User:Ceige/Hapese

Hapese is the language of the Hap (alt. Hamp, Amp, Ap, Ãp) people. Having a very shallow written history, the language is not well attested in earlier stages, but appears to be an isolate with some possible loans and Wanderwörter in its lexicon. Complicating things further, the language appears to previously have had well defined dialects which have merged on several occasions, resulting in many sets of variants and similar-looking synonyms across the language. This is likely due to the semi-nomadic nature of the Hap people.

Phonology

Consonants

Onsets (Descriptive)

The following consonants are allowed as onsets in most variants of the Hap language:

	Labial	Dental	Palatal	Dorsal	Guttural
Plosive	p	t	(c, zh)	k	(q)
Fricative	(f/ɸ/[ʍ])	s, z (θ, ð)	(sh, zh, yh, yhu [ɥ̊])		h
Nasal	m	n, l, (r)	(ñ)	ng
Approximant	w (v/β/ⱱ)	(r)	y, yu (ɥ)

^{Sandybrown cells: dialectal, rare, extinct, or otherwise not an important part of the language.}

^{Bolded phones: these tend to predominate over other possible allophones.}

Due to the effects of nasal harmony, lenition and palatalisation in some substrate dialects, sonorants and fricatives are common onsets.

Certain allophones of historically possible phones will tend to dominate. For example, [c, θ, ɥ̊] will tend to be replaced with /s/ (which is why /s/ is bolded in the table above).

Onsets (Standardised)

For the most part, the following is considered an essential list of phonemes to communicate in the language effectively:

	Labial	Dental	Palatal	Dorsal	Guttural
Plosive	p	t	zh [tɕ ~ tʃ ~ ʈʂ ~ dʑ etc]	k
Fricative	f	s, z	sh [ɕ ~ ʃ ~ ʂ]		h
Nasal	m	n, l		ng
Approximant	w	r	y

^{Sandybrown cells: not as essential but still used}

Codas (Descriptive)

There are significantly less viable codas in the language than onsets.

	Labial	Dental	Palatal	Dorsal	Guttural
Plosive	p	t		(k)	ʔ, (q)
Fricative		(θ, ð, s, sh)			h
Nasal	m, mp/mp	n, (nd)		ng, ngk	ɴʔ
Approximant	u	(r)	i

One notable feature in Hap is the post-stopped nasal codas. Of these, /mp/ is the most common, and /nd/ the least. Even /ngk/ is losing ground to /ng/, /ɴʔ/, and /k/. While they may appear imposing in writing, these are simply the same as the nasal + plosive clusters at the end of English words (e.g. clump, tent, Frank), but they are analysed as a single unit for phonological reasons (though not without debate).

On the subject of /k/: /k/ is often replaced with /h/ or /ʔ/, as is increasingly /t/. /p/ remains relatively stable.

The /r/ coda phoneme is only used emphatically and for fun. It used to be the coda version of an underlying /l/ or /r/ coda, but since it is no longer pronounced normally and not reflected in the orthography, the phoneme can be inserted onto the end of nearly any non-high open vowel.

Codas (Standardised)

	Labial	Dental	Palatal	Dorsal	Guttural
Plosive	p	t		(k)	ʔ
Fricative					h
Nasal	m, mp	n		ng, ngk	ɴʔ
Approximant	u		i

Vowels

While the vowels in any given word may vary, for the most part Hapese vowels are more stable than the consonants, dialectally speaking.

Monophthongs

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i	u
Mid	é	ə	o
Open	a

Diphthongs

	Main pronunciation	Allophones	Notes
ai	ɑɪ	äɪ, (æɪ, e(:))	Colloquially both merges with and diverges from éi
éi	ɛɪ	eɪ, æɪ, e(:)	Colloquially merges with /e/
əi	əɪ	eɪ, əi	Tends to merge with i and éi
oi	ɔɪ	oɪ, ɔe, oe
ui	ʉi	ʊɪ, uɪ	Tends to merge with /(C)wéi/
au	ao	æo, au, aʊ, (o(:))	Colloquially merges with /o/
éu	ew	eo, (ø:)
əu	əu	ew, ou Tends to merge with u and ou, rarely realised as a syllabic velar lateral
iu	iʉ	ɪw, iu	Tends to merge with /(C)yu/
ou	ɔw	ɔʉ, o(:)	Colloquially merges with /o/, also influenced by English

Final -u in these diphthongs is sometimes realised as /w/, which is interpreted varyingly as either a closure and rounding of the lips, compression, or velarisation (with some lateralisation thrown in, a feature picked up by contact with other languages - cf. the dark L in English and Portuguese).

Dictionary

Sheets wordlist

Dolgopolsky & Swadesh-Yakhontov Lists

Dolgopolsky list

1. I/me
2. two/pair
3. you (singular, informal)
4. who/what
5. tongue - ləi
6. name - nang, nã
7. eye - mé (pl. mé-a)
8. heart - nong, (tõ-)nõk
9. tooth - sit
10. no/not - long, lõ
11. nail (finger-nail) - kəi, kə-(lə)-lit ("scratchy flap")
12. louse/nit - siak, siək, sĩ-yak ("small noxious thing")
13. tear/teardrop
14. water - mop, nwəp
15. dead - simah, mak, mãk, sĩ-maʰ ("a little dead")