LINGUIST List 4.675

Thu 09 Sep 1993

Qs: Spanish, Icelandic, Irish, Tamil

Editor for this issue: <>

Directory

1. Stephen H. Houchen, Spanish Phonemes
2. "Reinhard, Icelandic vowels
3. a mcelligott, Irish
4. Allan C. Wechsler, Q: Tamil corpora

Hello! (I am a new member and this is my first post)

I have a question about Spanish phonetics for anyone who may know. Are
the orthographic syllables "gi"/"ji" (and "ge"/"je") homophonous, or are
they different types of fricatives? Just a little attempt at foreign
language accent reduction... Thanks to anyone who may know.

Steve Houchen
shhouchefirebird.aud.alcatel.com

Can any of the subscribers recommend discussions of vowel
aspiration in Modern Icelandic (published in any major European language
and Icelandic)?

Please send your reply to "rhahnu.washington.edu". I will make a
reference list available to "linguist" if I receive any replies.

Thank you.

--Reinhard F. Hahn--
University of Washington
Seattle, USA

I should appreciate if anyone could help me with the following queries:
I am attempting to characterise the various methods by which words may be
formed, for example prefixation, suffixation. In some areas I am having
difficulty it obtaining corresponding Irish. The following is a list
with some examples where possible in English. If I am unable to get an
Irish example a '?' is present and these denotes the areas for which I
need example.

Thanking you in anticipation of a favourable reply,
AMcE.

Prefixation: Irish: an- as in an-bheag
Suffixation: Irish: a/n as in loch -> locha/n
Compounding: Irish: ainm + focal -> ainmfhocal
Conversion: a word changes its class without any change to the form
 English: (to) carpet - verb, (the) carpet - noun.
 Irish: ?
Reduplication: a type of compound in which both elements are the same,
 or slightly different
 English: goody-goody, teeny-weeny
 Irish: ?
Clippings: an informal shortening of a word, often to a single syllable
 English: telly, flu
 Irish: ?
Acronyms: words formed from the inital letters of the words that make up
 a name
 English: NATO, radar
 Irish: ?
Alphabetism: where the letters are pronounced
 Irish: Teachta Da/la -> TD
Blends: two words merge into each other
 English: teleprinter + exchange -> telex
 Irish: ?


 Annette McElligott
 Tel No: 061-333644 ext. 5024
 Internet Email : mcelligottul.ie

Can anyone point me toward electronic corpora in Tamil?
Transcriptions from speech are good, but perhaps written Tamil will be
better, since the phenomena we are looking for are (perhaps) more
likely to turn up in sentences with intricate syntax.

Thanks in advance.