I return! Conlang help? [Edited: 2/9]

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Taskuhecate
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I return! Conlang help? [Edited: 2/9]

Post by Taskuhecate »

I doubt anyone will remember me, which is probably a good thing. I was around briefly about 4-ish years ago, but that idea has kind of. . .completely changed, so ignore pretty much anything I said back then!

That said, I'm having issues trying to put together these conlangs - I probably only really need five naming languages, but I'd rather have the basics down if I need to actually turn it into more. The problem is, even after four years, I am still shite at phonetics. xD I have a rough outline of what I think might work, but it's. . .very very plain. I was wondering if anyone on here might be up for helping me out. I really only need two conlangs right now, and three naming language. Tall order, I know, but that's what I get for deciding to write fantasy. I want to make the cultures more distinct, and diving into the conlangs might help me do that. I have characters already, one culture probably more fleshed out than the other, but it is all still a work in progress.

I have a rough outline of the main nation and culture within that nation that are at war, I have kind of. . .placeholder names for the others. I intend to make up a map for it later today or at least by the end of the week. Of course, the thing that is actually stopping me from writing is that I can't draw buildings and I can't imagine the stronghold well enough to describe it - it's driving me mad, honestly. Because I want it to have different bits of a few architectural styles, but I'm not sure how to fit them all together.

The conlangs, however:

C1: Essentially "common", the language of the Sūmké Empire that's basically using the sound inventory of Latin, basically pseudo Latin. Probably won't need much help there.
Consonants:
Plosives: [p] [ b ] [t] [d] [k] [g] [kʷ]
Nasals: [m] [n] [ɲ] ([ŋ])
Trill: [r]
Fricatives: [f] [s] [z] [ʃ] [h]
Affricative: [t͡s] [d͡z] [tʃ]
Lateral fricative: [ɬ]
Approximants: [ɹ] [j] [w]
Lateral approximant: [l]

Image


Vowels:
[a] [ i ] [ɛ] [ u ] [eu̯] [ae̯] [eɪ] [ɔ] [ɪ] [au̯] [ui̯] [ʊ] [oe̯] [o] [ʏ]

Image

Orthography:
<p> [p] <b> [ b ] <t> [t] <d> [d] <c/k/ch> [k] <g> [g] <qu> [kʷ] <m> [m] <n> [n] <gn> [ɲ] <n/g> ([ŋ]) <r> [r] <f> [f] <s> [s] <z/s> [z] <sc> [ʃ] <h> [h] <t> [t͡s] <z/j> [d͡z] <c> [tʃ] <l> [ɬ] <r> [ɹ] <i> [j] <u> [w] <l> [l]

<a> [a] <i> [ i ] <e> [ɛ] <u> [ u ] <eu> [eu̯] <ae> [ae̯] <é> [eɪ] <o> [ɔ] <i> [ɪ] <au> [au̯] <ui> [ui̯] <u> [ʊ] <oe> [oe̯] <o> [o] <y> [ʏ]

p b t d c/k/ch g qu m n gn n/g r f s z/s sc h t z/j c l r i u l
a i e u eu ae é o i au ui u oe o y

Long vowels are denoted by a macron.

Names in the language so far: <Talis> [talɪs], <Sūmké> [suːmkeɪ]



C2:
Consonants:
Clicks: [ǂ] [ǀ] [ǀʷ] [ǂʷ]
Plosives: [p] [ɓ] [t] [ɗ] [k] [kʷ] [q] [ʔ]
Nasals: [m] [n]
Fricatives: [s] [z] [ʃ]
Affricative: [t͡s] [tʃ]
Lateral fricative: [tɬ]
Approximants: [ɹ] [j] [w]
Not sure if I'm adding: [r]

Image
Image


Vowels:
[a] [ i ] [ɛ] [ u ] [oʊ̯] [aɪ] [eɪ] [ɔ]

Image

Orthography:
<x> [ǂ] <q> [ǀ] <xh> [ǀʷ] <qh> [ǂʷ] <p> [p] <v/b*> [ɓ] <d*> [ɗ] <t> [t] <c>*/<k> [k] <khu> [kʷ] <k>* [q] <‘> [ʔ] <m> [m] <n> [n] <s> [s] <z> [z] <ṡ> [ʃ] <ts> [t͡s] <tl> [tɬ] <ch> [tʃ] <r> [ɹ] <y> [j] <hu> [w]

a [a] i [ i ] ę [ɛ] u [ u ] o [oʊ̯] ą [aɪ] e [eɪ] ǫ [ɔ]

x q xh qh p v/b d t c*/k khu k* ‘ m n s z ṡ ts tl ch r y hu
a i ę u o ą e ǫ

Allowed consonant clusters:
skhu zy ṡy nt ns sk/sc

Three tones:
Low: à
Neutral: a
High: á

Names in the language so far: <Xo'te> [ǂoʔteɪ]



C3:
Consonants:
Plosives: [p] [ b ] [t] [d] [k] [g] [q] [ɢ]
Nasals: [m] [n] [ɲ] [ŋ]
Trill: [r]
Fricatives: [f] [v] [θ] [ð] [s] [ɕ] [h]
Affricative: [t͡s]
Lateral fricative: [ɬ]
Approximants: [ɹ] [j]
Lateral approximant: [l]

Image


Vowels:
[au] [ou] [aɪ] [ i ] [a] [e] [ʏ] [ u ] [ɞ]

Image


Orthography:
<p> [p] <b> [ b ] <t> [t] <d> [d] <k> [k] <g> [g] <kk> [q] <gh> [ɢ] <m> [m] <n> [n] <nn> [ɲ] <ng> [ŋ] <r> [r] <th> [θ] <ð> [ð] <f> [f] <v> [v] <s> [s] <sh>/<kj> [ɕ] <h> [h] <ç> [t͡s] <lh> [ɬ] <rr> [ɹ] <y> [j] <l> [l]
<á> [au] <ó> [ou] <æ> [aɪ] <i> [ i ] <a> [a] <e> [e] <u> [ʏ] <ú> [ u ] <ý> [ɞ]

p b t d k g kk gh m n nn ng r th ð f v s sh/kj h ç lh rr y j l á ó æ i a e u ú ý

Names in the language so far: <Kjárin> [ɕaurin]



I don't have anything plotted out for the other two yet, since those languages probably won't be featured too much. I imagine a lot of bilabials and labiodentals for one, and lots of liquid consonants and fricatives for the other, though.

My main problem is that I just. . .cannot hear the differences as much as I try. It takes me forever to suss it out - it's easier if I'm given letters or clusters to play with. >.<

That said, any help would be appreciated!
Last edited by Taskuhecate on Thu Feb 09, 2017 2:16 pm, edited 10 times in total.

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Zaarin
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Re: I return! Conlang help?

Post by Zaarin »

Welcome back. :) First, a note on notation: angular brackets <> indicate orthography, slashes indicate phonemes //, and square brackets indicate phones []. For example, in some American dialects one might have <car> /kær/ [kʰɛəɻ].

C2: I like your consonant inventory. Stripping out bilabials gives it a very North American feel (albeit an areal feature of the Northeast and Northwest). Regarding your orthography, are /q ǀ/ both written as <q>? Are they allophones? A second thought about orthography: if you're really going for a Mesoamerican feel, nothing says Mesoamerican like Old Spanish <x> /ʃ/, at least short of word-final -tl. ;) The vowels, however, look very...English. Specifically regarding /ɛ/: /ɛ/ is the sound in English bed; /ɛɪ̯/ is the sound in (American) English trailer; the phoneme you're looking for may be /e/ (as in Spanish <e> or French <é>).

C3: The consonant inventory doesn't really look anything like Icelandic (though that's not a bad thing), but I can definitely see the Icelandic influence in the vowels. The consonant inventory looks fine to me, except that having /ɢ/ without any other uvular consonants is very unlikely. This is the case for Farsi, but in Farsi /ɢ/ only occurs in loanwords from Arabic as the Farsi equivalent of /q/. Unless this is a similar situation where /ɢ/ occurs in borrowings from C2 /q/, I'd expect /ɢ/ to quickly become one of /g q ʔ ʁ~ʀ ʕ/. As a minor orthographic note, you might want to change <ó> to <ö> for clarity.

Hope that helps. :)
"But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?”

Taskuhecate
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Re: I return! Conlang help?

Post by Taskuhecate »

Oh geez, thanks for taking a look at it!

A lot has actually changed with it. I had a nice person from the reddit conlang discord help me out (for about 5 hours straight, they are a saint) and I just haven't had a chance to update it here. I was planning to make charts and everything... I'll probably have it up by the end of the night, though, or tomorrow at the latest. We just have to clean up the vowels for the C3 first. They even made me a keyboard for the C2 so I don't have to copy/paste all the ogonek vowels or the ṡ.


EDIT: I edited the first post with the new info!

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Re: I return! Conlang help? [Edited: 2/8]

Post by Frislander »

With the clicks, why do you only have dental and palatal? Those two seem to be the hardest to distinguish. And you only have one mode of articulation for them, when I would expect more: I'm not going to go extreme and say when you do clicks you have to have at least six different MOAs, but given the size of your consonant inventory otherwise I might expect three or four (say plain, voiced, nasal and glottalised, perhaps?).

(I don't insist on lots of series because the languages with loads of clicks also have large non-click consonant inventories, whereas your inventory is a good deal smaller than that)
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Re: I return! Conlang help? [Edited: 2/8]

Post by Hallow XIII »

Taskuhecate wrote:I doubt anyone will remember me
wrong
come back on IRC, we've been missing you
陳第 wrote:蓋時有古今,地有南北;字有更革,音有轉移,亦勢所必至。
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Read all about my excellent conlangs
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Taskuhecate
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Re: I return! Conlang help? [Edited: 2/8]

Post by Taskuhecate »

@Frislander: To be honest, those are the only two clicks I can really pronounce, and originally I started with only two, but was convinced to add the others. I'm also not sure how I'd represent them in the orthography, though I suppose with the glottalized I could add the apostrophe after the x or q thusly: <x'> <q'>. . . I'm also still a bit of a newbie to phoenetics, so I'm not entirely sure what the differences between the ones you listed sound like. ^^;;


@Hallow XIII: ...Oh dear. [cue gif of Gandalf: "I have no memory of this place..."] Also, I have no idea how to get back to the IRC channel, so if you PM with the server/channel info, I might pop on.

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Re: I return! Conlang help? [Edited: 2/8]

Post by Frislander »

Taskuhecate wrote:@Frislander: To be honest, those are the only two clicks I can really pronounce, and originally I started with only two, but was convinced to add the others. I'm also not sure how I'd represent them in the orthography, though I suppose with the glottalized I could add the apostrophe after the x or q thusly: <x'> <q'>. . . I'm also still a bit of a newbie to phoenetics, so I'm not entirely sure what the differences between the ones you listed sound like. ^^;;
The nasal is fairly easy: allow air to pass through your nose like with other nasal consonants. The glottalised one is trickier, but if you can otherwise pronounce glottalised consonants, you should be fine.

The point is that the bilabial, dental, alveolar, lateral and palatal clicks behave more as points of articulation rather than single consonants standing on their own.
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