Re: Glottal stops (was: B. Cthia and Nom)
McReynolds 
Tue, 29 Apr 1997 16:24:06 -0500

Saul Epstein wrote:
> Southwest corner of the Midwest, actually: Kansas City. But those
> pronunciations are pretty generalized. I just said "my dialect" so I
> wouldn't get cries of "speak for yourself," as I might if I just
> referred to it as "American English." I would have expected someone
> from Texas to say [vost] or [vo^st] for "voiced." Interesting.

Contrary to poular belief, 95% of the Texans I know don't have a
noticable accent or drawl.  Of course, I live in Houston, and one would
expect city-dwellers to be much more "standardized" with regard to
language.  The only "abnormality" that I know of from basic English
would be the use of "y'all."  I don't clip the "g" of of words like
"going" or "buying," like the stereotypical Texan would, as well.
 
> Right. But is it [t^pring] or [tpring]?
It would be {t^pring}, because that's what we hear in the show.  Vulcans
say the word, so we know that that pronunciation is correct.

> And, while I think that if
> anyone could successfully implement phonetic spelling it would be
> Vulcans, phonemic and morphological spellings have their own logic.
> I'm not sure things should always be written as pronounced,
> especially if we consider how long a particular writing system has
> been in use...

We also should remember that we're not writing in Vulcan.  For all we
know, Vulcan could have a different unique symbol for certain words and
other things.  We are learning Vulcan: the language, not Vulcan: the
writing system.  The symbols we use do not have to be a direct
correspondance with the symbols they use, but they should be a direct
correspondance with the sounds pronounced.

> It certainly FEELS "wrong" to me as the speaker of a language that
> only uses glottal stops to make vowels more distinct in certain
> environments. But I doubt such things are beyond the Terran
> articulatory organs, let alone the Vulcan.

Yeah.  I never said it was impossible... on the other hand, since we're
all humans speaking the language, we shoudln't do anything impossible to
pronounce.  Even the Klingon {Q} is pronouncable, after a fashion, and
it only appears in something like 1 other language on Earth.
 
> I've basically reached the limits of determinacy on this one...

Me too.  If we do create a new symbol for one, I would make the change
be in the schwa.  I think most people wouild recognize the apostrophe as
a glottal stop.  Also, it is reasonable to assume that the Federation
lingusts would try to stay consistant with their systems, and they used
the {'} for a glottal stop in Klingon.  Of course, that's all "in
character," and we don't HAVE to use any of the Okrand Romanized
alphabet, but it would make it a lot easier.  For those sounds which
don't exist in Klingon, other letters could be used.  Also, most
learners of Vulcan would be Trek fans, and would probably have a
fundamental knowledge of Klingon if they were interested in Star Trek
Langauges.  As such, using Okrand's system makes it easy for learners.

-McReynolds