From cbmvax!uunet!CUVMA.BITNET!LOJBAN Mon Feb 3 12:01:51 1992 Return-Path: Received: by snark.thyrsus.com (/\==/\ Smail3.1.21.1 #21.19) id ; Mon, 3 Feb 92 12:01 EST Received: by cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com (5.57/UUCP-Project/Commodore 2/8/91) id AA03060; Mon, 3 Feb 92 11:46:10 EST Received: from cunixf.cc.columbia.edu by relay1.UU.NET with SMTP (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA11882; Mon, 3 Feb 92 10:44:43 -0500 Received: from cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu by cunixf.cc.columbia.edu (5.59/FCB) id AA10692; Mon, 3 Feb 92 10:44:39 EST Message-Id: <9202031544.AA10692@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU by CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU (IBM VM SMTP R1.2.1) with BSMTP id 6351; Mon, 03 Feb 92 10:43:25 EST Received: by CUVMB (Mailer R2.07) id 5541; Mon, 03 Feb 92 10:43:18 EST Date: Sat, 1 Feb 1992 19:38:11 GMT Reply-To: Ivan A Derzhanski Sender: Lojban list From: Ivan A Derzhanski Subject: Allophones of zero in Lojban To: John Cowan , Eric Raymond , Eric Tiedemann In-Reply-To: nsn@AU.OZ.MU.EE.MULLIAN's message of Fri, 31 Jan 1992 22:37:57 +1100 <27186.9201311221@cogsci.ed.ac.uk Status: RO I wasn't bothered much when I read that Lojban was supposed to have a thing called a buffer vowel, which a speaker was permitted to insert between consonants whenever he felt like it. I wasn't bothered much when I read that this vowel was allowed to vary from speaker to speaker, and that English speakers were advised to use a sound written as /I/, and to pronounce {mlatu} as /mIlatu/. I wasn't bothered, that is, I didn't feel compelled to speak up. Still, I have to declare, on behalf of the entire body of Slavic- tongued people, that while we have some sympathy for those who have trouble pronouncing word-initial /ml/ (a cluster we take for granted), we will have to undergo some special training to learn to distinguish /I/ from /i/. I personally can't tell them apart, all my linguistic training nonwithstanding. I'm generally opposed to the idea of a buffer vowel, because I think it would make word recognition much more difficult. I would favour an epenthetic schwa, say, {.ymlatu}, where the listener would naturally delete the {.y-} as a semantically empty space filler. Ivan