Rokadong
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Rokadong (IPA: [ɾokadoŋ]) is a Nentan language spoken in western Quillan. As one of the primary languages of the Quill Kingdom, Rokadong is spoken by over 50,000,000 people, mostly Kana kanvas, as a first language.
Kanvas are a species of cat-like anthropomorphic beings unique to Spectradom, the world in which Rokadong is placed, and Rokadong reflects that in some ways. However, the language is 100% human-compatible, as the virtually-identical-to-human figure and sketch species also use it.
Introduction
Rokadong is my first conlang, first started in 2020 as part of my worldbuilding projects. Specifically, it is linked to my project "Drawn to AfterLife," though the language itself may see use in my other projects. It is one of the three notable languages of DTAL, alongside the as-yet very incomplete Nentan language Kairitelan and Gomensayan language Liðakuin.
Rokadong, like all of my serious conlangs, is meant to be similar to natural languages in terms of scope. It is primarily inspired by Malay, but also draws significant inspiration from Spanish and Japanese.
This is a work of love and I ask any readers that, outside of grammatical mistakes, they do not make any edits without my premission. This work is protected by copyright, and I do plan on using it in monetized material; this wiki is a service both for myself and for any future fans.
Etymology
Rokadong is a contraction of "dong to rokasela," meaning "Rokasela's language." Rokasela refers to the six major islands of the Acrylla Archipelago, where Rokadong originated, and apocryphally, may also refer to the six extensions from the core of a kanva's body: two arms, two legs, a head, and a tail.
Phonology
Consonants
| Labial | alveolar | Post- alveolar/ palatal |
Velar | Uvular | Glottal | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | ||||||||
| Stop | p | b | t | d | t͡ʃ | d͡ʒ | k | ɡ | ʔ | |||
| Fricative | f | v | s | z | ʃ | h | ||||||
| Approximant | (ɹ) | j | w | |||||||||
| Lateral | l | |||||||||||
| Trill | (r) | (ʀ) | (ʢ̠ᵐ) | |||||||||
| Tap | ɾ | |||||||||||
Notes
- /ɾ/ is a highly variable sound, with exact realization depending on dialect and surroundings:
- [r], the "long r", is usually found morpheme-initially as well as in clusters of /ɾ l/.
- [ɹ], the "vowel r", is found morpheme-finally in some dialects.
- [ʀ], the "growl r", is marginally phonemic, as some words in some dialects retain it instead of it merging. It may also appear in imperative or otherwise forceful speech as an allophone of /ɾ/.
- [ʢ̠], the "purr r", is usually also labialized, if not produced with an entirely closed mouth, which is why it appears as ʢ̠ᵐ in the chart. This sound is true glottal, and thus is not possible for humans to reproduce, as the only method humans have of producing a glottal trill is through vowels, which are produced with an open mouth. However, it can be imitated through a variety of means if desired, and often is merged with one or more of [r ʀ m], even for kanva speakers.
- Nasal consonants lose their contrast before stop consonants. However, they still contrast in morpheme-final position, so /ŋ/ is still considered phonemic.
- /h/ is frequently elided between unlike vowels.
- /s, z, (t)ʃ, dʒ/ palatalize to [ʃ~ɕ, ʒ~ʑ, (t)ɕ, dʑ]] before /i, j/, though in some dialects this is rarer for /s, z/.
- In Pahang Rokadong and Oceanic Rokadong dialects, [s, z] may vary with non-sibilant equivalents [θ, ð], especially morpheme-finally. The latter used to be phonemic, but merged with the former, now only appearing as an allophone of it. These dialects are described as "tékuhasa" ("all S"). In Continental Rokadong dialects, assibilation of /θ/ is complete, and only [s, z] remain.
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i iː | u uː | |
| Mid | e eː | (ə) | o oː |
| Open | a aː |
Notes
- /e, o/ may be realized as [e̞, o̞].
- /i, u, e, o/ may be opened in the final syllable of a morpheme if it is closed, to any of [i~ɪ~e~ɛ, u~ʊ~o~ɔ, e~ɛ, o~ɔ] respectively, though this is substantially more common for /i, u/ than for /e, o/.
- Morpheme-final short /a/ becomes [ə] in most dialects, but some perform this change on all unstressed short /a/.
Prosody
Rokadong is generally described as mora-timed, with short vowels and coda sonorants each providing one mora to the syllable, and long vowels and diphthongs providing two moras. However, timing may sway toward syllable-timing in certain dialects and speaking styles. Particularly for Sanenyandoka, the dialect most well-known for syllable timing, this phenomenon is known as "raisendoka" (literally "gun speech").
Stress
Rokadong is a dynamic-accent language. Stressed syllables are louder than non-stressed syllables. Stressed syllables may also have higher or lower pitch, but this is not phonemic in Rokadong any longer, so it is not described as a pitch-accent language.
Stress is usually on the syllable containing the penultimate mora. As such, the ultimate syllable receives the accent if it is closed or has a long vowel. However, if the antepenultimate vowel is long, and the penultimate and ultimate vowels are not long, then that long vowel receives the accent.
Phonotactics
Rokadong is a (C)V(C) language for the most part, though the final C in a word may also be clusters of a stop followed by /ɾ/. Phonetically, stop-rhotic sequences are [Bɾə]], however. V can be a short vowel, a long vowel, or a diphthong. A more full description of Rokadong's syllable structure would be (C)(j)V(ː/C/SR), where C is a consonant, j is /j/, V is a vowel, and SR is a stop-rhotic sequence.
/h ʔ/ are in complementary distribution, with the former only being permissible in the onset of syllables, and the latter only being permissible in the coda of syllables, and only before consonants or at the end of words. Additionally, /ŋ/ merged with /n/ at the start of syllables, while the opposite occured with /ɲ/. Therefore, /ɲ ŋ/ are also in complementary distribution when not assimilated.
Rokadong's diphthongs are /aj aw oj ja jo ju/. Only the latter three may appear with a syllable coda after them.
When a morpheme's initial vowel is preceded by another vowel, the boundary is often realized as hard attack. However, /h/ almost never causes hard attack, even if it gets elided.
The following strings of phonemes that may occur due to affixes or compounding are not allowed:
- Any phoneme followed by itself; if a conflict occurs, one is dropped for consonants. Vowel handling under this rule differs between dialects, though usually either they combine to a long vowel, or the latter vowel is given hard attack.
- Two consecutive consonants that differ only in voicing; if a conflict occurs, then the voiced vowel is kept unless the prior vowel is short and unstressed, then the unvoiced consonant is kept.
- Two nasal consonants; if a conflict occurs, then the coda nasal is dropped. However, in many dialects, this does not apply when the second nasal is /m/ and the first nasal is not.
- The sequences /ji, wu, wo, uw, ow, uo, and ou/ are not allowed unless there is a syllabic break between them. If needed, the semivowel is dropped or becomes /v/.
Orthography
Rokadong may be either written using the Latin alphabet or the native Rokadong abugida.
Romanization
Rokadong consonants are written as seen in the IPA, with the following exceptions:
- /ɲ/ is written as ny, except when before <c> or <j>, in which case the y is dropped.
- /ŋ/ is written as ng
- /tʃ/ is written as c
- /dʒ/ is written as j
- /ɾ/ is written as r (this includes all of its allophones)
- /ʃ/ is written as sh
- /j/ is written as y in the onset (and in i-on-glide diphthongs) and i in the coda (in i-off-glide diphthongs)
- /w/ is written as w in the onset and u in the coda (in diphthongs)
- /ʔ/ is written as h
Rokadong short vowels are written as they are seen in the IPA, while long vowels are written with an acute accent over the short vowel being lengthened. The diphthongs /aj, aw, oj/ may be confused with the syllable-boundary monophthong pairs /a.i, a.u, o.i/, so in situations where the latter is preferred, the syllable boundary is written with an apostrophe. Assimilated nasals are written as they are spoken, except when separated by a dash.