The language itself it actually began as somekind of offshoot to Iberian, a language which supposedly only had /b k[k] d[d] t[t] g[g]/ as the plosives and only /s[S] s[s]/ as the fricatives...

After I posted the last post I patched up the mess a-bit.
/b k[k] d[d] t[t] g[g]/ marginal: /q[q]/
/bj[b_j] kj[k_j] dj[d_j] tj[t_j] gj[g_j]/
/l[l] r[r/] rr[r]/
/3[T]/
/n[n] ñ nj[J]/
/s[s]/

/a i e u o ü/ ai ei au ui

lang~
Last edited by Shrdlu on Tue Sep 18, 2012 11:14 am, edited 2 times in total.
If I stop posting out of the blue it probably is because my computer and the board won't cooperate and let me log in.!

User avatar
Haplogy
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 325
Joined: Sat Mar 03, 2012 10:14 am
Location: Dutchland

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Haplogy »

Is <ui> /ui̯/ or /u̯i/?
Knowledge is power, and power corrupts. So study hard and be evil!

User avatar
Shrdlu
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 485
Joined: Mon Apr 25, 2011 12:29 pm
Location: hinter schwedischen Gardinen

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Shrdlu »

It depends on what type of consonant are before it, but mostly it is probably allophonic.
If I stop posting out of the blue it probably is because my computer and the board won't cooperate and let me log in.!

User avatar
Nortaneous
Sumerul
Sumerul
Posts: 4544
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2009 1:52 am
Location: the Imperial Corridor

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Nortaneous »

so have you ever done anything besides phoneme inventories
Siöö jandeng raiglin zåbei tandiüłåd;
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.

User avatar
Shrdlu
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 485
Joined: Mon Apr 25, 2011 12:29 pm
Location: hinter schwedischen Gardinen

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Shrdlu »

Oh, you cheapshot -- search "lang~" and my username and you'll see. I have like 80% of the grammar fleshed out, because I only have one lang~ --- and then I keep changing the phonemic inventory when I feel like trying something new.
If I stop posting out of the blue it probably is because my computer and the board won't cooperate and let me log in.!

User avatar
Nortaneous
Sumerul
Sumerul
Posts: 4544
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2009 1:52 am
Location: the Imperial Corridor

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Nortaneous »

speaking of consonant inventories, here is a clicklang related to cherun

/p t ts tɬ c cʎ̥ k kp ʔ/ <p t x tl j kl k kp d>
/pʰ tʰ tsʰ cʰ kʰ kpʰ/ <ph th xh ch kh kph>
/ɓ ɗ/ <b d>
/kǃʼ kǃʰ ŋǃ kǁʼ kǁʰ ŋǁ kǂʼ kǂʰ ŋǂ/ <! !h n! ǁ ǁh nǁ ǂ ǂh nǂ>
/v s ɬ r j ʎ̥ ɣ w ħ h/ <v s l r j ly gh w ħ h>
/m n ɲ ŋ ŋm/ <m n ny ng ngm>
/æ e ɤ o i ɯ/ <a ei e o i u>
/a˞ e˞ ɚ o˞/ <ar er ur or>
+ length and faucalization contrasts on the vowels

clicks and implosives only occur word-initially, glottal stop doesn't contrast with null initial, so <d> is never ambiguous. it's written that way because <d> is creaky voice in cherun
Siöö jandeng raiglin zåbei tandiüłåd;
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.

User avatar
Tropylium
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 512
Joined: Sun Aug 07, 2005 1:13 pm
Location: Halfway to Hyperborea

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Tropylium »

Vowel phonation contrasts and /cʎ̥/ in a clicklang? Seems somehow familiar. :wink:

Granted, that also has Central African stuff like ɓ kp, also rhotic vowels, ħ, etc. but it doesn't really help against my impression that clicks seem to kind of invite flirting with faucets. Somehow all the reasonably simple to pronounce clicklangs I know of are engelangs.

If I wanted to do something with the opposite aesthetic, the segment inventory might look something like this…
/ŋʘ ŋǃ~ŋǂ ŋǃʷ/
/p t~tʃ k kʷ ʔ/
/f s~ʃ h hʷ/
/m n j w/
/a ɛ i u/
[ˌʔaɪsəˈpʰɻ̊ʷoʊpɪɫ ˈʔæɫkəɦɔɫ]

User avatar
Nortaneous
Sumerul
Sumerul
Posts: 4544
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2009 1:52 am
Location: the Imperial Corridor

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Nortaneous »

It's the other way around: I actually took out a lot of things that appear in Cherun, the related lang that I had the phonology for first. Cherun has five phonation contrasts, /ɛː/, seven diphthongs, a more complete palatal series (come to think of it, I should take /cʎ̥/ out...), and voiced laterals. The only non-click consonants that don't directly correspond to something in Cherun are /ɓ ɗ r ħ/.

Of course, Ngmwragh probably looks kitchen-sinkier than Cherun, but that's just because its phonology hasn't reached a very stable state yet. There will be some mergers later on. (I might even make some of the odder Hathic langs clicklangs, and descend them from this instead of Cherun. There's one with eight non-click consonants: something like /t c k ʔ s m n w kǃʼ kǃʰ ŋǃ kǁʼ kǁʰ ŋǁ kǂʼ kǂʰ ŋǂ ɑ ɛ i u ɑ̃ ẽ ɨ̃/, if I don't get too interesting with the clicks.)
Siöö jandeng raiglin zåbei tandiüłåd;
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.

User avatar
Rekettye
Sanci
Sanci
Posts: 30
Joined: Tue Sep 18, 2012 3:27 pm
Location: Elindotia

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Rekettye »

Elindotian v. 1.0

/m n p t k b d g f s z ʃ tʃ ts x l ʁ j w/ + all palatalised versions (yes, contrastive) excl. /ʁ j w/
/i e ə a o u/
/ai ei oi au/

/e o/ > [ɛ ɔ] / [-stress]
/ai ei oi au/ > [a: e~ɛ: o~ɔ: ɑ:] / __ /ʁ/
/ʁ/ has dialectal [r~ɻ~ʐ] (+ voicing/retroflex assimilation if [ʐ])
/ə/ has dialectal [ɪ~ɨ]
(+ nasal POA assimilation)

(C)(C)V(V)(C)(C)
Onsets: single C, C + /l ʁ j w/ excl. C=/m n l ʁ j w/, stop + fricative excl. incongruent voicing, affricates and /kx/.
Codas: single C excl. /j w/, liquid + C excl. /j w/, nasal + C excl. /np nb mt md/, nasal + fricative, stop + fricative excl. incongruent voicing, fricative + fricative excl. geminates & incongruent voicing & /f/-final, fricative + stop excl. /fp xp/.

Weight-sensitive right-edge bounded stress
Rule: stress the rightmost heavy syllable in the word, and if neither is heavy, stress the penult
Heavy = diphthong nucleus, coda or both; /ə/ nucleus can never be heavy
Low Pr. kalbeken < Lith. kalbėti
Lith. sūris = cheese, Fr. souris = mouse... o_O

Plusquamperfekt
Lebom
Lebom
Posts: 81
Joined: Sun Mar 01, 2009 3:33 am

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Plusquamperfekt »

Any suggestions how I could romanize this without using (many) diacritics or letter combinations that contain more than three letters? ;)
Unbenannt.jpg
Unbenannt.jpg (42.64 KiB) Viewed 5682 times

User avatar
Haplogy
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 325
Joined: Sat Mar 03, 2012 10:14 am
Location: Dutchland

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Haplogy »

Plusquamperfekt wrote:Any suggestions how I could romanize this without using (many) diacritics or letter combinations that contain more than three letters? ;)
I suggest you post this in the Romanization callenge thread.
Anywho:
/p pX pʼ pʷ pʷʼ b bʷ/ <p px p' pv pv' b bv>
/t tX tʼ tʷ tʷʼ d dʷ/ <t tx t' tv tv' d dv>
/t͡ʃ t͡ʃX t͡ʃʼ t͡ʃʷ t͡ʃʷʼ d͡ʒ d͡ʒʷ/ <c cx c' cv cv' dž džv>
/t͡ɕ t͡ɕX t͡ɕʼ t͡ɕʷ t͡ɕʷʼ d͡ʑ d͡ʑʷ/ <ć ćx ć' ćv ćv' dź dźv>
/k kʼ kʷ kʷʼ g gʷ/ <k k' kv kv' g gv>
/q qʼ qʷ qʷʼ ɢ ɢʷ/ <q q' qv qv' ġ ġw>
/m m̥ n n̥ ɲ ɲ̥/ <m mh n nh ń ńh>
/f fʷ/ <f fv>
/s sʷ z zʷ/ <s sv z zv>
/ʃ ʃʷ ʒ ʒʷ/ <š šv ž žv>
/ɕ ɕʷ ʑ ʑʷ/ <ś śv ź źv>
/X Xʷ ʁ ʁʷ/ <x xv ṙ ṙw>
/h/ <ḣ>
/l ɬ ʎ w ʍ r j/ <l lh lj v w r j>
/nǀ nǀʷ n̥ǀ n̥ǀʷ/ <n! n!v nh! nh!v>
/nǃ nǃʷ n̥ǃ n̥ǃʷ/ <ń! ń!v ńh! ńh!v>
Knowledge is power, and power corrupts. So study hard and be evil!

User avatar
Pinetree
Lebom
Lebom
Posts: 204
Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2012 1:55 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Pinetree »

Esmelthien wrote:
Plusquamperfekt wrote:Any suggestions how I could romanize this without using (many) diacritics or letter combinations that contain more than three letters? ;)
I suggest you post this in the Romanization callenge thread.
Anywho:
/p pX pʼ pʷ pʷʼ b bʷ/ <p px p' pv pv' b bv>
/t tX tʼ tʷ tʷʼ d dʷ/ <t tx t' tv tv' d dv>
/t͡ʃ t͡ʃX t͡ʃʼ t͡ʃʷ t͡ʃʷʼ d͡ʒ d͡ʒʷ/ <c cx c' cv cv' dž džv>
/t͡ɕ t͡ɕX t͡ɕʼ t͡ɕʷ t͡ɕʷʼ d͡ʑ d͡ʑʷ/ <ć ćx ć' ćv ćv' dź dźv>
/k kʼ kʷ kʷʼ g gʷ/ <k k' kv kv' g gv>
/q qʼ qʷ qʷʼ ɢ ɢʷ/ <q q' qv qv' ġ ġw>
/m m̥ n n̥ ɲ ɲ̥/ <m mh n nh ń ńh>
/f fʷ/ <f fv>
/s sʷ z zʷ/ <s sv z zv>
/ʃ ʃʷ ʒ ʒʷ/ <š šv ž žv>
/ɕ ɕʷ ʑ ʑʷ/ <ś śv ź źv>
/X Xʷ ʁ ʁʷ/ <x xv ṙ ṙw>
/h/ <ḣ>
/l ɬ ʎ w ʍ r j/ <l lh lj v w r j>
/nǀ nǀʷ n̥ǀ n̥ǀʷ/ <n! n!v nh! nh!v>
/nǃ nǃʷ n̥ǃ n̥ǃʷ/ <ń! ń!v ńh! ńh!v>

alman
Niš
Niš
Posts: 3
Joined: Thu Mar 10, 2005 9:54 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by alman »

Here is my conlang's phonology, it is intended to be a naming language...

/p t k q/ <p t k q>
/b d g/ <b d g>
/m n/ <m n>
/r ʀ/ <r>
/s ʃ x ɣ χ/ <s sh kh gh qh>
/l ɮ/ <l lh>
/tʃ dʒ/ <ch j>
/j/ <y>

/i y e ø a u o i: y: e: ø: a: u: o:/ <i ü e ö a u o ii üü ee öö aa uu oo>

There is a simple front-back harmony system:

front vowels: e ö ü
back vowels: a o u
neutral vowels: i

Comments?

User avatar
Haplogy
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 325
Joined: Sat Mar 03, 2012 10:14 am
Location: Dutchland

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Haplogy »

Okay, you got me. I'll try again.

/nǀ nǀʷ n̥ǀ n̥ǀʷ/ <nʇ nʇv ʇ ʇv>
/nǃ nǃʷ n̥ǃ n̥ǃʷ/ <nʗ nʗv ʗ ʗv>

/nǀ nǀʷ n̥ǀ n̥ǀʷ/ <n! n!v t! t!v>
/nǃ nǃʷ n̥ǃ n̥ǃʷ/ <ń! ń!v c! c!v>
Knowledge is power, and power corrupts. So study hard and be evil!

User avatar
Nortaneous
Sumerul
Sumerul
Posts: 4544
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2009 1:52 am
Location: the Imperial Corridor

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Nortaneous »

just write it as americanist
Siöö jandeng raiglin zåbei tandiüłåd;
nää džunnfin kukuch vklaivei sivei tåd.
Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei. Chei.

User avatar
Pinetree
Lebom
Lebom
Posts: 204
Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2012 1:55 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Pinetree »

I made this to somewhat emulate the sound and visual aesthetic of the insular Scandinavian languages (Icelandic and Faroese) - Could I have suggestions as to what more I can do with the allophony?
Consonants:
Nasals: /m n ŋ/ <m n ng>
Plosives: /p b t d k g/ <p b t d k g>
Fricatives: /ɸ β s z x/ <f v s z h>
Affricates: /pɸ bβ ts dz/ <pf bv ts dz>
Flaps: /ɾ/ <r>
Approximants: /j l w/ <ð l ǵ>
Vowels:
"Thin" Vowels: /ø y/ ö ü
"Plain" Vowels: /a ɛ ɪ ɔ ʊ/ <a e i o u>
"Broad" Vowels: /ɔa ɛj ʊi ɔu ʉu/ <á é í ó ú>
Allophony:
Voiceless plosives and affricates are preaspirated following a vowel (this carries through across word and syllable boundaries).
All obstruents palatalize prior to thin vowels, and labialize before broad vowels. No similar process occurs before plain vowels.

User avatar
Rekettye
Sanci
Sanci
Posts: 30
Joined: Tue Sep 18, 2012 3:27 pm
Location: Elindotia

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Rekettye »

Hubris Incalculable wrote:I made this to somewhat emulate the sound and visual aesthetic of the insular Scandinavian languages (Icelandic and Faroese) - Could I have suggestions as to what more I can do with the allophony?
Consonants:
Nasals: /m n ŋ/ <m n ng>
Plosives: /p b t d k g/ <p b t d k g>
Fricatives: /ɸ β s z x/ <f v s z h>
Affricates: /pɸ bβ ts dz/ <pf bv ts dz>
Flaps: /ɾ/ <r>
Approximants: /j l w/ <ð l ǵ>
Vowels:
"Thin" Vowels: /ø y/ ö ü
"Plain" Vowels: /a ɛ ɪ ɔ ʊ/ <a e i o u>
"Broad" Vowels: /ɔa ɛj ʊi ɔu ʉu/ <á é í ó ú>
Allophony:
Voiceless plosives and affricates are preaspirated following a vowel (this carries through across word and syllable boundaries).
All obstruents palatalize prior to thin vowels, and labialize before broad vowels. No similar process occurs before plain vowels.
Your "broad vowels" are almost identical, both orthographically and phonetically, to the Faroese ones. So that's good if you're going for Faroese-style.
I think there is generally more preaspiration in Icelandic - in Faroese it's only before orthographic double consonants (i.e. after short vowel nuclei).
The weirdest things are /pɸ bβ/ - are they even attested?
Now why use <ǵ> for /w/, unless you're copying Faroese etymological orthography which indicates sounds lost from Old Norse?

EDIT: If this is a posteriori and meant to be another branch of Old Norse that developed separately but in a generally Insular way, then the question of orthography is fine of course. But if it's an a priori lang meant to look/sound like InSc, it's too copy-ish for my taste.

EDIT 2: I see that [pɸ] is attested allophonically in Taos. But still weird.
Low Pr. kalbeken < Lith. kalbėti
Lith. sūris = cheese, Fr. souris = mouse... o_O

User avatar
Pinetree
Lebom
Lebom
Posts: 204
Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2012 1:55 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Pinetree »

Rekettye wrote:Your "broad vowels" are almost identical, both orthographically and phonetically, to the Faroese ones. So that's good if you're going for Faroese-style.
I think there is generally more preaspiration in Icelandic - in Faroese it's only before orthographic double consonants (i.e. after short vowel nuclei).
The weirdest things are /pɸ bβ/ - are they even attested?
Now why use <ǵ> for /w/, unless you're copying Faroese etymological orthography which indicates sounds lost from Old Norse?

EDIT: If this is a posteriori and meant to be another branch of Old Norse that developed separately but in a generally Insular way, then the question of orthography is fine of course. But if it's an a priori lang meant to look/sound like InSc, it's too copy-ish for my taste.

EDIT 2: I see that [pɸ] is attested allophonically in Taos. But still weird.
It's for an a priori language - and yes, the <ǵ> is there in imitation of Faroese. I guess I could change /pɸ bβ/ to /pf bv/, but to do that and not change /ɸ β/ to /f v/ would somewhat offend my sense of continuity... oh well.

User avatar
Rekettye
Sanci
Sanci
Posts: 30
Joined: Tue Sep 18, 2012 3:27 pm
Location: Elindotia

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Rekettye »

Hubris Incalculable wrote:It's for an a priori language - and yes, the <ǵ> is there in imitation of Faroese. I guess I could change /pɸ bβ/ to /pf bv/, but to do that and not change /ɸ β/ to /f v/ would somewhat offend my sense of continuity... oh well.
Having /pf bv/ but not /f v/ would be perfectly reasonable (the rarity of /bv/ notwithstanding), especially if /ɸ β/ were on their way to changing to /f v/ from /p b/ in certain environments.

Also, please please change the diphthongs so that it's not an exact copy of Faroese...

Also (2), the only reason Faroese has a crazy orthography is because of historical sound changes - for an a priori lang, even if you're not inventing a script, <ð g> for /j w/ is just insane. But whatever floats your boat.

EDIT: Fixed typos.
Low Pr. kalbeken < Lith. kalbėti
Lith. sūris = cheese, Fr. souris = mouse... o_O

User avatar
Pinetree
Lebom
Lebom
Posts: 204
Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2012 1:55 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Pinetree »

Rekettye wrote:Also, please please change the diphthongs so that it's not an exact copy of Faroese...
But.. I really like those diphthongs. They're beautiful.
Rekettye wrote:Also (2), the only reason Faroese has a crazy orthography is because of historical sound changes - for an a priori lang, even if you're not inventing a script, <ð g> for /j w/ is just insane. But whatever floats your boat.
Like I said when i introed it, I also want to emulate the visual aesthetic of InSk, not just the sound, so I think this is the best place to do it. But perhaps i will make them only do that intervocalically, and use different, more sensible symbols elsewhere.

User avatar
Chagen
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 707
Joined: Thu Sep 22, 2011 11:54 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Chagen »

Here's a proto-lang I want to develop from. The phonology in the daughter langs won't be such a clusterfuck, I swear:

/p pʰ pˤ b bʰ t tʰ tˤ d dʰ k kʰ kʷ kˤ g gʰ gʷ q qʰ qʷ qˤ ɢ ɢʰɢʷ/
/s f/
/ɻ/
/l j/
/n m ŋ nʷ mʷ ŋʷ/

/i a u/

And to think this started out as a Proto-Germanic rip-off. Now it looks nothing like PrGmc.

I'm not quite sure where this is gonna head, but an equivalent of Grimm's Law is gonna happen to the aspirated plosives.
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

Wattmann
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 352
Joined: Mon Jan 23, 2012 4:50 am

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Wattmann »

Chagen wrote:/ɢʰ/
Do you even know what that sound sounds like :o
Warning: Recovering bilingual, attempting trilinguaility. Knowledge of French left behind in childhood. Currently repairing bilinguality. Repair stalled. Above content may be a touch off.

tezcatlip0ca
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 385
Joined: Fri Mar 12, 2010 6:30 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by tezcatlip0ca »

Wattmann wrote:
Chagen wrote:/ɢʰ/
Do you even know what that sound sounds like :o
A breathy-voiced uvular plosive. Unattested, but plausible for a language with both voiced aspirates and uvulars.
The Conlanger Formerly Known As Aiďos

User avatar
2+3 clusivity
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 454
Joined: Fri Mar 16, 2012 5:34 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by 2+3 clusivity »

Chagen wrote:/p pʰ pˤ b bʰ t tʰ tˤ d dʰ k kʰ kʷ kˤ g gʰ gʷ q qʰ qʷ qˤ ɢ ɢʰɢʷ/
Aiďos wrote:A breathy-voiced uvular plosive. Unattested, but plausible for a language with both voiced aspirates and uvulars.
Having been the target of this complaint before . . . /ʱ/ means breathy voice. So you might want to show: /ɢʱ/ but spell <ɢʰ>. Unless you are trying to have something like a TRUE voiced aspirate as in / b͡pʰ /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southeaste ... #Phonetics.
linguoboy wrote:So that's what it looks like when the master satirist is moistened by his own moutarde.

Bachgen_Cymraeg
Niš
Niš
Posts: 7
Joined: Wed Feb 29, 2012 9:10 pm

Re: Post your conlang's phonology

Post by Bachgen_Cymraeg »

Siberian Dwarvish (second revision):
Consonants and vowels.jpg
Consonants and vowels.jpg (38.46 KiB) Viewed 5344 times
Allophony:
/l/ is realized as [ɺ] root-medially between two vowels, and as /l/ root-initially or when next to a consonant. The phoneme does not occur root-finally.
/h/ may become palatal [ç] after /i/, velar [x] after /u/, and intermediate between [ç] and [x] after /ɨ/.
/ʁ/ is a uvular approximant, but can have weak frication.

Syllable structure:
monosyllabic roots: (C)VC
disyllabic roots: (C)V(C).CVC
trisyllabic roots: (C)V(C).CV(C).CVC

Phonotactics:
Uvular consonants are illegal root-initially.
/h m n/ are illegal in the syllable coda.
/l/ is illegal in root-final codas, but may occur in non-final codas.
Close vowels are not permitted before uvular consonants.

Post Reply