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While working on the lessons, I've come to realize that Ladekwa is often
very difficult to pronounce. The cause of the difficulty is the
frequency of diphthongs (i.e., there are two many syllables with
semi-vowels, but CSV is worse and 'y' is worse than 'w'). The problem
(for me at least) is not the existence of diphthongs - it's the
juxtaposition of two or three in the same word. I have no difficulty
with sentences that contain just one semi-vowel per word.
It turns out that about two-thirds of all modifiers and two-thirds of
all classifiers contain a semi-vowel, and the net result is lots of
tongue-twisting phrases and sentences. Some of the drill sentences are
so difficult that I have to repeat them up to seven or eight times
before I get it right (and getting it right once doesn't mean that I'll
get it right the next time).
Every language has tongue-twisters, but Ladekwa has far too many.
So, I've decided to experiment with a new approach, and I'll be working
on it over the next several days. It's very simple:
Modifier ::= CV or CVn, where C is b c d f g j k p s t v or z
Classifier ::= CSV or CVS
In other words, the new approach discards the voiced-unvoiced
distinction. Modifiers and classifiers can use any of the
consonants. Root morphemes that do NOT contain a semi-vowel are
modifiers. Those that DO contain a semi-vowel are classifiers.
If there is a correspondence between the meaning of a modifier and a
classifier, then the semi-vowel can be removed from the classifier
to produce the modifier; eg. classifier "faw" could becomes modifier
"fa". Modifiers that are not based on classifiers can have the form
CVn; eg. "ban" will have no relationship to "baw", "bya", "bay",
etc.
Any comments or suggestions?
Regards,
Rick Morneau
http://www.eskimo.com/~ram