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Re: [engelang] Re: Engelang phonology chat

On Tue, Aug 28, 2012 at 4:36 PM, John Cowan <cowan@hidden.email> wrote: 

Mike S. scripsit:

> That'd be a good choice if Lojban rules didn't declare [y] declare a
> variant of /i/. Rounding is defined as nondistinctive in Lojban, so I
> believe that /1/ and its rounded variant are the only choices enjoying a
> significant chunk of vowel space.

What's worse is that the whole of North America and parts of the U.K. are
steadily moving /u/ forward toward [y], generation by generation.
Ghosts no longer say [bu:]; they now say [bu\:], and fairly shortly it
may well be [by:] outright.

Hmm, I wonder if I say [u\:] then.  Probably; Russian /u/ sounds somehow exaggerated to me, but it's probably closer to cardinal /u/ than mine. 

The /u/ -> /y/ shift would likely precipitate a bunch of shifts if it changes through to completion.