Message-Id: <199602161223.HAA09008@locke.ccil.org>
Date:         Fri, 16 Feb 1996 06:47:45 -0500
Reply-To: Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
Sender: Lojban list <LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET>
From: Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>
Subject:      Re: loglan rapprochement orthography
To: John Cowan <cowan@LOCKE.CCIL.ORG>
Content-Length: 1678

>I understood that every letter corresponds uniquely to one phoneme.

We are getting into lingusitic convention here. I have always presumed that
diphthongs in  linguistics are a single sound, and hence it is
meaningful to
say that a diphthong is a single phoneme.  If so, then no, neither TLI
Loglan or Lojban has all phonemes represented by a single letter, because
linguists I  THINK would say that the word "oi" consistes of a
 single phoneme.
If you extend it into two phonemes, you will phonologically insert a glide
of some kind, in which case the result is no longer 2 phonemes but 3, becaus eth
the glides are all phonemic in Lojban as well: "o'i o,ui o,ii. are distinct.

JCB in later years violated audiovisual isomorphism.  In his current language,
syllabic consonants are written as singl letters EXCEPT in fu'ivla, when they
must be written with doubled letters.  Our rapprochement does NOT allow this -
if we use "rr" for syllabic r, then we use it everywhere for syllabic r.

>Do I misunderstand? Does the second phoneme in <bo> (both orthographies)
>occur in the word <lau> (standard standard)?

Official Lojban says no, but we choose not to argue with JCB whether the
sound in that diphthong is o or u.  The Lojban phoneme is represented by
au/ao and is a single phoneme, if I understand what phonemes are (always
a questionable proposition, especilly when arguing with you %^)

We HAVE changed position in recent years regarding the phonemic effect
of comma.  Current policy is that "rl" and r,l" are the same word even
though one is pronounced as a single syllable and the other as two syllables.
It used to be that the two could be different words.

lojbab