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Re: [txeqli] Re: Structure Words



On Mon, Apr 15, 2002 at 08:18:05PM -0000, uaxuctum wrote:
> I find it more "unpleasant" to use the
> apostrophe as a letter and much more to have it
> pronounced as an h--not to mention the overabundance
> of that sound in Lojban, which is by far the most
> constantly-to-be-pronounced sound in it; I can't
> stand having to say "aha", "eeha", "ohoo",
> "ehee" at every minute.

This seems to be a ubiquitous problem. If you want a consistent way of
creating 'cmavo', you'll have to come up with some sort of method of
tacking on another syllable. (I've seen guaspi, with its
all-one-syllable words like "zglai". It's horrid.) With an apostrophe
you're saying "aha", "iha", etc. all the time, but with y/w you're
saying "aya" and "iwe" just as much. What if you steal one of the weaks
from the ordinary words, say "l"? Then you're simply using "l" far too
much. If you pick a word to transform the next phoneme into a cmavo,
say "za", then you're saying "za" too much.

It seems the idea with the Lojban ' is that it should be unobtrusive in
both appearance and sound.

That said, given the chance to rearrange the cmavo I would like to make
too-common CV'V words into single syllables wherever possible. For
example, turning the ubiquitous Lojban "la'e di'u" into, say, "ke jdi".

-- 
Rob Speer