Chiwere Popular Orthography

Lance Foster ioway at earthlink.net
Tue Apr 17 13:57:45 UTC 2001


Koontz John E wrote:

>
> > I think for a beginner-level the "kh" may be easier to deal with (I
> > know some really want the hyphens but I put my foot down on that one).
>
> The problem with stop + h combinations (ph, th, ch, kh) is that they are
> the most natural way to write aspiration, which is essentially always a
> factor in Mississippi Valley languages.

ok..if th and ch should be avoided as they are "the most natural way to write
aspiration", then what do you say about their use in Jimm's system then as far
as che and thi? Most in the community seem to be okay with th as theta for
example. Although aspiration may be a linguistic characteristic, I don't think
it seems to have much importance in the way of distinguishing a meaningful sound
anymore (though if you have an example of such a distinction I would be
interested!).. aspiration seems just to be a matter of having a more authentic
"native accent".

I still have a problem with whether the b/p in b/paxoje was originally supposed
to be "snow" (ba) or "head" (pa)

Lance



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