Wakeu
Posted: Mon Nov 18, 2013 2:56 pm
I have finally decided to create a Wakeu thread here on the ZBB. In this first post, I shall - not very surprisingly - deal with phonology. I'll focus on two features - the dark-light contrast, and the three-moraic morphemes.
The dark-light contrast
Wakeu has a rather limited phoneme inventory. I have nevertheless tried to through some interesting (or not so interesting...) stuff into to this limited phoneme inventory. Namely, a contrast between light (palatalised, "front") and dark (velarised or "back") consonants. The full consonant inventory looks like this:
pʲ pˠ t k <p pw t k>
bʲ bˠ j ɰ <b bw y w>
mʲ mˠ n ŋ <m mw n ng>
The above phonemes can be divided into "light" - pʲ t bʲ j mʲ n - and "dark" - pˠ k bˠ ɰ mˠ ŋ - ones.
There is also a couple of coronal phonemes, that are neutral to the light-dark opposition:
l <l>
r <r>
Wakeu has an underlying 5-vowel system - with /i/, /e/ and /a/ counting as front vowels, and /o/ and /u/ as back vowels.
The opposition between light and dark consonants is only apparent before front vowels. It is neutralised before back vowels. Typically, the consonants there take the "dark" realisation.
Three-moraic morphemes
Most common morphemes are made up of a 3-moraic foot. There are three kinds of feet:
(1) /CVːCV/ <CVCV> (Ex: <kala> kaːla "can")
(2) /CVCːV/ <CVCCV> (Ex: <kalla> /kalːa/ "shall", "must")
(3) /CVCVː/ <CVCVV> (Ex: <paraa> /paraː/ "stone")
Primary stress falls on the syllable containing the penultimate mora
Many words are compounds, made up of two (or occasionally, three or more) feet. In a typical, "headed" compound, the head morpheme is placed first, and the modifying morpheme is placed last. Only the last morpheme will retain its primary stress. What happens with the first morpheme (that has lost its stress) is that it is reduced from three to two moras.
The distinction between the three kinds of feet is thus neutralised in unstressed morphemes - all unstressed morphemes will have the form /CVCV/.
CVːCV + CVːCV -> CVCVCVːCV
CVCːV + CVːCV -> CVCVCVːCV
CVCVː + CVːCV -> CVCVCVːCV
This can lead to some homophones (though I have no examples off the top of my head right now).
There are some resources on Wakeu available:
An online grammar
A dictionary
It remains to see how much time I have to spend on this thread...
The dark-light contrast
Wakeu has a rather limited phoneme inventory. I have nevertheless tried to through some interesting (or not so interesting...) stuff into to this limited phoneme inventory. Namely, a contrast between light (palatalised, "front") and dark (velarised or "back") consonants. The full consonant inventory looks like this:
pʲ pˠ t k <p pw t k>
bʲ bˠ j ɰ <b bw y w>
mʲ mˠ n ŋ <m mw n ng>
The above phonemes can be divided into "light" - pʲ t bʲ j mʲ n - and "dark" - pˠ k bˠ ɰ mˠ ŋ - ones.
There is also a couple of coronal phonemes, that are neutral to the light-dark opposition:
l <l>
r <r>
Wakeu has an underlying 5-vowel system - with /i/, /e/ and /a/ counting as front vowels, and /o/ and /u/ as back vowels.
The opposition between light and dark consonants is only apparent before front vowels. It is neutralised before back vowels. Typically, the consonants there take the "dark" realisation.
Three-moraic morphemes
Most common morphemes are made up of a 3-moraic foot. There are three kinds of feet:
(1) /CVːCV/ <CVCV> (Ex: <kala> kaːla "can")
(2) /CVCːV/ <CVCCV> (Ex: <kalla> /kalːa/ "shall", "must")
(3) /CVCVː/ <CVCVV> (Ex: <paraa> /paraː/ "stone")
Primary stress falls on the syllable containing the penultimate mora
Many words are compounds, made up of two (or occasionally, three or more) feet. In a typical, "headed" compound, the head morpheme is placed first, and the modifying morpheme is placed last. Only the last morpheme will retain its primary stress. What happens with the first morpheme (that has lost its stress) is that it is reduced from three to two moras.
The distinction between the three kinds of feet is thus neutralised in unstressed morphemes - all unstressed morphemes will have the form /CVCV/.
CVːCV + CVːCV -> CVCVCVːCV
CVCːV + CVːCV -> CVCVCVːCV
CVCVː + CVːCV -> CVCVCVːCV
This can lead to some homophones (though I have no examples off the top of my head right now).
There are some resources on Wakeu available:
An online grammar
A dictionary
It remains to see how much time I have to spend on this thread...