Sounds
No complete phonological study of Korandje, systematically justified by minimal pairs, has yet been made. According to Souag (2010), the vowel system consists of lax ə, ŭ, ə̣̣ and tense a, i, u, ạ, ụ, while the consonant system is as follows:
| Labial | Coronal | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Pharyngeal | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosives | b bʷ | t tˤ d dˤ | k kʷ ɡ ɡʷ | q qʷ | (ʔ) | ||
| Affricates | ts dz | ||||||
| Approximants | w | l lˤ | j | ||||
| Fricatives | f fʷ | s sˤ z zˤ | (ʃ ʒ) | x xʷ ɣ ɣʷ | ħ ʕ | h | |
| Nasals | m mʷ | n | |||||
| Trill | r rˤ |
Items in brackets are not normally used by older speakers. A bilabial click is attested in one baby-talk word.
An earlier proposal by Nicolaï (1981), based on a very limited corpus of recordings provided by Champault, suggested a smaller phoneme inventory:
| Labial | Coronal | Palatal | Velar | Labiovelar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosives | b | t d | k ɡ | kʷ ɡʷ | ||
| Affricates | ts dz | |||||
| Approximants | l | j | w | |||
| Fricatives | f | s z | ʃ ʒ | ɣ | h | |
| Nasals | m | n | ||||
| Trill | r |
alongside pharyngealized consonants ṭ ḍ ṣ ẓ ṇ ḥ as well as x q, found mainly in loanwords, and a six-vowel system: a, i, u, e, o, and ə (schwa).
Read more about this topic: Korandje Language
Famous quotes containing the word sounds:
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—Anna Howard Shaw (1847–1919)
“O to dream, O to awake and wander
There, and with delight to take and render,
Through the trance of silence,
Quiet breath;
Lo! for there, among the flowers and grasses,
Only the mightier movement sounds and passes;
Only winds and rivers,
Life and death.”
—Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894)
“A flutist who is moved to tears by his own performance will soon make the listeners laugh because of the sounds that he produces.”
—Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)