Post your conlang's phonology

[Zontas]

Phonology of Yoab:

Consonants and Glides:

/m n ŋ/ m n ng/ñ
/p~b t~d k g/ p t k g
/ð f~v s z ʃ~ʒ h~ɦ/ d f s z x h
/w~ʋ j/ w y
/l r/ l r
/ts~dz tʃ~dʒ/ ts/c~dz tx/j~dj

Notes:

-There is no voicing distinction between /p/, /t/, /f/, /ʃ/, /h/, /ts/, and /tʃ/ (dynamic consonants). Other (static) consonants change voicing in certain environments, albeit allophonically and less frequently. The phoneme on the left of the tilde is the basic pronunciation.

-/n/ becomes /m/ before labial consonants and /ŋ/ before velar consonants syllable-finally. Spelling can reflect this.

-All consonants can become labialized and palatalized.

-Syllable-final /p/, /t/, and /k/ become aspirated.

-All consonants can be geminate, and all sonorants, affricattes and fricatives (except /h/) are phonetically syllabic. An acute accent over the digraph/letter or an apostrophe after the digraph/letter is used to mark this if not in isolation.

- /ʋ/ appears as an allophone of /w/ intervocally. /w/ is always retained in diphthongs.

-/ʔ/ appears allophonically between two vowels.

Vowels and Diphthongs:

/a ɑ ɛ~ɔ ə i e~o u/ a ą/a' e ȩ/e' i o u
/ai̯ ɶu̯ ɑi̯ ɒu̯ ɛi̯ (ɛu̯) (ɔi̯) ɔu̯ iə yu̯ ei̯ (eu̯) (oi̯) ou̯ uə̯ ɯi̯/ ai au ąi ąu ei (ew'/eŵ) (ey'/eŷ) eu iȩ iu oi (ow'/oŵ) (oy'/oŷ) ou uȩ ui

Notes:

-Rounding is not phonemic with vowels that have a tilde in their phonetic display.

-All vowels can be lengthened. A macron or a vowel+h represents this phenomenon.

-Outside of diphthongs, vowels are pronounced separately. A trema or an apostrophe separates them; tremas are always placed on the second element. Diphthongs in parentheses only appear in loanwords or a select few native words.

Phonotactics:

The following is the acceptable syllable formation:

(C(g))+V+(G)+(F(g))

C= Any consonant.
g= Glidalizers /ʲ/, and /ʷ/.
V= All vowels, including syllabic vowels.
G= Diphthong glide.
F= Acceptable syllable-final consonants (/n~m~ŋ/, /l/, /r/, /z/, /k/, /t/, /p/, and /g/).

Tone and Stress:

Yoab uses a six-(technically five)-tone system with; Tone 1-Low Pitch /˩/ or /˨/ (1 or 2) [marked with a grave accent], Tone 2-High Pitch /˥/ or /˦/ (5 or 4) [marked with an acute accent], and Tone 6-Neutral which varies depending on environment, but usually sounds like tone middle tone /˧/ (3) [unmarked]. All consonants (including syllabics) are tone 3.

Length is generally merged with the tone. A macron and tonal mark (if any) is used to transcribe this. Subscript numbers may be used to mark all tones, if necessary.

Stress is dynamic and forte prosody is usually on odd syllables.

Sandhi:

Combined roots can cause some pronunciation changes in fused forms that aren't mentioned above such as:

-Rounding of vowels changes depending on if the succeeding consonant is a sonorant or labial.

-Neutral tone vowels gain mimicked tone when immediately preceded by other toned vowels. Other toned vowels can do this if the meaning won't get confused.

-Centering of vowels occurs in unstressed positions. Lowering of fricative and plosive consonants happens in the same places.

-Non-High and Non-Low vowels are typically elided when adding affixes, at the end of a word, or in between complicated root formations.

-Diphthongization usually occurs when merging any vowel plus /i/, or /u/; or in the case of either of the two- /ə/. Likewise, consonants become affricatted if the first consonant is /t/ and the second is either /s/, /z/, or /ʃ/.

-Lengthening sometimes occurs if a vowel comes before itself. Likewise, consonants can be geminated when merged before themselves.

-Syllables are simplified in many combined words.

=====

What do you all think? The conlang is called Yoab and topic for it is found in the Conlangery and Conworlds section somewhere near the top, altho it might move.

If you can't find it normally just search for the 'Yoab' topic. I promise to handle criticism and constructive critique is always welcome. Again, I am deeply sorry for how I have acted.

[Chagen]

The one problem I have with that inventory is that you have front rounded vowels but no back rounded vowels. That's pretty weird. I don't know of any actual real-world examples of it (though it's probably not impossible...)

What? I have /o/. And it USED to have /u/, but it fronted into /ʉ/.

[Taernsietr]

He does have /o/. Though something looks a bit weird in that set... Could develop allophony so it doesn't like like some changes were only for the sake of being different (/ʉ ɑ/ struck me as being replacements for /u a/ ).

The consonant inventory is pretty meh though. The romanization is bad. And...

/ʊ̯/ <g>

Huh?

edit: ninja'd

[Whimemsz]

Oh, whoops. Sorry. Totally skipped over that! I don't have a huge problem with that, then.

But even ignoring the romanization issue, my new complaint is your distinguishing all three of /ʋ w ʊ̯/. That's pretty weird! Unless /ʊ̯/ is just part of diphthongs (but if that's the case why not just include them on the diphthong line of the inventory?)

[Chagen]

Huh?

Danish has the same thing for final /g/, I don't see what's so surprising. Also, I quite like the romanization I used for it besides <nl>.

[Lyktorna]

Huh?

Danish has the same thing for final /g/, I don't see what's so surprising. Also, I quite like the romanization I used for it besides <nl>.

Do you have a similar diachronic/aesthetic explanation motivating your orthography? Also, final /g/. (Actually just syllable-final, and also /v/, if Wiki is credible.) Do you have phonotactics now?

(In the event that you answer yes to either one of those, /p t k g q/ is a curious choice)

[Zontas]

@Chagen

The plosives are okay.
The fricatives are fine.
You can find something better than <nl>, but atleast you recognized your mistake.
The affricates should be <ts> and <tc> or <z> and <x> following the analogy you have.
The rest seems fine.

[Vuvuzela]

<ṇ> is usually fine for the retroflex nasal. <rn> is also used sometimes, but it's not IMHO pretty. "Rnagarrnati rnelo narnle" vs. "Ṇagarṇati ṇelo naṇle". Both are better than "Nlagarnlati nlelo nanlle"

[Chagen]

Huh?

Danish has the same thing for final /g/, I don't see what's so surprising. Also, I quite like the romanization I used for it besides <nl>.

Do you have a similar diachronic/aesthetic explanation motivating your orthography? Also, final /g/. (Actually just syllable-final, and also /v/, if Wiki is credible.) Do you have phonotactics now?

(In the event that you answer yes to either one of those, /p t k g q/ is a curious choice)

I generaly design orthographies to look appealing to myself and not to be historical or anything.

I have no phonotactics, but I can say that that non-syllabic vowel only occurs finally.

[Whimemsz]

Helios: Some of the Yoab description is confusing, so I'm not sure what you were intending by all of the comments. Nonetheless, some questions/suggestions:

*I definitely would recommend not including allophonic variation within your phoneme inventory chart. It just clutters it up and makes it harder to read. So, for instance, the second line should read: "/p t k g/ p t k g"; in your discussion below the chart, you can then explain that /p t/ have voiced allophones in certain environments.

*You don't explain the orthographic variants: when is "ng" used for /ŋ/ as opposed to "ñ", for instance?

*In which environments are the "dynamic" consonants allophonically voiced?

*I'm not positive what you mean by all sonorants, affricates, and fricatives are "phonetically syllabic". The literal meaning doesn't make a lot of sense in this context... like would a word like /tʲaz/ be phonetically [tʲaz̩]? That would be kind of bizarre.

*You write "/v/ also appears as an allophone of /w/ intervocally and syllable-finally"; but your phonotactics section doesn't permit /w/ as a possible syllable-final consonant, and you say that "/w/ is always retained in diphthongs", so somewhere here you've been inconsistent (also, remember to keep /phonemic slashes/ separate from [phonetic brackets]! You mean: [v] appears as an allophone of /w/ but /w/ remains [w] in diphthongs).

*"Rounding is not phonemic with vowels that have a tilde in their phonetic display." It took me a couple of takes to realize what you meant by this. Again, avoiding cluttering your phoneme charts with allophonic variation can help with clarity here. Just show phonemes of (say) /ɛ/ and /e/, and then explain below that the two phonemes have both rounded and unrounded variants, and describe the environmental conditioning of those variants.

*"Length is generally merged with the tone." You should elaborate on this; with no other context it's not clear what you mean.

*"Neutral tone vowels gain mimicked tone when immediately preceded by other toned vowels. Other toned vowels can do this if the meaning won't get confused." By immediately preceded, do you mean, only when there's no intervening consonant? Also, phonological changes are normally not conditioned by non-phonological considerations (including whether homophony will result). Instead, the change just applies regularly, and if it creates a problem speakers generally either alter the effects of the change analogically (which could be a possible explanation for this "mimicked tone" change's failure to apply, I suppose, depending on the exact situations you had in mind) or borrow/innovate new terms to avoid homophony, or simply drop the distinction if it's not an important one.

*What do you mean by "lowering" of fricatives and plosives? Fricatives go to approximants and plosives go to fricatives?

*"Non-High and Non-Low vowels are typically elided when adding affixes, at the end of a word, or in between complicated root formations." It's not clear which vowels you mean in all of these cases (is it root-final vowels that are elided when suffixes are added, for example?). Here and elsewhere, providing examples can really help readers interpret and understand your description.

*"Syllables are simplified in many combined words." In what ways? What are some examples?


Hopefully these questions/suggestions are helpful.

[WeepingElf]

Phonology of Yoab:

Consonants and Glides:

/m n ŋ/ m n ng/ñ
/p~b t~d k g/ p t k g
/ð f~v s z ʃ~ʒ h~ɦ/ d f s z j h
/w~v j/ w y
/l r/ l r
/ts~dz tʃ~dʒ/ ts/c~dz ch/tj~dj

Two of your phonemes (/f~v/ and /w~v/) overlap. They shouldn't.

[Zontas]

Helios: Some of the Yoab description is confusing, so I'm not sure what you were intending by all of the comments. Nonetheless, some questions/suggestions:

1.I definitely would recommend not including allophonic variation within your phoneme inventory chart. It just clutters it up and makes it harder to read. So, for instance, the second line should read: "/p t k g/ p t k g"; in your discussion below the chart, you can then explain that /p t/ have voiced allophones in certain environments.

2.You don't explain the orthographic variants: when is "ng" used for /ŋ/ as opposed to "ñ", for instance?

3.In which environments are the "dynamic" consonants allophonically voiced?

4.I'm not positive what you mean by all sonorants, affricates, and fricatives are "phonetically syllabic". The literal meaning doesn't make a lot of sense in this context... like would a word like /tʲaz/ be phonetically [tʲaz̩]? That would be kind of bizarre.

5.You write "/v/ also appears as an allophone of /w/ intervocally and syllable-finally"; but your phonotactics section doesn't permit /w/ as a possible syllable-final consonant, and you say that "/w/ is always retained in diphthongs", so somewhere here you've been inconsistent (also, remember to keep /phonemic slashes/ separate from [phonetic brackets]! You mean: [v] appears as an allophone of /w/ but /w/ remains [w] in diphthongs).

6."Rounding is not phonemic with vowels that have a tilde in their phonetic display." It took me a couple of takes to realize what you meant by this. Again, avoiding cluttering your phoneme charts with allophonic variation can help with clarity here. Just show phonemes of (say) /ɛ/ and /e/, and then explain below that the two phonemes have both rounded and unrounded variants, and describe the environmental conditioning of those variants.

7."Length is generally merged with the tone." You should elaborate on this; with no other context it's not clear what you mean.

8."Neutral tone vowels gain mimicked tone when immediately preceded by other toned vowels. Other toned vowels can do this if the meaning won't get confused." By immediately preceded, do you mean, only when there's no intervening consonant? Also, phonological changes are normally not conditioned by non-phonological considerations (including whether homophony will result). Instead, the change just applies regularly, and if it creates a problem speakers generally either alter the effects of the change analogically (which could be a possible explanation for this "mimicked tone" change's failure to apply, I suppose, depending on the exact situations you had in mind) or borrow/innovate new terms to avoid homophony, or simply drop the distinction if it's not an important one.

9.What do you mean by "lowering" of fricatives and plosives? Fricatives go to approximants and plosives go to fricatives?

10."Non-High and Non-Low vowels are typically elided when adding affixes, at the end of a word, or in between complicated root formations." It's not clear which vowels you mean in all of these cases (is it root-final vowels that are elided when suffixes are added, for example?). Here and elsewhere, providing examples can really help readers interpret and understand your description.

11."Syllables are simplified in many combined words." In what ways? What are some examples?


Hopefully these questions/suggestions are helpful.

Next time number your questions so I can answer them easier. They've been really helpful.

1,6. The allophony is almost omnipresent in those phonemes, so I mentioned it.

2. I didn't because it's not part of the phonology. They're in free variation.

3. Unvoiced in unvoiced environments, and vice versa. The dynamic vowels are rounded in rounded environments and vice versa.

4. It means those consonants have syllabicy as phonemic as in Czech or Serbian.

5. Thanks for mentioning that. It's been fixed.

7. Length is on a different axis of dividing vowels than tone.

8. Yes; The tone is mimicked standardly only if it does not create homophones.

9. Yes.

10. Aze+kana=Azkana. Non-High and Non-Low vowels mean Non-Close and Non-Open vowels.

11. Use+hiro=Usiro.

[Herr Dunkel]

11. Use+hiro=Usiro.

Is there any pattern to this, as examples are not enough, or is it that regularity took a lunch break?

Also, Chagen, welcome <3

[finlay]

10. Aze+kana=Azkana. Non-High and Non-Low vowels mean Non-Close and Non-Open vowels.

so... mid vowels?

[Solarius]

Phonology of Yoab:

Consonants and Glides:

/m n ŋ/ m n ng/ñ
/p~b t~d k g/ p t k g
/ð f~v s z ʃ~ʒ h~ɦ/ d f s z j h
/w~v j/ w y
/l r/ l r
/ts~dz tʃ~dʒ/ ts/c~dz ch/tj~dj

Two of your phonemes (/f~v/ and /w~v/) overlap. They shouldn't.

Maybe they could overlap in the allophony. Say, /f/ could be [v] between vowels, and /w/ could be [v] word-initially or something.

[WeepingElf]

Two of your phonemes (/f~v/ and /w~v/) overlap. They shouldn't.

Maybe they could overlap in the allophony. Say, /f/ could be [v] between vowels, and /w/ could be [v] word-initially or something.

Such a situation leads to a phonemic split and merger. The two [v]s become the same phoneme, while the [f] and the [w] become (parts of) separate phonemes. For instance, initial [d] and intervocalic [d] are considered the same phoneme in Spanish, even though the first is from Latin /d/ and the second from Latin /t/. The intervocalic [d] is no longer an allophone of /t/ in Spanish just because of this merger.

[Bachgen_Cymraeg]

Siberian Dwarvish revised:

/p t k q/
/ɓ ɗ/
/s ɬ ɣ h/
/m n/
/l ʁ̞/

/i ɨ u/
/e ǝ o/
/ä/

/s/ > [z] intervocalically, as shown in the spelling.
/h/ may take on weak frication consistent with the vowel preceding it.
/ʁ̞/ is a uvular approximant, but may also have weak frication.
/i ɨ u/ are lowered and merge with /e ǝ o/ before /q ʁ̞/.

Monosyllabic roots: (C)VC
Disyllabic roots: (C)V(C)CVC
Trisyllabic roots: (C)V(C)CV(C)CVC

/q ɬ l ʁ̞/ are illegal root-initially. /s h m n/ are illegal in the coda.

[Tropylium]

/ɓ ɗ ɣ ʁ̞/ kind of seems like you didn't want a voiced stop series but did not have a single plan on what to have instead.

*ʛ ʁ̞ would make some sense, but the /ɣ/ kind of stands out.

Then again: you have s z medially, so perhaps /ɣ/ is rather from similar voicing of *x; initial *x might have become /h/.

[Ouagadougou]

Ccymrant:

/m n ŋ ɴ/
m n ng nq
/p b t tʼ d ʦ ʦʼ ʣ k kʼ g q qʼ ɢ/
p b t tt d c cc j k kk g q qq gg
/s z h/
s z h
/w ɾ/
w r
/i ɨ u ɛ a ɔ/
i y u e a o

To distinguish /ɴ/+/q/ from /n/+/qʼ/, etc., a raised dot is used: nq•q vs. n•qq. The former is optional; the latter is not.
Vowels are always nasalized before a nasal consonant.
Final voiced stops devoice.
Stops adjacent to /h/ lose their voicing/ejectivization and are aspirated.
Intervocalic /z/ is pronounced /ɾ/.

Syllable structure is (C)V(K)(F), where
K=nasals + /b d w/
F=all consonants with the exceptions of /ʣ g ɢ z ɾ/

[maıráí]

Still working out what combinations are affricates and what are not.

Consonants are voiceless at the end of an utterance. (Plosives are also unrealized) Consonants are voiced otherwise.

All consonants but plosives can be long. The palatal fricative is written differently when short/long, hence the two romanizations. (The <n, nn> is a typo.)




Vowels can be short and long.

Rounding does not occur, except in certain childish, comforting, insulting, or imitative utterances. [Didn't want to erase them completely.]

Vowels can be high (á) or low (à) tone.
If similar vowels (the columns; Reds/Front, Greens/Mid, or Blues/Back) are together, all but the lowest vowel is dropped, and it becomes falling (ǎ) or rising (â). [lɛ˥ + æn˩ = læn˥˩] <lé + aèn = laên>

[Wattmann]

I wondered at first how there's no rounding in a vowel system of those dimensions... then the flashy colors ammended it all x3

[maıráí]

I wondered at first how there's no rounding in a vowel system of those dimensions... then the flashy colors ammended it all x3

That was the plan!

[legolasean]

The phonology of my language Kala. (new)

consonants
Plosive- /p t k/ - <p t k>
Nasal- /m n ŋ/ - <m n ng>
Approximant- /w l ɰ/ - <w l h>

vowels
/a i ɯ/ - <a i u>
/a˞ i˞ ɯ˞/ - <ar ir ur>
/aɪ̯ ɯʊ̯/ - <ai hu>

Tones
˦ ˨ ˩˥ ˥˩ ˦˥ ˩˨ ˧˦˧ - ā à á ȁ a̋ a᷅ a᷈

[Wattmann]

The phonology of my language Kala. (new)

consonants
Plosive- /p t k/ - <p t k>
Nasal- /m n ŋ/ - <m n ng>
Approximant- /w l ɰ/ - <w l h>

vowels
/a i ɯ/ - <a i u>
/a˞ i˞ ɯ˞/ - <ar ir ur>
/aɪ̯ ɯʊ̯/ - <ai hu>

Tones
˦ ˨ ˩˥ ˥˩ ˦˥ ˩˨ ˧˦˧ - ā à á ȁ a̋ a᷅ a᷈

First of all, can you pronounce those tones, seriously, that's too much.
Now, there's already a more famous language going by that name here. My suggestion is you rename yours, if you want that is.

[Kaenif]

The phonology of my language Kala. (new)

consonants
Plosive- /p t k/ - <p t k>
Nasal- /m n ŋ/ - <m n ng>
Approximant- /w l ɰ/ - <w l h>

vowels
/a i ɯ/ - <a i u>
/a˞ i˞ ɯ˞/ - <ar ir ur>
/aɪ̯ ɯʊ̯/ - <ai hu>

Tones
˦ ˨ ˩˥ ˥˩ ˦˥ ˩˨ ˧˦˧ - ā à á ȁ a̋ a᷅ a᷈

First of all, can you pronounce those tones, seriously, that's too much.
Now, there's already a more famous language going by that name here. My suggestion is you rename yours, if you want that is.

That's only one more than my mother lang, so that isn't the problem of too much tones. I can pronounce and distinguish them, though maybe if lego can is another problem.
I agree about the name of the language though. Maybe you can take the name as an endonym, then make up a more distinct exonym as the common name, as in how people with other languages (English, Russian, other conlangs) call it, like Carah, Kalish, or the like.