Vowel
coalescence is a phonological process in which two consecutive vowels fuse into
a long vowel. In Proto-Drem, the process for vowel coalescence is uncommon yet
seen, so note that these occur. The main issue with this is the need to 2
‘words’ to combine into 1 large compound word. The compound can be either a
verb compound or a noun compound, although, noun compounds are seen more often.
It has also been known to occur with straight nouns with a pronoun and noun
class attached, such as mimìŋ’ándò becoming mimyàándò and finally to mimyǎndò {my forests}.
When we use
C for a consonant, V for a vowel and a period ‘.’, for a space in between each
syllable, we generally look at our compound as this CV.CV.CV.CV which as it
looks, is 4 syllables long. What causes the process to occur is the unusual
nasal cluster being in the middle of a word, and for us, that word would be the
second one of the compound. A nasal cluster is clusters formed with a nasal {m,
n, ŋ} at the start of it. So the compound looks now like CV.CV.CV.NCV as
the NC stands for a nasal cluster.
What
exactly happens is the 3rd consonant disappears and the 2nd
vowel (which is from the first word) combines with the 3rd vowel
(which is from the 2nd word) into a vowel cluster. The cluster
becomes a long vowel of the combination. Knowing the proper combinations is
crucial when seeing this process occur. Note that when scanning the
combinations below, most of the combinations show up as either a long [e] or a
long [o] sound
Also below
as we look at the vowel clusters, we see 2 ‘new’ sounds show up, that of a
consonant and the addition of a w next to it, plus the vowel. So that a [b]
with a [w] and an [a] would look like bwa where the b
and w are blended together as one sound. The next ‘new’ sound is the ‘j’ which
also next to a consonant forms a cluster, so if we take the same [b] and [a],
then we’d get a bja as the b and j are blended
together as above. These two processes are very rare and only occur in several
words, but note that it does happen.
Combinations
for vowel coalescence:
aa > a:
ao > o:
au > o:
ai > e:
ae > e:
oo > o:
ou > o:
oi > e:
oe > e:
oa > o:
uu > u:
ui > wi
ue > we
ua > wa
uo > wo
ii > i:
ie > je
ia > ja
io > jo
iu > ju
ee > e:
ea > e:
eo > o:
eu > o:
ei > e:
Note* In a
later unit dealing with word formation, we will discuss vowel coalescence again,
since a noun with a pronoun, and noun class can actually go thru this process,
and in this way is in ways more easily seen than the ‘normal’ way see above.
Below we’ll see is a small group of changes showing how tones are affected by
this process. Below are the 4 tones that will talked about a bit below..
CàCá > Càá > Cǎ
CáCà > Cáà > Câ
CáCá > Cáá > Cá
CàCà > Càà > Cà
In Proto-Drem, tones come together just like vowels,
as seen above. Tones come together in one of 4 ways in Proto-Drem. The first is
where a high-tone [H], meets up with a low-tone [L] and forms a combination
tone [HL] that over time changes into a falling tone [F] which is seen in
Proto-Drem as â (the little symbol above the a looks like a tiny mountain). The
second way tones can combine is just the opposite of the above where a low-tone
[L] meets a high-tone [H] and combines to form a rising tone [R] where the
pitch of the vowel rises as one says the sound. The symbol looks like a v above
the vowel, and is seen as ǎ. The next two ways are much more common forms
of tone coalescence in Proto-Drem and will be encountered. The first of these
two ways is where two high tones [H][H] meet to form a doubled high-tone [HH]
which them shortens and simplifies into a single high tone [H]. The vowel is
seen just like a regular vowel with a high tone symbol above it, which is seen
as á. The second of these ways is just the opposite and is seen where 2
low-tones meet [L][L] and combine into a double
low-tone [LL] and then simplify into a single low-tone [L] and which looks like
à
We will get into tones more in detail in a later
unit, but for now, a few tidbits to help you understand tones a bit more. The
main thing to understand for now is the term “repair-strategy”. This term is
the working of several rules which deal with how tones change in a dremish sentence. These rules will be dealt with later, but
are known to be important to creating a generally stable environment for tones
to change as little as possible and for tone sequences to ‘flow’ if one can use
a term from music. For you the reader, just know that tone coalescing is done
when repair strategies cannot “fix” the issue. Thus when this set of rules,
called WFC, cannot fix the un-naturally occurring tone sequences, tone
coalescing then can act like a WFC rule and simplify the tones to a ‘base tone’
So to look at examples seen above...the C in the
examples below will be just a normal consonant
CàCá > Càá > Cǎ
CáCà > Cáà > Câ
CáCá > Cáá > Cá
CàCà > Càà > Cà