Mila: Difference between revisions

Mila is the language spoken by the lula on the planet Kukca. The lula come originally from a technologically advanced planet. The planet Kukca had been terraformed many million years previously and was deemed ripe for colonisation. The colonists were sent under the pretext that they would be repairing the on-planet communication system (in the form of a pyramid), but were not told that they would subsequently become colonists, (it has been discovered that finding willing volunteers is a far from easy task and the home planet necessarily resorted to tricks to send colonists). The colonists had been genetically altered to thrive on the planet, based on readings sent from the communication towers.

Other planets which have been previously terraformed have become 'zoos' which may be occasionally visited (our own Earth is one such planet), holiday destinations or like this one colonies, and partly as an elaborate social experiment from the home planet to see how lula can cope. The colonists first arrived about 150 years previous to the language as described here is spoken. On colonisation the language was completely regular having been the constructed lingua franca of the home planet.

The original aim of Mila was not to create a whole language fitting into a constructed world, but rather a way to experiment with language change. I wanted to create a language with a simple phonological system and phonotactics which may be manipulated to explore how language can change and to test certain linguistic hypotheses, historical phonology being my main area of interest. I soon discovered though that it would be a good chance to improve my knowledge of other areas of linguistics and it has inevitably developed into a full language. I didn't want at an early stage to deal with loan words which is why I felt it necessary to have the language in complete isolation and a constructed world has thus also been created. With a constructed world and culture it brings with it all the problems of translations from Earth-based languages. How does one translate 'dog' for example? Mila does have a word for 'dog' but it should be understood as a dog-like creature, as opposed to an actual dog. As such the goals of the language have somewhat drifted, now focussing on a realistic setting for the language, though development of the language into separate daughter languages is also an ultimate goal.

The lula who first inhabited the planet were taught raised by scientists in isolation, a necessity as they had been genetically moderated to cope with the planets climate (which is much hotter than the home planet) and air (which is richer in oxygen than the home planet). The scientists, being from an international background, spoke the planet's lingua franca, which is itself a constructed language, based on many of the home planet's language families. The original Mila (meaning simply 'language') was therefore completely regular. In the 150 years since colonisation the original population of 56 has risen to a few thousand (they breed quickly) and the language is now the everyday mother-tongue of the speakers, a situation which has never occurred on the home planet, such that Mila on the home planet has changed little in years. As a mother-tongue, though, the language has undergone a number of changes and irregularities have crept in, most notably in the phonology, shortenings of pronouns and semantic shifts.

/r/ This is a voiced alveolar trill [r]. In initial pre-stressed position and intervocalically it usually has at least two taps in all other positions it is more commonly a voiced flap [ɾ]. In the environment of an adjacent /h/ it will be slightly devoiced, though not fully so. Examples: '''ʌʌʌ''' /ʹrira/ [ʹrirɐ] ''noise''; '''oʌ́ω''' /ʹparna/ [ʹpaɾnɐ] ''bad''.2; '''υιʌ''' /ʹluhra/ [ʹɫuhɾɐ ~ ɫuhɾ̥ɐ] ''father''; '''υιʌ́''' /luʹhar/ [ɫuʹhaɾ] ''father''.3.

This trilled sound is notoriously difficult for many lula to produce and often becomes other sounds, which would usually be classed as speech defects. One very common ‘speech defect’ is to produce this sound as a ‘whistled s’, i.e. an apical retracted [s] which sounds a little like a kettle boiling. Another common pronunciation is to produce the trill as an apical voiced fricative [z̺]. The flapped [ɾ] allophone does not undergo these changes.

Stress is usually placed on the first syllable of the root of a word. Exceptions include where a grammatical /a/ is inserted. This will always take the stress. It usually occurs in the first syllable of the root anyway, but in agreement with the third person it will occur on the second syllable of the root. Suffixes generally do not affect stress placement, though the lative suffix ''':v''' /-ij ~ -ja/ used inflectionally will always be stressed, and the negative suffix :ɔ /-uk ~ -ka ~ -ga/ may be stressed if the negative itself is stressed.

Main sentence stress falls on the part of the sentence where agreement with the subject falls. This however is not the case if this word is a pronoun (which in non-formal speech are shortened). If there is a pronoun then the stress will fall on the verb, and if there is no verb, then the stress will fall on the subject. There is a rise in intonation before the main sentence stress and then the intonation falls from this main stress. There is no difference between statements and questions.

The first is that adjacent consonants must agree in the amount of voicing. If therefore a voiceless obstruent (apart from '''ι''' /h/) is adjacent to a voiced consonant then it will become voiced. The word for ''house'' is '''υɔυ''' before voicing considerations are taken we have the basic outline of /ʹluk.la/ (the asterisk indicates a wrong form). The /k/ needs to agree for voicing with the following /l/ which is voiced. The /l/ cannot devoice so the /k/ must become the voiced /g/. giving us [ʹlug.lɐ]. Similarly, the word for ''more'' is '''oωɾ''' which gives the basic outline /ʹpin.ta/ but the /t/ needs to agree for voicing with the preceding /n/ so will become /d/, giving us [ʹpin.dɐ].

If coda /l/ or /r/ occur after /u/ or /i/ respectively then the /l/ and /r/ will be elided. We thus have the example of the word ''language'' '''ɷʌυ''' which has the root MRL. Without elision the syllabification gives /ʹmir.la/, but the /r/ follows /a/ and is in coda position, so the pronunciation is [ʹmi.lɐ]. Similarly the word for ''four'' is '''oυɾ''' which will syllabify prior to elision as /ʹpul.da/ but with elision it surfaces as [ʹpu.dɐ].

A grammatical /a/ can be inserted (which will take the word stress). This is shown in the orthography by placing an acute accent above the consonant it precedes. ''I am hungry'' is for example '''ɷ́on'''. As the acute accent is above the '''ɷ''' we must insert /a/ before this sound. This gives us the modified root of aMPC. Starting from this /a/ we then syllabify /ʹam.bic/. ''You are hungry'' translates as '''ɷón''' will insert /a/ before the second syllable giving the modified root of MaPC which syllabifies as /ʹmap.ca/. And finally ''(s)he is hungry'' translates as '''ɷoń''' giving the modified root as MPaC. Again starting from the left we start with /mV/ The vowel will be /u/ because of the following non-coronal sound, but the /p/ will not complete the syllable, but rather forms the onset of the following consonant, giving the syllabification of /muʹbac/.

====Irregularities=====

There are a number of words with irregular pronunciations which are not indicated in the orthography and a learner must just learn them. The word '''onυ''' can mean both ''book'' and ''ghost''. For the meaning ''book'' it is pronounced regularly as [ʹpiɟ.lɐ]. For the meaning of ''ghost'' it is pronounced irregularly as [ʹpuɟ.lɐ]. It is because of such words that /i/ and /u/ are generally accepted as separate phonemes, however the amount of such irregularities are very limited.

The Romanisation of Mila follows more closely the final pronunciation than the underlying phonological structure. So degeminated consonants as well as elided liquids are not shown, whilst voiced obstruents are shown as voiced. Unstressed [ɐ] is shown as 'a'. Stress is not normally indicated, as it is usually predictable based on the word root, but it may be indicated with an acute accent above the stressed syllable. The romanisation has the advantage that it allows for irregularities to be shown, such that the past and future tenses of ''to sleep'' as given in the previous section are shown as 'inhuhu' and 'uhu' respectively.

Mila has a series of affixes, either prefixes or suffixes. In the orthography these are shown separated from the root with the symbol ''':'''. Syllabification of suffixes is a continuation of the syllabification process of the root. Prefixes are syllabified in the form VC. A word such as ''closed''-<span style="font-variant: small-caps;">adj</span> is ʌ:cιɾ:ω which syllabifies prior to phonological processes as /irʹsuh.tin/ but will surface as [iʹzuh.tin]. Because of the syllabification rules any affix may have a number of allomorphs. The dubitative suffix is ''':o''' /-p/ which may surfaces as [-up] if following an onset consonant, [-pa] if following a voiceless coda and [-ba] if following a voiced coda.

The following is an overview of the affixes which can be used to modify nouns.

The subject of a sentence is indicated with the suffix ''':n''' [-ic ~ -ca ~ -ɟa]. The subject in Mila usually indicates the actor of a sentence, although when an intransitive verb is used which modifies another verb the subject of the sentence may appear in the predicate position. As such the language may be analysed as showing syntactic ergativity.

:::[ʹlit.c'''ic''' da iʹmin.ra]

The locative is used to indicate position, both physical and temporal and can be translated as at, in, on, by, near etc. It is formed by the prefix '''ʌ:''' /i(r)-/ placed directly on the noun it refers to. It never takes stress and so the stress will remain on the syllable it would appear on if the prefix were not present.

:::[ʹpiɟ.lic '''i'''ʹgu.ma ɟa]

The supraessive prefix '''ɔ:''' is used to indicate position above the noun it modifies. As with the locative it does not affect stress placement. So '''ɔ:ιnc''' /ukʹhicsa/ '<span style="font-variant: small-caps;">spre</span>-cloud' means simply ''above the clouds''. It usually refers to position without physical contact, though occasionally it may have a similar meaning to ''on top of'' or ''at the top of''. An example of this is '''ʌ:'''ɔυn /iʹguɟa/ which, by using the locative here, means ''at/on the mountain''. By using the supraessive, though, we have '''ɔ:'''ɔυn /uʹkuɟa/ which would mean ''at the top of the mountain''. Another example would be '''ʌ:'''ɔυɷ /iʹguma/ which can mean ''on the table'' but could equally indicate ''at'' or ''by the table'' using the locative, but '''ɔ:'''ɔυɷ /uʹkuma/ takes away the ambiguity and can only mean ''on (top of) the table''.

It can also be used for figurative purposes, so a king could be spoken about as being ‘on top of the people’ '''ɔ:υυυ''' /ugʹlula/. Some of these words have taken on derivational meanings, so the example just given '''ɔ:υυυ''' also means ''haughty'' and as such has become confused with the identical verbal prefix ɔ: (see below) which is used for iteration, such that the homonym '''ɔ:υυυ''' can also mean ''crowded''.

====Predicate====

==Example texts==

[[Category:Conlangs]]