Re: Monovocalism: sequel

From: tgpedersen
Message: 33418
Date: 2004-07-07

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "mcvwxsnl" <mcv@...> wrote:
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "P&G" <petegray@...> wrote:
> > Hebrew shows minimal lexical pairs, e.g.:
> > yo:m = day; ya:m = sea
> > (ayin)e:z = goat; (ayin)o:z = strength
> > ?el = to ?e:l = god
> > etc
> > So I think the starting point for this discussion is misguided.
> > Vowels are used lexically (and morphologically) in at least one
> > Semitic language.
>
> But that was not the starting point of the discussion. The question
> was whether there is at least one Semitic language where vowels are
> *not* used lexically. This is (almost) the case in Classical
> Arabic, and reportedly in Southern Peripheral Semitic languages.
>
> Certainly in the case of the verbs, the root of an Arabic verb is
> given by its consonantal "skeleton". Vowels are inserted and
> affixed purely as a function of the morphology.
> The claim is somewhat harder to make in the case of (pro)nouns and
> adjectives, where there are a number of vocalic patterns (for the
> singular and the "broken" plural) to which the forms may belong,
and
> which are not always predictable based on the class (pronoun, noun
> or adjective, etc.) or function of the word.
>
> This is in principle completely parallel to the situation as
> reconstructed for PIE. The vocalism of verbs is largely
predictable
> based on the morphology (e-grade/zero-grade in the present, o-grade
> in the perfect sg., zero-grade in the middle, etc.), while the
> vocalism of (pro)nouns and adjectives is somewhat less predictable
> in general.


Peripheral note: such a language will have to shield itself from
loanwords, which come with fixed wovels. (How does one adapt one's
name to Icelandic, which inflects like nom. fjörður, dat. firði?
Answer: you don't. You accept the new name that's given to you.) Or
else the loanwords will stay unassimilated and form their own block
which inflects to its own rules. That's perhaps what we see in
Germanic verbs?

Torsten