Re: CHAT: weird names

On Thu, 5 Aug 1999, Adam Parrish wrote:

>         I'm beginning to favour <j> for /j/ as well -- mostly because it
> frees up <y> to represent a vowel.  In Doraya, <j> represents both /j/
> and /I/, which makes words that begin with a /jI/ very ugly, such as in
> the word _yyl_ 'ugly' :) I'd like to change it so that <j> represents
> /j/, but "Doraja" just doesn't look right to me . . .
Do as I did, and define /j/ after a vowel as a vowel. I don't spell
"Hayan" (the name of a noble family) as "Hajan" either: the diphthong
/aj/ is "ay" or "ai". The difference has historical reasons; also, in
southern dialects, "ay" is longer and somewhat flatter ([A:j] versus
[aj]), and in all dialects "ai" is always stressed even if it's in an
otherwise unstressed position, like in the second syllable of a
two-syllable word (contrast the names Valain [va'lajn] and Valyn
['valIn]; most of these words are names).

   Irina

            Varsinen an laynynay, saraz no arlet rastynay.
                     irina@rempt.xs4all.nl (myself)
       http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt/irina/index.html (English)
    http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt/irina/backpage.html (Nederlands)