--- In cybalist@..., "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...> wrote:
> What are the typological grounds for the statement that uvulars
> trigger a-colouring (and not o-colouring, for instance)? What would
> be a possible (neuro)physiological explanation? Just wondering.
>
> Sergei
With respect to Greenlandic, if I remember correctly now so many
years after, what my phonology teacher Jørn Rischel, who was involved
in the design of a spelling reform for it, said, it is a three-vowel
language (i, a, u), but before uvulars (eg /q/) /i/ has the
allophone /e/, and /u/ the allophone /o/ (present ending(?) -voq, -
poq). For convenience they decided to keep /e/ and /o/ in the
spelling in those cases.
Torsten