Re: THEORY: NATLANGS: Phonology and Phonetics: Tetraphthongs, Triphthongs, Diphthongs

R A Brown skrev:
> Tristan Alexander McLeay wrote:
>
>> On 26/05/06, Eldin Raigmore <eldin_raigmore@...> wrote:
>>
>>> [QUESTIONS 1]
>>>
>>> Questions;
>>>
>>> Aren't most diphthongs either
>>> pre-palatalizations (rising diphthong with a [i] or [j] on-glide), or
>>> pre-labializations (rising dipththong with a [u] or [w] on-glide), or
>
>
> I think you're probably right saying 'most'. Indeed, if they actually
> begin with [w] or [j] some people IIRC question whether they are
> diphthongs at all, and not just CV combos. It depends IMO on the
> phonotactics of the language. If [j] and/or [w] occur _only_ and as
> allophones of /i/ and /u/ then we should, I think, call them diphthongs.
There are of course other possible criteria as well.
I would like to see English [ju] as a diphthong since
there are no other jV sequences that can appear after
a consonant or consonant cluster, and in particular
after an initial consonant or consonant cluster.
To be sure sequences like [j@] do occur in words
like _barbarian_, but AFAIU they are still in free
variation with disyllabic [i@] or [I@] sequences
depending on style and tempo, which [ju] is not.

> The _convention_ of writing standard English diphthongs as /aj/, /aw/
> etc is, as I've understood it, merely an 'ASCIIfication' of those
Not necessarily.  I'd rather see them as an exploitation of the
fact that there otherwise are no V+semivowel+C or V+semivowel+#
sequences.  NB that some such analyses use /eh/ etc. for [e@]
etc. on the same kind of distributional grounds.  I've even
seen an analysis of French that saw the liaision(sp?)-preventing
|h| and the mute |e| as realizations of the same phoneme!

> representation where the second element is denoted by a [i] or [u] with
> the small inverted breve beneath it. Those diphthongs are also often
> denoted as [ai] and [au] or as [aI] and [aU]. In normal speech the
> tongue rarely, if ever, reaches that second position. For example,
> English /aj/ is often realized (by those who actually use a diphthong)
> as [aI] or [ae], with the second element being non-syllabic.
It is definitely [ae] to my ear, but my L1 has no [I]
and no true diphthongs -- e.g. |aj| being [Az\] as
often as not.  I am a semi-native speaker of German,
but I've seen German |ei| transcribed as [ae] as well...

--
/BP 8^)>
--
Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se

    "Maybe" is a strange word.  When mum or dad says it
    it means "yes", but when my big brothers say it it
    means "no"!

                            (Philip Jonsson jr, age 7)

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