From cbmvax!uunet!CUVMA.BITNET!LOJBAN Mon Mar 16 16:36:26 1992 Return-Path: Received: by snark.thyrsus.com (/\==/\ Smail3.1.21.1 #21.19) id ; Mon, 16 Mar 92 16:36 EST Received: by cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com (5.57/UUCP-Project/Commodore 2/8/91) id AA04117; Mon, 16 Mar 92 16:34:38 EST Received: from pucc.Princeton.EDU by relay1.UU.NET with SMTP (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA25070; Mon, 16 Mar 92 15:25:06 -0500 Message-Id: <9203162025.AA25070@relay1.UU.NET> Received: from PUCC.PRINCETON.EDU by pucc.Princeton.EDU (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 4636; Mon, 16 Mar 92 15:18:52 EST Received: by PUCC (Mailer R2.08 PTF011) id 4330; Mon, 16 Mar 92 15:13:21 EST Date: Mon, 16 Mar 1992 18:46:00 GMT Reply-To: cbmvax!uunet!cix.compulink.co.uk!jbdp Sender: Lojban list From: Julian Pardoe Subject: London and Laibach. X-To: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: John Cowan , Eric Raymond , Eric Tiedemann Status: RO Mark says (with regard to {la laibax.}): > Not quite. It's the syllables {la}, {lai}, or {doi}. So {lai-} blows it > anyway. Oh, I didn't know about {lai}. But {la lauzits.} would be OK? > So, incidentally, does a trick Nick has occasionally used, of replacing {la} > syllables with {la'a}. So far as I know, although the name can't start with > {'a}, the syllable {la} is still illegal. I have an ambiguous view of {a'a}-type syllables. For pronunciation I def- initely treat them as two syllables, e.g. I say {jdikyRI'a} not {JDIkyri'a}, but from a morpohological(?) point of view I'm inclined to treat them as single syllable, because of the restricted distribution of {'} and because that's how they appear to function in cmavo. So part of me wants to say that Nick's trick is OK for the same reasons that {la lauzits.} is OK: {la'a} is not the two syllables {la,'a} (just as {lau} is not {la,u}) but the single syllable {la'a} and so there can be no conflict with the syllable {la}. (Of course, pragmatically there may be a conflict, but (according to my argument) we need a separate rule to cover this case.) Mark says: > For me, I've never heard anyone who really says {lndn}. Here where I live, > the closest pronunciation is probably {LYndn} or maybe {LYndyn}, and that's > pretty much what I've heard from native speakers from the area as well, > though theirs is closer to {*landn}, which is a no-no, because of the > {la-}. In my accent (pretty much "unmarked RP" ("degenerate RP" if you ask my father!)) the two vowel sounds in the word "butter" are quite distinct in quality. (The phonetic transliteration scheme used in an American dictionary I was browsing through last year suggested that in the US the distinction is purely one of length. I found this a little unconvincing; it certainly didn't seem to be true of my host, but then she had an English father.) Most dictionaries of English English use the IPA inverted lower-case v for this "short u" sound. (It suggests a barless small caps "A".) Ivan says: > I map the six Lojban vowels to the six stressed Bulgarian vowels, and I > definitely don't hear my {a} in "London". What I hear is {lyndn.}. My presumed Lojban accent would I guess use the same vowels as my Esperanto accent. This has been described as "Polish", which I take to be a compliment. (Most English Esperantists, even experienced ones, have cringe-ri'a accents!) It's hard to be sure, but I'd say that the "a" I use (except in stressed open syllables) is closer to the English "short u" sound than to any other -- and vice versa (even taking {y} into account). > Julian: I'd accept {london} though, because that fits in with the way I > think names should be done. > Ivan: Well, I would pronounce very much unlike I pronounce "London" in > English - and I think I do that correctly. > Mark: {london} doesn't really sound too far off to me, Given that {landn} doesn't work, I vote for {londn}/{londyn} or {london} but because they *do* sound far off to me, at least "sufficiently far off". {landn} sounds like a slightly bodged "London"; {lndn} sounds like a seriously way-off-course "London" -- and because of that it grates on my ear terribly. {londn} etc. sound like "clean foreign pronunciations" and don't offend me nearly as much. -- la djuliyn. --