Hello.

I had an idea to make English, but each phoneme is swapped for an opposite. This is easy to do for vowels - for example, /i/ and /u/ are opposites, because one is front and the other is back. I tried to figure out a similar system for consonants and have been stuck ever since. So, how would you calculate an opposite for /m/, or /h/, or /r/? I’m sure there must be a way to do it, but for the life of me I can’t figure it out.

  • FritzApollo@lemmy.todayOP
    2·
    1 month ago

    That simplifies things, because it gives you some room to “force” certain pairs. You could for example shoehorn the short vowels qualities into cardinal /i e æ/ vs. /u o ɒ/, or a similar system, so the opposition becomes apparent.

    Yeah that’s the kinda thing I was thinking of re: vowels. I don’t know exactly what I want from the vowels, but it’s something like that.

    Which English dialect or standard are you using as a basis?

    Well, it’s a goofy baby-talk cipher, so I’m inclined to be pretty flexible with this.

    You could do it based on the furthest in the mouth, then you’d get binary vs. velar… and the alveolars are left unchanged.

    I thought of that… I just think it would get too messy if I tried to be precise with this method. Maybe I just need another method.

    • Lvxferre [he/him]@mander.xyzM
      1·
      1 month ago

      Here’s my take. Just as a bunch of ideas, perhaps it’s helpful.

      Diaphonemes(F) Phonemes(F) Diaphonemes(B) Phonemes(B)
      æ(trap), ɑː/æ(bath) /æ/ ɑː(palm), ɒ(lot) /ɒ/
      ɜ:r(nurse) /ær/ ɑ:r(start) /ɑr/
      ɛ(dress) /e/ ɔː(thought), ɒ/ɔː(cloth) /o/
      eɪ(face) /ej/ oʊ(goat) /ow/
      N/A /ew/ ɔɪ(choice) /oj/
      ɛər(square) /er/ ɔ:r(north) /or/
      ɪ(kit), i(happy) /ɪ/ ʊ(foot) /ʊ/
      ɪər(near) /ɪr/ ʊər(cure) /ʊr/
      i:(fleece) /ɪj/ u:(goose) /ʊw/
      ʌ(strut), ə(comma) /ɐ/ ʌ(strut), ə(comma) /ɐ/
      aɪ(price) /ɐj/ aʊ(mouth) /ɐw/
      ər(letter) /ɐr/ ər(letter) /ɐr/

      All sets were reorganised into a “pseudo-dialect” with seven vowels, no length. It shouldn’t correspond to any RL dialect, but still be close enough to be English. Almost all phonemes were paired, but:

      • /oj/ got an artificial front counterpart, /ew/.
      • when inverting any /Vr/ sequence, sub the /r/ with the consonant you choose as /r/'s “opposite”.
      • /ɐ/ is its own opposite. It’s a “neutral” vowel.

      I thought of that… I just think it would get too messy if I tried to be precise with this method. Maybe I just need another method.

      Personally I’d go with the merry-go-round. Because it’s somewhat easy to force English into three sets of consonants, through the following changes /θ ð h/ → /f v Ø/ (all three associated with baby talk). Then you get the following:

      labial: /m p b f v/
apical: /n t d s z/
dorsal: /ŋ k g ʃ ʒ/

      The only ones left behind are /t͡ʃ d͡ʒ l r j w/. I think /j w/ can be paired together (as if they were vowels), /l r/ (they often occur in similar environments), and then /t͡ʃ d͡ʒ/ can be analysed as sequences, so after “opposed” they end as /ps bz/, /kf gv/ or something like this, you get the idea.