From: Mate Kapovic
Message: 32951
Date: 2004-05-26
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen" <jer@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, May 26, 2004 5:31 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] Re: Unreality of One-Vowel Systems (was: Bader's article
on *-os(y)o)
> On Tue, 25 May 2004 enlil@... wrote:
>
> > Jens, I'm not your enemy, at least not all the time, and this is
> > one of those cases where I understand what you're saying and I
> > agree with it in a basic sense.
>
> Sounds like a wolf dressed up as a sheep.
>
> > That is, I can see how one can analyse
> > IE or Sanskrit on a very abstract level as having a one-vowel system,
> > although only by ignoring all counterproof. Since the existence of
> > this counterproof is an ongoing debate apparently, it puts into
> > question whether this analysis is justified or not.
>
> Yes, but even so it proves the existence of a language that can engender
> such a debate. That has been denied.
>
> > Let's say, however, it's fully justified for now. Even so, none of
> > these analyses have yet any bearing to any matter concerning pre-IE,
> > from what I see. If not, please explain _how_ they do. For what further
> > conclusions are you using this monovocalic analysis? Is it not to
> > substantiate your views on the pre-IE vowel system?
>
> I would like to have an answer to the burning question raised by the
> strikingly monotonous PIE vocalism. Why are there so many roots with the
> vocalism /e/? And why so few with any other vocalism? Does hat fact not
> have a cause? Is it not justified to ask such a question? I don't know
> much about what is fact and what is fallacy in Nostratic, but we both know
> about the theory that Nostratic had a variety of vowels which collapsed
> into a single vowel in IE. I do not know if a single vowel is sufficient,
> but I see surprisingly little counterevidence, so little in fact that it
> calls for an explanation.
>
> The parallel with Sanskrit is really particularly striking. One may ask
> why there are so few vowels in Sanskrit, why only /a, a:/ when the other
> languages have /a, e, o, a:, e:, o:/? Well, that is not considered a silly
> question, for we know the answer: there was a major collapse of vowel
> timbres. Now we have a PIE with a puzzlingly monotonous vocalism, and I
> ask, why is that? Why is that a stupid question all of a sudden? Why is it
> stupid to parallelize with the vowel collapse of Sanskrit and consider the
> possibility that there had been a similar reduction of vowel timbres in
> the prehsitory of PIE? And why is it silly to be reminded of the theory
> already existing that there indeed was such a reduction?
>
> Right or wrong, the theory of a pre-PIE vowel collapse would explain the
> absence of a varied vocalism in PIE, especially on the lexical level (in
> roots). If it reflects a real event of reduction in the vocalic variety it
> may also explain that there apparently *are* a limited number of roots
> with /a/ or /o/ as their fundamental vowel. They may be words that entered
> the language *after* the presumed vowel collapse and therefore did not
> share it, or they could be later coinings on the part of the speakers of
> post-collapse pre-PIE. They could also reflect the result of processes of
> change that have left only this trace and have therefore not been
> adequately explained. How ever this may be, these are pertinent questions.
>
> I would envisage these possibilities even without a typological parallel,
> but since I was provoked and ridiculed for not having a parallel I pulled
> the ace from my sleeve.
You can always pull another joker out :) Abkhaz has been analyzed as a
system with no phonemic vowel.
I am definitely with Jens here... Monovocalic theory cannot be excluded on
typological grounds since some languages *can* (even if it is only a
possibility) be analyzed like that and also there is the standard example -
if all the Khoisan languages died out before linguists came there, I bet 99%
of all linguists would swear that phonemic clics are absolutely impossibile.
Mate