User:Selguha/Lido phonotactics

This page contains drafts for a loglang/auxlang project I am currently calling Lido (for 'Lojban-ido'). Lido has barely any syntax or lexicon yet; it is being built from the phonology up.

Background

Lido has the following inventory. Throughout the rest of this document, Lido orthography rather than IPA will be used.

Lido consonant graphemes and phonemes

		Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	unvoiced	p	t	c  t͡ʃ	k
	voiced	b	d	j d͡ʒ~ʒ	g
Fricative	unvoiced	f	s	x ʃ	h x~h
	voiced	v	z
Nasal		m	n
Lateral			l
Rhotic			r
Semivowel		w		y j

Lido employs a tiered phonological system, with multiple levels representing points along a scale from 'foreign and unassimilated' to 'native.' There are three primary levels: I, II and III. These pertain to the following lexical classes: names, culturally specific loanwords, native words. Each level has its own phonotactics, along with other constraints.

Such a baroque system (which this undeniably is) is sure to receive criticism. I believe that it is necessary in order to balance faithfulness to source languages with the desired restrictiveness, that is, simplicity, of this auxlang-like phonology. However, this argument has yet to be fleshed out, and I am quite open to being persuaded that certain aspects of the tiered system are unnecessarily complex.

Level I: Names

This is numbered as the first level for two reasons: because it represents a 'baseline' of what is phonologically 'intelligible' or parsable to the prototypical Lido speaker, and because it has the fewest constraints. Level I phonotactics are based heavily on English. Syllable structure is maximally (C)CCVVCC(C), where the first and last consonants are only possible word-initially and word-finally, respectively. At least the first consonant of a word, and possibly the last, is able to syllabify with a vowel from an adjacent word.

Stress may occur in four patterns: penultimate, ultimate, antepenultimate, preantepenultimate -- from most to least native/unmarked.

Level II: Loanwords

This level corresponds to Lojban's zi'evla word-class. It pertains to words whose meaning is too specialized or culturally specific for them to have native root-word forms.

All words have final vowels; stress is penultimate. There are a few exceptional ways in which Level II is more constrained than particular sublevels of Level III.

Level III: Native words

This level includes three sub-levels for the three primary classes of Lido word: compound words, root words and function words. These are numbered IIIa, IIIb and IIIc respectively, indicating an increasing number of phonological constraints as maximal nativeness is approached. In general, Level III is characterized by relatively small sets of possible onsets and heterosyllabic clusters, and a maximal syllable template of CCV(V|C).

All words have final vowels and penultimate stress, except for 'emphatic' allomorphs of function words. These latter word-forms have a final glottal stop and ultimate stress. (Elsewhere, glottal stop is not phonemic, and its status as a phoneme in the language is marginal.)

Heterosyllabic clusters

Figure 1: Word-medial clusters of Level III

	p	b	f	v	m	t	d	s	z	n	l	r	c	j	x	k	g	h
p						pt		ps		pn	pl	pr			px
b							bd		bz	bn	bl	br		bj
f						ft		fs		fn	fl	fr			fx
v							vd		vz	vn	vl	vr		vj
m	mp	mb	mf	mv		mt	md	ms	mz	mn	ml			mj	mx
t								ts				tr
d									dz			dr
s	sp				sm	st				sn	sl					sk
z					zm		zd			zn	zl
n						nt	nd	ns	nz		nl		nc	nj		nk	ng	nh
l	lp	lb	lf	lv	lm	lt	ld	ls	lz	ln			lc	lj	lx	lk	lg	lh
r	rp	rb	rf	rv	rm	rt	rd	rs	rz	rn	rl		rc	rj	rx	rk	rg	rh
c
j					jm		jd			jn	jl	jr
x	xp				xm	xt				xn	xl	xr	xc			xk
k						kt		ks		kn	kl	kr			kx
g							gd		gz	gn	gl	gr		gj
h						ht		hs		hn	hl	hr			hx

Key

Color	Meaning
Light green	Clusters that are both legal heterosyllabic clusters in Level III and legal word-final clusters in Level I.
Light blue	Clusters that are not legal word-final clusters in Level I, but are legal heterosyllabic clusters in Level III.
Indigo	Clusters that are legal onsets as well as intervocalic clusters in Level III.

Figure 2: Word-medial clusters of Level II [WORK IN PROGRESS]

	p	b	f	v	m	t	d	s	z	n	l	r	c	j	x	k	g	h
p			pf		pm	pt		ps		pn	pl	pr	pc		px	pk		ph
b				bv	bm		bd		bz	bn	bl	br		bj			bg
f	fp				fm	ft		fs		fn	fl	fr	fc		fx	fk		fh
v		vb			vm		vd		vz	vn	vl	vr		vj			vg
m	mp	mb	mf	mv		mt	md	ms	mz	mn	ml			mj	mx
t								ts				tr
d									dz			dr
s	sp				sm	st				sn	sl					sk
z					zm		zd			zn	zl
n						nt	nd	ns	nz		nl		nc	nj		nk	ng	nh
l	lp	lb	lf	lv	lm	lt	ld	ls	lz	ln			lc	lj	lx	lk	lg	lh
r	rp	rb	rf	rv	rm	rt	rd	rs	rz	rn	rl		rc	rj	rx	rk	rg	rh
c
j					jm		jd			jn	jl	jr
x	xp				xm	xt				xn	xl	xr	xc			xk
k	kp		kf		km	kt		ks		kn	kl	kr	kc		kx			kh
g		gb		gv	gm		gd		gz	gn	gl	gr		gj
h	hp		hf		hm	ht		hs		hn	hl	hr	hc		hx	hk

Key

Color	Meaning
Yellow	Clusters that are legal heterosyllabic clusters in Level II and Level IIIa.
Light green	Clusters that are both legal heterosyllabic clusters in Level III and legal word-final clusters in Level I.
Light blue	Clusters that are not legal word-final clusters in Level I, but are legal heterosyllabic clusters in Level III.
Indigo	Clusters that are legal onsets as well as intervocalic/word-medial clusters in Level III.