Message-Id: <199510270659.AAA20716@teal.csn.net>
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Date: Fri, 27 Oct 1995 00:42:43 -0600
To: John Cowan <cowan@LOCKE.CCIL.ORG>
From: cbogart@quetzal.com (Chris Bogart)
Subject: Re: Incredible!
Status: OR

>la .and. cusku di'e
>> There are 2 kinds of syllable, C(@) and CV. @ is schwa and can be
>> omitted between certain consonant pairs. Cmavo are all of form CV
>> or CVCV or CVCVCV, etc. Gismu are all of form C(@)CV (with 17 C
>> and 5 V, that gives 1445 possible gismu; Lojban actually has 7 V
>> phonemes and 22 C phonemes, so that gives 2904 possible gismu).

Guaspi does something similar -- its gismu are monosyllabic but can have 
several consonants at the beginning and end; also it counts some liquids and 
things as vowels, I think.  The use of tones for syntax probably allows some 
overlap between cmavo and gismu -- not sure about that though.

I don't know how the numbers work out for guaspi, but in your scheme you've 
got the gismu space packed pretty tightly.  (1300 gismu out of 1445 or 2904 
possible words)  I wonder how far you can go with that before the lack of 
redundancy makes it hard to speak the language in a noisy room or over the 
phone.  The cmavo are already like that, but I only actually use and 
understand about half of them (less?) so it's hard to know if they'll cause 
that problem yet.

What if we constructed the gismu CCVCV/CVCCV as they are now, generated from 
the six source languages, but constrained in such a way as to make the CCV 
portion unique for each gismu.  That CCV part would then be the only rafsi 
for that gismu.  I don't think that is possible without using your nalmelbi 
[pe'i .u'u] consonant cluster scheme, though.  Timothy Miller's Ferengi 
language takes the approach of jamming consonants together willy-nilly with 
schwas as needed, and it's not a pretty sight (sorry, Timothy!)  Could we 
eke out 1300 by allowing a few more consonant combinations, 3-letter combos 
("str") and adding syllabic liquids and sibilants?  Throwing "th" and "dh" 
into the alphabet?  Umlauts?  Tones?  Clicks?  Farts and armpit noises? 
*Anything* but random consonant clusters! :-)

[pe'i morphology changes are worth discussing, but I don't actually advocate 
any change.  se'i the language is sufficient as is -- za'a we're only 
suggesting changes because the jai za'o schedule is giving us too much time 
on our hands to be perfectionists.]