Re: [tied] Estimated timeframe from albanian s->sh transformation

On Thu, 29 Jan 2004 16:10:09 +0000, alexandru_mg3 <alexandru_mg3@...>
wrote:

>You said:
>" Within a single speech community, a sound change usually takes
>place within a single generation. So that's how long it can take."
>
> Putting twice the same afirmation without arguments, and saying
> " So that's how long it can take."
> don't mean that you have demonstrated it.
>
> Sorry to say this but I don't see any arguments here.... Did you?

What arguments do you need? The nature of sound change as a generational
thing is well known. Can't argue about the facts.

>P.S. "In the first place, you're comparing apples with oranges. "
> -------------------------------------------------------------
> I didn't compare apple with orange. I said ONLY that a global
>shift like s->sh took at least twice the time when a loan spread,
>because the speed of this second process is very very small at the
>beginning:
> Why?
> If I hear you saying a word with 'sh' this doesn't mean that I
>will say it too...I prefer to speak it, as I heard to my parents or
>to my friends. If everybody speak around me, with /sh/ , I will make
>the shift too, but this is the final point of this process and not
>the initial one.
> This is in contradiction with a loan situation: if I see
>a 'mouse' in your hands , I will ask you which is its name, and I
>will used that name immediately.

Exactly. Sound change at the level of the individual usually happens only
once, at the beginning of life (it happens when you persist in talking like
your peers, and *not* like your parents). Vocabulary (borrowed or not)
comes and goes, and you can change it (and change it back) several times in
a lifetime.


=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...