Kimow: Difference between revisions
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! colspan=2 | Nasal | ! colspan=2 | Nasal |
Revision as of 10:25, 15 April 2024
Kimow | |
---|---|
Kimau[1] | |
kimow | |
Pronunciation | [ˈkʰím.ǒʊ] [ˈkʰǐɯ.ɑ̄w] |
Created by | Jukethatbox |
Date | 2024 |
Native speakers | 7.7 million(total) (2024) Kimo: 3.96 million Wakki: 3.74 million |
language isolate
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Dialects |
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Kimow(/kiːmoʊ/, kimow; Kimow: [ˈkʰím.ǒʊ] or [ˈkʰǐɯ.ɑ̄w]), also(but less commonly) called Kimau,[1] is a language isolate that is notorious for the fact that the majority of its words are homonyms, meaning they have various meanings. For example, the name of the language, Kimow, can mean "Kimow"(adj.), "the Kimow language", "the Kimow people", "an ethnic Kimow", "a Kimow speaker(so not necessarily an ethnic Kimow)", "a member of the Kimow diaspora", "Kimow food" or "a Kimow city". There are also only two main dialects, the Kimo and the Wakki, and their homonymic meanings differ greatly at times, making mutual understanding difficult. Tone and phonology vary slightly as well, though not as greatly and are thus more mutually intelligible.
Phonology
Orthography
Kimow uses its own version of the Latin alphabet for writing.
Letter (Maj-min) |
A a | B b | C c | D d | E e | F f | G g | H h | Ḥ ḥ | I i | K k | Ḵ ḵ | L l | M m | N n | O o | Ö ö | P p | S s | T t | U u | W w | V v | Y y | Z z |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
IPA | a | bʱ | c | dʱ | e ɘ |
f | gʱ ʔ[3] |
h | ɦ | i | kʰ | q | l | m ɯ[4] |
n ŋ[5] |
o ɑ |
ø ɵ/œ |
pʰ | s | tʰ | u/ʊ w[6] |
v | j | z |
Consonants
Aside from Wakki dialects using [w] as a replacement for [u] and [ʊ], consonants do not vary at all between Kimow speakers.
Bilabial | Labiodental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar/ Labial-velar |
Uvular | Glottal | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Plosive | pulmonic | c ɟ | q | ʔ | ||||
aspirated | pʰ bʱ | tʰ dʱ | kʰ gʱ | |||||
ejective | pʼ bʼ | tʼ | kʼ gʼ | qʼ | ||||
Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | ||||
Fricative | pulmonic | f v | s z | ç | h ɦ | |||
ejective | fʼ vʼ | sʼ zʼ | ||||||
Approximant | normal | j | w[6] | |||||
lateral | l | ɫ |
Vowels
Red sounds are exclusive to Kimo dialects, while blue sounds are exclusive to Wakki dialects. Green sounds are exclusive to Igkin dialects, which although are a subset of Kimo dialects, do have some different sounds. Black sounds are in all sets of dialects.
Front | Central | Near-close | Back | |
---|---|---|---|---|
Close | i | ɯ[4] u[6] | ||
Near-close | ʊ[6] | |||
Close-mid | e ø | ɘ[7] ɵ[7] | o | |
Open | a œ[8] | ɑ[9] |
Prosody
Stress
Across all dialects, stress has only one pattern: prototonic in most cases, oxytonic when there is a case marker.
Tone
Use of tone in Kimow is not indicated in the orthography and varies by Kimo and Wakki dialects, though within their own subsets they tend to conform to one standard tone system.
Tone | |
---|---|
Kimo | Wakki |
high [˦ ] |
rising [˩˥] |
rising [˩˥] |
mid [˧] |
falling [˥˩] |
low rising [˩˨] |
rising-falling [˧˦˧] | |
extra low [˩] |
low [˨] |
low [˨] |
Phonotactics
Morphophonology
Morphology
Homonyms
Kimow is notorious for the fact that many of its words are homonyms with various meanings that can differ greatly from each other. Additionally, these different meanings can sometimes be simply up to dialectic difference, such as in the word vesi(visi in Wakki dialects). To analyse the many meanings of a typical Kimow word, one can use the Itou table, as so:
Kimo | Wakki | |
---|---|---|
Word | vesi | |
Pronunciation | [věsȉ] [vɘ̌sȉ] |
[vēsì] |
Meaning 1...n |
bicycle vehicle two-wheeled vehicle two wheels (coll.) Dutch/Netherlands Amsterdam bridge for bicycles bicycle path |
boat ship cargo ship ship cargo navy sailor (rare) United Kingdom (rare) United States |
Syntax
Constituent order
The Kimo dialect mainly uses SOV, though in the Wakki dialect, the subject is inferred through verb conjugation, meaning the verb order is more like VO.
Noun phrase
Verb phrase
Sentence phrase
Dependent clauses
Example texts
Other resources
Notes
- ^ a b Original exonym of the language before widespread English-based romanisation, now only used in German in the form of kimauisch.
- ^ Mostly extinct, some elderly speakers still exist.
- ^ When placed before /k/.
- ^ a b Allophone of [m]
- ^ Before a velar plosive only.
- ^ a b c d In Wakki dialects, the [u]/[ʊ] is substituted by [w] in most cases.
- ^ a b Both are variants of [e] and [ø] in Kimo and Wakki dialects.
- ^ Alternative allophone of /ø/, though [ø] is still more widely used.
- ^ Wakki variant of Kimo [o].