Only slightly different words

[Skomakar'n]

After a nice Skype conversation tonight with fellow conlangers, I realised just how many proper words you can get in Swedish if you take a simple pattern and just change the vowel. Let me state some examples, and you can come up with your own ones.

H-T

• hat – hate
• hot – threat
• hut – 'veta hut' means 'to know one's place'; the word is not used alone
• höt – alternative form of 'höet', meaning 'the hay'
• het – hot
• hit – hither

-L

• öl – beer, ale
• al – alder (the tree)
• ål – eel
• yl – howl, cry
• el – electricity
• il – something cold and quick, like in the wind or sore teeth

M-S

• mås – gull
• mas – don't know the exact translation, but some man from the government, come to force you to pay a debt
• mys – cuddle, coze, cuddle!, coze!
• mes – wimp, coward, a type of bird
• mos – mash, sauce
• mös – cuddled, got cozy (in some dialects)
• mus – mouse (plural is 'möss', by the way; not far)

[Rui]

The typical English example is B-T

beat
boot
butte (/bjut/...not sure if this technically counts)
bit
bait
boat
but
bet
bought
bat
bot
bite
bout

[Skomakar'n]

Oh, yeah. Forgot about diphthongs. Then I can add Swedish majs (maize) to the last one too!

EDIT:
Actually, no... I didn't add möss because the vowel is short, and that matters in Swedish (mös means something different), and a diphthong doesn't fit the pattern either.

I'll make another one, instead!

H-R

• har – has (also haver)
• här – here, army
• hur – how (also huru)
• hor – prostitution
• hår – hair
• hör – hears, hear!
• Höör – a town in Scania
• hyr – hires, hire!

[Pabappa]

Rad red rid rod Rudd raid read ride road rude .... Plus roid and some nonstandard verbs with -ed.

[Skomakar'n]

I think it's a bit of cheating to mix vowel lengths and mix monophthongs and diphthongs.

[Cathbad]

I can think of some Arabic ones that change consonants instead of vowels, e.g.

ثعبان \ تعبان

tha3baan 'snake' vs. ta3baan 'tired'

قلب \ كلب

qalb 'heart' vs. kalb 'dog' (for people who don't manage the uvular q very well, our teacher has actually suggested to just use the colloquial pronunciation ?alb for 'heart', since ending up saying 'dog' instead is not very... nice)

And so on. There are scores of others, but these are the only ones I can think of right now. The classical 'vowel-based' one learners of MSA are often baffled by is ši3r 'poetry' vs. ša3r 'hair', but in a lot of cases the semantic closeness of such short vowel minimal pairs may make the distinction moot anyway.

[Ser]

Spanish only has five monophthongs, and diphthongs other than /ie ia io ue/ aren't that terribly common. So this doesn't really yield that many words...

The first sets I could find after trying various combinations of consonants:

cama "bed"
quema "it burns"
quima "tree branch" (dialectal: in some parts of Spain)
coma "comma"
cuma "big, curved knife" (dialectal: Central America, including San Salvador)

pata — "leg" (of an animal)
peta- — "peta-"
pita — (meaning changes wildly depending on the dialect)
pota — colloquial euphemism for puta, widely used in San Salvador; a certain type of squid
puta — "whore"; "fuck!" (as a general insult, i.e. an interjection, not a verb)

And yes, apparently there's no word with cVma or pVta with a diphthong.

EDIT: Oh! Just thought of another one.

pedo — "fart"
pido — "I beg"
podo — "I prune (a tree, etc.)"
pudo — "he was able to, he could (do sth)"
puado — the teeth (of a comb), as a sort of mass noun
puedo — "I can, I'm able to"
piado — "chirped"

I can think of some Arabic ones that change consonants instead of vowels,

Of course, this is a lot easier with consonants in Spanish. I even remember seeing in Tomás Navarro Tomás' Manual de pronunciación española (a classic work in Spanish linguists, from 1918!) a list with all the phonemes of Spanish, using actual words and changing only one of the consonants. (Can't remember how it was though.) But I guess that goes for any language?

[Skomakar'n]

I can think of some Arabic ones that change consonants instead of vowels,

Of course, this is a lot easier with consonants in Spanish. I even remember seeing in Tomás Navarro Tomás' Manual de pronunciación española (a classic work in Spanish linguists, from 1918!) a list with all the phonemes of Spanish, using actual words and changing only one of the consonants. (Can't remember how it was though.) But I guess that goes for any language?

Perhaps if you find the right word.

beta, feta, heta, leta, meta, peta, reta, veta
ås, bås, dås, fås, gås, kås, lås, mås, nås, rås, sås, tås
bäck, däck, (fick), (gick), häck, käck, läck, meck, näck, räck, säck, täck, tjeck, väck
bur, dur, fur, hur, kur, lur, mur
bök, dök, hök, kök, lök, mök, pök, rök, sök
bal, dal, gal, hal, kal, mal, tal, val
datt, fatt, (haft), katt, (latt), matt, natt, ratt, satt, (tagit), Watt

Can't come up with one so far!

[finlay]

I think it's a bit of cheating to mix vowel lengths and mix monophthongs and diphthongs.

Why's that? They're not really treated any differently by English phonology.

[Gulliver]

I think it's a bit of cheating to mix vowel lengths and mix monophthongs and diphthongs.

Why's that? They're not really treated any differently by English phonology.

Seconded. Pure vowels and diphthongs are equal.

Pat
Part*
Pot
Port*
Pit
Peat
Pet
Pate
Put
Putt
Poot
Pout

* As you may have gathered, my English is non-rhotic. Then again, even though it's a vowel sound, I would think that most people think there is an R in there, so they may not count.

Consonants:
if
it
is
in
ick (yuck)
ish (sort of)
itch
id

Be
See/Sea
Dee (letter name, river)
Gee (gee up, Binky!)
Fee
He
Key/Quay
Lee/Leigh
Me
Knee
Pea/Pee
Thee
Tea/Tee
Vee (letter name)
Wee
Ye
Zee (letter name)
Chi

[Mr. Z]

I can think of some Arabic ones that change consonants instead of vowels, e.g.

ثعبان \ تعبان

tha3baan 'snake' vs. ta3baan 'tired'

قلب \ كلب

qalb 'heart' vs. kalb 'dog' (for people who don't manage the uvular q very well, our teacher has actually suggested to just use the colloquial pronunciation ?alb for 'heart', since ending up saying 'dog' instead is not very... nice)

And so on. There are scores of others, but these are the only ones I can think of right now. The classical 'vowel-based' one learners of MSA are often baffled by is ši3r 'poetry' vs. ša3r 'hair', but in a lot of cases the semantic closeness of such short vowel minimal pairs may make the distinction moot anyway.

Another example I remember must be something like /xa:ra/ "neighborhood" vs. /X\a:ra/ "shit". There might be a /h/ or a /G/ somewhere in there, but this is how my Arabic teacher pronounces it. Now this is one minimal pair you want to know about

[linguoboy]

The typical English example is B-T

In my phonetics class, we used H-D:

had
hod
hawed
heed
head
hayed
hid
hide
HUD (a US government agency)
hood
hoed
hued

Or something like that. Somewhere I think I still have spectrogrammes of my vowels circa 1989. I would love to find them again and see just how much living in Chicago has altered my accent.

[finlay]

Be
See/Sea
Dee (letter name, river)
Gee (gee up, Binky!)
Fee
He
Key/Quay
Lee/Leigh
Me
Knee
Pea/Pee
Thee
Tea/Tee
Vee (letter name)
Wee
Ye
Zee (letter name)
Chi

Ghee
She

the only gaps seem to be /θi, ri, ʒi/ and obviously /ŋi/, but 're' is a normally-bound derivational morpheme that's used in email terminology as a standalone word indicating a reply topic – you just wouldn't normally hear it said out loud.

[MisterBernie]

and obviously /ŋi/

I thought we'd agreed that [ŋ] is the non-initial allophone of /h/


For German, one that came to mind is the pattern f-len, though you have to allow for inflected forms:
fallen [a] - fall
fahlen [aː] - pale.PL
fällen [ɛ] - fell
fehlen [eː] - be absent
vielen [iː] - many.PL
vollen [ɔ] - full.PL
Fohlen [oː] - foal
füllen [ʏ] - fill
fühlen [yː] - feel
feilen [aɪ̯] - rasp
faulen [aʊ̯] - rot
Fäulen [ɔɪ̯] - decay.PL
so /ɪ/, <ö> and both /u/s are the lacking ones, and I admit the /ɔɪ̯/ one may be slightly constructed

[linguoboy]

're' is a normally-bound derivational morpheme that's used in email terminology as a standalone word indicating a reply topic – you just wouldn't normally hear it said out loud.

I have, though, and I've even said it.

[Rui]

Also from German:

Buten - butylene (according to my dictionary. I've never heard the word, since I've never been in a chemistry class in Germany)
bieten - (to) offer
bitten - (to) ask
Bütten - hand-made paper (Duden says this is rarely used)
beten - (to) pray
böten - (we/they) would offer (probably rarely used, esp. in speech. würde bieten is prefered)
boten - (we/they) offered, Boten - messengers
Betten - beds (dative), bedding
baten - (we/they) asked
(bäten - (we/they) would ask, for those who distinguish it from beten)
Beuten - plural of prize/booty etc.
bauten - (we/they) built

I'm probably forgetting one or two (or possibly more)...they would be /y:/, /œ/, /ʊ/, /ɔ/, /a/, /ɑe/


In Mandarin, this exercise works a little too well.

[MisterBernie]

Buten - butylene (according to my dictionary. I've never heard the word, since I've never been in a chemistry class in Germany)

That one's [buˈteːn], though, so it's not quite a minimal pair.

There's also Butten for /ʊ/ as flatfish-DAT.PL

[Rui]

Buten - butylene (according to my dictionary. I've never heard the word, since I've never been in a chemistry class in Germany)

That one's [buˈteːn], though, so it's not quite a minimal pair.

There's also Butten for /ʊ/ as flatfish-DAT.PL

Durrrrrrr -_- Should've noticed that. Duden says there's a word used in northern Germany "buten" that means "outside"...http://www.duden.de/suchen/dudenonline/buten

Also, I totally forgot about Butten...the only reason I know it is because I used to know a guy whose last name was Buttke, and he told me it was some word for fish.

[linguoboy]

Buten - butylene (according to my dictionary. I've never heard the word, since I've never been in a chemistry class in Germany)

That one's [buˈteːn], though, so it's not quite a minimal pair.

What about booten? Or is that too slangy?

[MisterBernie]

What about booten? Or is that too slangy?

Eh, fuck slanginess, it's allowed I just never use it, hence why I didn't think of it.

We could also add failen to the f-ln group, then...

[finlay]

're' is a normally-bound derivational morpheme that's used in email terminology as a standalone word indicating a reply topic – you just wouldn't normally hear it said out loud.

I have, though, and I've even said it.

I have too, actually... I just can't put my finger on why it doesn't feel "right".

[Bob Johnson]

're' is a normally-bound derivational morpheme that's used in email terminology as a standalone word indicating a reply topic – you just wouldn't normally hear it said out loud.

I have, though, and I've even said it.

I have too, actually... I just can't put my finger on why it doesn't feel "right".

because it's latin? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_re

[Skomakar'n]

I think it's a bit of cheating to mix vowel lengths and mix monophthongs and diphthongs.

Why's that? They're not really treated any differently by English phonology.

We should do all of the English ones from an Australian standpoint.

[sucaeyl]

Teen /tin/
Tin /tɪn/
Ten /tɛn/
Tan /tæn/
Tarn* /tan/
Tawn...y /ˈtɑni/
Ton /tʌn/
Torn• /tɔn/
Too...sh /tʊʃ/
Tune /tun/
Turn /tɝn/

Tain...t /teɪnt/
Tine /taɪn/
Tone /toʊn/
Town /taʊn/
Tarn /taɹn/
Torn /tɔɹn/

*Not my dialect. Yes, yes, everything should be in square brackets.

[----]

For Vietnamese, you can have a lot of words with all the same consonants, but different tones.

ma- funeral, ghost/spirit
mà- relative pronoun
má- mother, cheek, centella (a type of flower)
mả- tomb/grave
mã- horse, cipher/code, varnish, appearance
mạ- a grain of rice, to plate (coat in a metal or other covering)

or the same tone and initial consonant, but different vowels.
da- hide, pelt, leather
de- cinnamon
dê- goat, satyr
di- to leave behind; to crush with the feet
do- because of...
du- to walk; to push
dơ- dirty; to raise (one's hand)
dư- odd (i.e. there were about 50 odd people there)

This isn't even getting into the ~25 diphthongs that the language has