Date: Wed, 7 Jan 1998 06:42:50 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199801071142.GAA02458@locke.ccil.org> Reply-To: Logical Language Group Sender: Lojban list From: Logical Language Group Subject: Re: lojban 'a' X-To: lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu To: John Cowan X-Mozilla-Status: 0011 Content-Length: 1426 X-From-Space-Date: Wed Jan 7 06:42:51 1998 X-From-Space-Address: LOJBAN@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU >While we're on the subject, does anyone have a chart showing the >distingushing characteristics of the lojban phonemes? Especially the >vowels. > >I'm also curious about a chart of minimally contrastive pairs, and >what, if any, allophones exist. The book, Chapter 3, goes into this at considerable length. No chart, though, as I recall. Minimally contrasting pairs is not especially useful for defining Lojban phonetics. All possible values of CV for Lojban consonants and vowels are valid words, and hence provide a comprehensive set of totally meaningless minimal pairs except for the VV diphthings, and those can be covered by any number of CVV words, most of which are also valid words. In general the vowels are defined as being ideally at positional extremes: hi front, hi back, mid front, mid back, and open, all preferably tense to contrast with the lax medial y. Roundedness is not significant. The 5 Romance vowels are probably good examples for a/e/i/o/u. lojbab ---- lojbab lojbab@access.digex.net Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc. 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273 Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: ftp.access.digex.net /pub/access/lojbab or see Lojban WWW Server: href="http://xiron.pc.helsinki.fi/lojban/" Order _The Complete Lojban Language_ - see our Web pages or ask me.