Suwaash
Suwaazh is a conlang inspired by similarities between Sino-Tibetan (especially Rgyalrongic) and Navajo. It is an isolate within a large language family which includes monosyllabic tonal languages and Athabaskan-style polysynthetic languages. Suwaazh is the lingua franca of modern Sngeaf.
Vocabulary
Suwaazh is about as purist as German or Finnish, but it has some loans from Anbirese.
Phonology
The following describes Amisheg (Standard Sowaazh) phonology.
Consonants
Amisheg has a large consonant inventory of 33 consonants:
| Labial | Dental | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m /m/ | n /n̪/ | ny /ɲ/ | ||||
| Stop | tenuis | b /p/ | d /t̪/ | g /k/ | ɂ /ʔ/ | ||
| aspirated | p /pʰ/ | t /t̪ʰ/ | k /kʰ/ | ||||
| ejective | t' /t̪ʼ/ | k' /kʼ/ | |||||
| Affricate | tenuis | j /t̪s̪/ | jh /tʂ/ | jy /tɕ/ | |||
| aspirated | c /t̪s̪ʰ/ | ch /tʂʰ/ | cy /tɕʰ/ | ||||
| ejective | c' /t̪s̪ʼ/ | ch' /tʂʼ/ | cy' /tɕʼ/ | ||||
| Fricative | fortis | s /s̪/ | sh /ʂ/ | sy /ɕ/ | kh /x/ | h /h/ | |
| lenis | z /z̪/ | zh /ʐ/ | zy /ʑ/ | gh /ɣ/ | |||
| Approximant | w /w/ | l /l/ | y /j/ | ||||
/mj pj pʰj lj/ are allowed before vowels.
Vowels
Amisheg has only 4 vowel qualities, although there is phonemic vowel length and nasality.
| Front | Back | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| short | long | short | long | |
| Close | i, į | ii, įį | u, ų | uu, ųų |
| Open | e, ę | ee, ęę | a, ą | aa, ąą |
The vowels i ii į įį are centralized after retroflex consonants; u uu ų ųų are fronted after palatal consonants.
Grammar
Suwaazh grammar is inspired by similarities between Sino-Tibetan and Navajo grammar. Like Navajo, Suwaazh is head-final and head-marking, but it is not nearly as polysynthetic.
Nouns
Possessive affixes
Plurals
Postpositions
Postpositions inflect like nouns in that they take personal affixes.
- dative -ash: węęhash 'for the world/Earth'; nash 'for me'
Verbs
The verb is the only obligatory component of a Suwaazh clause. Adjectives are also verbs.
The root
A Suwaazh verb root consists of an obligatory initial, a vowel which may ablaut, and an optional final.
Possible initials are:
- all single consonants
- ⟨my by py⟩
Final consonants are restricted to ⟨b d z~s zh~sh zy~sy g ɂ h l n⟩; the -n final may not follow a nasal vowel.