Re: Glottal Stops and word-initial vowels

On Sunday, January 11, 2004, at 08:37  AM, Roger Mills wrote:
> Daniel D. Hicken wrote:
>> Is it a given that word initial vowels cause humans to use a glottal
>> stop
>> such as in /?{p@l/ apple, or /?{lo/ French 'Allo'  Or is it more
>> frequently found that there are not?
>
> From my limited experience:  Germanic langs. yes, though not
> necessarily in
> English**; Romance langs. no (except for French hache aspirée just
> mentioned), they elide their vowels.  Indonesian and most of its
> relatives
> yes, eliding vowels is a no-no.  Hawaiian and some other Oceanic
> langs. have
> contrastive 0 vs ? initial, which IMO must be very hard to hear (the ?
> in those cases is < *k).
Rokbeigalmki has very limited constractive 0 vs /?/:
/?i/ = female prefix
/i/ = 'and'


-Stephen (Steg)
  "challah is a twisted experience."