Re: [tied] Abstractness (Was Re: [j] v. [i])

From: Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen
Message: 22730
Date: 2003-06-05

On Thu, 5 Jun 2003, Piotr Gasiorowski wrote:
> [...] To use a real-life example, English /h/ and /N/
> ("ng") are in complementary distribution, but no-one has ever dreamt of
> simplifying the system by assigning them to the same phoneme.

Why not? The two phones are in complementary distribution in Avestan and
do in fact there represent rule-governed realizations of /h/, IIr. /s/.

Jens