Czecklish

TODO: Czecklish Introduction

Background

The a priori constructed language Czecklish is heavily influenced by the West Slavic and Romance language families. Concerning phonology and phonological constraints, the greatest influence comes from Czech, Polish and Italian. Its morphology, however, is very non-Indo-European. Czecklish is an agglunitative, polysynthetic and noun-incorporating language. As such, it's verb conjugation and noun declension is very complex and difficult. An interesting aspect of Czecklish morphology is that it utilizes polyexponential formatives to encode multiple grammatical categories. That is to say, one bound morpheme (smallest unit of meaning) can be used to express different grammatical categories simultaneously. Czecklish is also unusual in that adjectives and adverbs are completely absent, being replaced with auxiliary participles and attibutive verbs.

Phonology

Vowels

Czecklish's vowel system is very similar to Polish's. This is because Polish and Czecklish share a close relationship phonologically, and sound changes tend to be shared between them. One such 'shared' sound change is Proto-Slavic *ų̄ (realized as Proto-Czecklish /ɯ/)to Common Slavic/Polish /y/. This sound change is not so much shared, as it is a common innovation. However, Czecklish has many diphthongs, which are not characteristic of Slavic languages. Czecklish diphthongs arose from syncope of voiced fricatives, and are not related to Indo-European diphthongs. For more information about Czecklish phonology, see Czecklish Phonology.

Oral Monophthongs

Czecklish has a total of 10 monophthongs. Monophthongs occur in short and elongated variants. Vowel length is phonemic, and is used to disambiguate some minimal pairs. There are two central vowels: /ɨ/ and /ɑ/. The central vowel /ɑ/ is actually a back vowel, but is realized in a central position. In some dialects, though, it is pronounced as a back vowel.

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i i:	ɨ ɨ:	u u:
Open-mid	ɛ ɛ:		ɔ ɔ:
Open		ɑ ɑ:

Nasal Monophthongs

Czecklish has a total of 8 nasal monophthongs. Like oral monophthongs, nasal vowels occur in both elongated and short variants. Close Front and Back monophthongs are never nasalized, due to phonotactic constraints. Nasal monophthongs cannot occur before nasal consonants.

	Front	Central	Back
Close		ɨ̃ ɨ̃:
Open-mid	ɛ̃ ɛ̃:		ɔ̃ ɔ̃:
Open		ɑ̃ ɑ̃:

Diphthongs Czecklish has a very large number of diphthongs - 38 in fact! Vowels can form diphthongs with both close and open-mid vowels, as well as /ɑ/. The central vowel /ɨ/ cannot be a second element in diphthongs, as it can never be non-syllabic. Nasal vowels can also form diphthongs, but they are not as common, and do not appear before nasal consonants.

	i̯	u̯	ɛ̯	ɔ̯	ɑ̯	ɛ̯̃	ɔ̯̃	ɑ̯̃
i		iu̯	iɛ̯	iɔ̯	iɑ̯	iɛ̯̃	iɔ̯̃	iɑ̯̃
u	ui̯		uɛ̯	uɔ̯	uɑ̯	uɛ̯̃	uɔ̯̃	uɑ̯̃
ɛ	ɛi̯	ɛu̯		ɛɔ̯	ɛɑ̯		ɛɔ̯̃	ɛɑ̯̃
ɔ	ɔi̯	ɔu̯	ɔɛ̯		ɔɑ̯	ɔɛ̯̃		ɔɑ̯̃
ɑ	ɑi̯	ɑu̯	ɑɛ̯	ɑɔ̯		ɑɛ̯̃	ɑɔ̯̃
ɨ	ɨi̯	ɨu̯	ɨɛ̯	ɨɔ̯	ɨɑ̯	ɨɛ̯̃	ɨɔ̯̃	ɨɑ̯̃

Consonants

Pulmonic

Czecklish has a total of 31 phonemic consonants:

	Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m	n	ɲ	ŋ
Plosive	p b	t d	c ɟ	k g
Affricate	pf	ts dz	tɕ dʑ
Fricative	f v	s z	ɕ ʑ ɕʷ	x ɣ	ɦ
Approximant			j	w
Trill		r	r̝
Lateral app.		l	ʎ

/ɕʷ/

The labialized voiceless palatal fricative /ɕʷ/ is a rare phoneme that is found in only 58 lexemes. /ɕʷ/ cannot appear before back vowels or nasal vowels. As such, it is only found before short or elongated front vowels. It can also appear before /ɑ/.

/pf/

The labial affricate /pf/ is not a true labial affricate; it is actually a labial plosive that is released as a labiodental fricative. It is a rare consonant worldwide, but is actually a quite frequent Czecklish phoneme, occurring in 26% of Czecklish lexemes.

/ŋ/

The velar nasal is both a phoneme and an allophone. As a phoneme, /ŋ/ can occur in any position in a word, including in the initial position. Before the velar consonants /k/ and /g/, [ŋ] is an allophone of /n/. The phoneme /ŋ/ can never occur before velar consonants.

Alphabet

The Czecklish alphabet is closely based upon the Czech and Polish alphabets. The close relationship that Czecklish has with its neighboring West Slavic languages has influenced its phonology significantly over the centuries. Therefore, its alphabet has been made to reflect Czecklish's phonological changes. Because of this, the Czecklish alphabet is considered a 'Frankenstein' of the Czech and Polish alphabets, with German influence. Czecklish uses the letter ẞß, as in German. It is important to note that Eszett has a different phonetic value than in German. Czecklish’s Latin alphabet has a total of 41 letters:

Letter	IPA	Letter	IPA	Letter	IPA	Letter	IPA	Letter	IPA
Aa	/ɑ/	Ęę	/ɛ̃/	Łł	/w/	Ss	/s/	Yy	/ɨ/
Ąą	/ɑ̃/	Ff	/f/	Mm	/m/	Šš	/ɕ/	Y̨y̨	/ɨ̃/
Bb	/b/	Gg	/g/	Nn	/n/	Tt	/t/	Zz	/z/
Cc	/ts/	Hh	/ɦ/	Ňň	/ɲ/	Ťť	/c/	Žž	/ʑ/
Čč	/tɕ/	Ii	/i/	Oo	/ɔ/	Uu	/u/
Dd	/d/	Jj	/j/	Ǫǫ	/ɔ̃/	Ůů	/u:/
Ďď	/ɟ/	Kk	/k/	Pp	/p/	Vv	/f/
Ee	/ɛ/	Ll	/l/	Rr	/r/	Ww	/v/
Ěě	/ɛ/	Ľľ	/ʎ/	Řř	/r̝/	Xx	/ks/

For more information on the Czecklish alphabet and its letters, see Czecklish Orthography & Numerals. It contains detailed explanations of the origins of certain letters, and how they are pronounced. It also explains how and when the letter Eszett is used, and its origins as it relates to the Czecklish alphabet. More information on diacritics and punctuation can also be found on the Czecklish Orthography & Numerals page.

Digraphs Czecklish uses 7 digraphs:

Letter	IPA
Ch ch	/x/
Dz dz	/dz/
Dž dž	/dʑ/
Gh gh	/ɣ/
Ng ng	/ŋ/
Pf pf	/pf/
Rž rž	/rʑ/