| other
as a phonemic unit. It may be used incidentally or expressly. |
| The
incidental use is predictable and is dependent on environment. It
occurs in the following ways: |
(i)
If the adjacent sound is a nasal, the vowels in the neighbourhood,
in case of [ ]
the preceding and in case of [m] and [n] the follwing are very frequently
nasalized. In such cases the nasals are retained fully and the nasalization
is used as colouring. The examples like [ ga]
and [mõ)]
have been given above. |
(ii)
Even if there is no adjacent nasal sound, the vowels may be nasalized
and may occur in free variation with ono-nasalized ones, so as the
Munda natives may accept both the words as the same, e.g., [ i: i]
ore [ :i]
‘brave’. Such examples are, however, rare and more common
words of this type have expressly used nasalization. |
| (iii)
In cases where the sound following the nasal is not homorganic, the
vowel preceding nasal becomes nasalized as in examples like [hõnļa],
[dćnsi]. Here a nasal is optionally dropped if the vowel is nasalized.
In such cases the contact for the nasal may become so laz as to replace
the nasal totally, so that the words remain like [hõja] or [dćsi]. |
(iv)
After an intervocalic [ ],
where the preceding vowel is a nasalized one, the following also may
incidentally and arbitrarily be nasalized as in [søć]
‘intelligent’ and the like. |
| But,
apart from the above categories of the redundant nasalization, the
expressly used variety is in abundance in Mundari speech and is of
the following types: |
| (i)
In such cases where the incidental use has become universally accepted
or the historical restoration of the nasal is not possible, the nasalized
vowels are used without the contact of anasal
stop and the non-nasalized form will be unacceptable to the Mundas.
For example: [kõ]
‘to be’, [ļi):]
‘to smell’, [si)]
‘the pubic hair’ etc. |
| (ii)
The final [n] may be replaced completely by nasalization over the
preceding vowel if it is a long one and occurs in the same syllable.
Such replacement is more observable in the single syllabled word as
in the examples like [ļć:] ‘any’ for
[ļa:n]. |
(iii)
When preceded by a vowel sequence, [] is replaced by nasalization and the vowel sequence changes
to diphthong as in [ć ]
for [ai]
‘I’. Here the nasalization is to bring the segments into
one single syllabel. Medially, the[] even before a single vowel may be replaced by nasalization. |
| Both
types of nasalization, used incidentally or expressly can occur over
single, a diphthong as well as triphthong with the glides. |
| Now,
with all the examples and situations cited above this is quite clear
that all and any of the vowels can be nasalized and even can be so
demonstrated to show that a nasalized and a non-nasalaized conclusion
can be to set up a seris of nasalized vowels paralled to the non-nasalized
ones. But for two reasons this interpretation is to be abandoned,
firstly because the distribution for all the nasalized vowels will
be very much restriced and secondly that there will be an unnecessary
addition of so may more phonemes, which is asainst the principle of
economy. |
| The
other alternative is to set up a separate phoneme of nasalization.
But, the situation given above under expressly used nasalization will
show that even if nasalzation is stated to be phonemic and its distribution
is explained on the basis, it occurs in complementation to both [n]
and []. |
| In
environment CV: - the /n/ has allophone in nasalization. The only
problem is created by the examples given in No. (i) |
