Mid term 1 (Syllabic)

Question 1

Syllable

Answer 1

a unit of linguistic structure that consists of the syllabic element and any sound segments that are associated with it (phonological building blocks)

Question 2

A syllabic element

Answer 2

the obligatory component of a syllable
the most sonorous elements
1 vowels
2 syllabic consonants (l m n r)

Question 3

Syllable structure (Onset)

Answer 3

the longest sequence of consonants to the left of the nucleus not violating phonotactic constraints

Question 4

Syllable structure (Rhyme)

Answer 4

obligatory

consists of the nucleus and coda

Question 5

Syllable structure (Nucleus)

Answer 5

obligatory

the core of the syllable ( vocalic/ syllabic)

Question 6

Syllable structure (Coda)

Answer 6

the elements that follow the nucleus

Question 7

the Mora

Answer 7

unit of rhythmic time, every “tap” has to be the same length
Nucleus:
one mora (if the vowel is short)

two mora (if the vowel is long or if the vowel is a diphthong)

Coda:
some languages count the coda as a mora, some do not

Question 8

Syllabic systems

Answer 8

one symbol represents one syllable used in a word

Question 9

Syllabary

Answer 9

a set of characters representing syllables used for a language

Question 10

Modern syllabaries

Answer 10

Cherokee

Cree

Question 11

Sequoyah (George Guess)

Answer 11

credited for creating the Cherokee syllable system. a lot of theories that motivated the design.
85 unique symbols
each symbol represents a syllable

Question 12

Cherokee writing system problems

Answer 12

makes contrast for tone and vowel length
glottal stop
complex onsets
writing system doesn’t account for this (fit problem)

Question 13

Cree

Answer 13

Most widely spoken native language in Canada 100,000 speakers
95 signs

Question 14

Pitman shorthand

Answer 14

symbols to represent phonetic sound
developed to make things faster
some influence in Cree from Pitman shorthand

Question 15

James Evans

Answer 15

the man who made birch bark talk
credited for developing Cree writing system
Cree fits better than Cherokee

Question 16

Ancient Syllabaries

Answer 16

Manyogan

Cuneiform

Question 17

Manogan

Answer 17

logographic to syllabic
Manogan is the syllabic use of these formally logographic chinese scripts.

chinese script transferred to japanese
970 chinese characters for 87 phonetic syllables
can represent tone

Question 18

3 Chinese writing systems

Answer 18

Katakana
Hiragana
Kanji

Question 19

Cuniform

Answer 19

logographic to syllabic
Sumarian
Akkadians invaded and changed it

Question 20

Akkadian

Answer 20

classified a samidic language with words like “SLM”
group of consonants for word meaning with implied vowel sound in between them
akkadian cuneiform is syllabic (changed from logographic)

one symbol, two values
add a symbol that specifies the vowel, put symbols together right to left, left to right

Question 21

The poor fit of Cypriot

Answer 21

55 signs
2 variants 
common syllabary: right to left
Newer syllabary: left to right
echo of a vowel
means CCV, symbols represented as CVCV
word final n, r, s... use ne, re, se syllabograms but don't say vowel

Question 22

Yi: a good fit, except..

Answer 22

a quite accurate encoding of Yi speech
each syllable has a different sign for three different tones
8,000 characters to 819 characters
latest syllabary to ever be standardized
each character can have three forms (tons)
influence from chinese

Question 23

features of syllabaries

Answer 23

best suited to languages with simple syllable structure

relatively small number of syllables