Incidentally,
both these non-syllabic vowels are the second elements of the
complex nuclei (diphthongs) e.g.,
|
/w/ : [ ] |
[b si] |
/bowsi/ |
‘buffalo’ |
|
[g ri] |
[gwri]1 |
‘pig’1 |
|
|
|
|
| [w] |
[wUl] |
/wul/ |
‘wool’ |
|
[ra.tipuwa] |
/ratipurwa/ |
‘dawn’ |
|
|
|
|
| /y/ : [i] |
[m la] |
/moyla/ |
‘dust’ |
|
[m] |
/moy/ |
‘I’ |
|
[ta] |
/tay/ |
‘she/he’ |
|
|
|
|
| [y] |
[ya.te] |
/ya.te/ |
‘here’ |
|
[beya] |
/beya/ |
‘bad’ etc. |
|
An attempt was
made in this chapter to describe the phonemes of this language. A
statement regarding the sequences of consonants occurring in this
language are given in the next section.
|
|
(b)
Syllabic Pattern
|
| The sudden brief
contraction of the respiratory muscles expels a small amount of air
from the lungs. The air escapes in a relatively free and
unrestricted passage and it is in the movement of the least
restriction in the sequence of movements that makes up the syllable.
Thus a syllable is essentially a movement of the speech organs and
not a characteristic feature of speech sound. A vowel is the nucleus
of the syllable while a consonant is a marginal part associated with
the beginning and the end of the air engendered by the chest pulse.
While the nucleus is equated with the peak, the marginal part
(consonant) may be either pre-nuclear in which case it is the onset
or post nuclear in which case, it is the coda. While the vowels
usually occupy the nucleus or peak, the consonants occupy the margin
(both onset and coda).
A syllable being the smallest unit of recurrent phonemic
sequence, may be considered a phonological unit which in turn
enters into still larger stretches of speech reaching upto a
complete utterance. A syllable includes not only the sequential
phonemes but also prosodic features like stress, tone etc. Any or
all of these occur in a sequence with each other and a syllable is
that stretch of phoneme which makes is possible to state relative
distribution most economically.
1Gwri
is also pronounced as gahuri by many people.
|
As
far as this language is concerned, a syllable may consist of just a
nucleus or the nucleus may be preceded and or followed by one or
more consonants. The members of the syllables in a monosyllabic word
is clear and unambiguous. In the case of words having two or more
syllables, the syllabic division is based on the principle that :
|
| (a) |
as few new positions or members shall be admitted as possible and
|
| (b) |
the same number of positions shall regularly be divided in the same
way. |
|
|
In this, the membership of monosyllabic words would form the critierion
for syllabic division. It may, however, be stated that as a rule of thumb, a
disyllabic word in this language having VCV would invariably be split up as
V and CV and not VC and V. Here also, the mono-syllabic words give a clue,
in that the vast majority of the mono-syllabic words have the CV pattern as
in : ki ‘what?’. The mono-syllabic words having VC as in : «j1
‘today’ are of extremely low frequency.
A word in this language may consist of one or more syllables ranging up
to
a maximum of four syllables. Disyllabic and trisyllabic bulary in this
language. The words having four or five syllables are almost exclusively
compound words. It would be possible to make a schematic diagram of
different types of permutations and computations of syllables that could
occur within a word in this language. These are stated below, beginning with
monosyllabic words.
The entire monosyllabic words in this language could be sub grouped into
six classes which when put in a schematic formula would be :
|
(c) (c) V (c) (c)2
|
The only limitation in the operation of the above formula is that V
cannot occur alone. The illustrative examples of these types are given below
:
|
|
| VC |
aj |
‘today’ |
| CV |
bo |
‘wife of a brother’ |
| CVC |
tan |
‘hard’ |
| CCVC |
tris |
‘thirty’ |
| CCVCC |
klark |
‘clerk’ |
| CVCC |
benj |
‘bench’ |
|
|
|
|
1j
is in alternation with ji, though the former has H.F.
2In the
formulaic statement : C=any consonant and V=any vowel.
|
