[Lingtyp] Query: syllable-reversing ludlings

Mon May 18 12:07:09 UTC 2020

Dear David,

A heavy-handed stress pattern like that of Dutch has no ludlings involving orderings of syllables. Two independent argots reverse the segment strings in syllables containing full vowels (ie non-schwa). Suffixes and syllables with schwa remain.

A maximal syllable like /straks/ comes out as /skarts/ ‘in a minute’. Chimpanzee /SIm.pan.’zee/ would be /mIS.na.’pees/ and geraamte  /x@’ra:m.t@/ is /x@’ma:r.t@/ ‘skeleton’. I suspect that reversing the order of syllables is precluded by the implied change of the metrical pattern, which might make the argot unusable.  

I described one of the two ludlings here
http://gep.ruhosting.nl/carlos/achteroetkalle_2014.pdf

The other one, used by IJmuiden fishermen, was more recently brought to my attention by Marc van Oostendorp and looks very similar judging by some examples.

Best wishes,
Carlos 

________________________________________
From: Lingtyp [lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org] on behalf of David Gil [gil at shh.mpg.de]
Sent: Monday, 18 May, 2020 12:00 PM
To: Eric Campbell
Cc: lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] Query: syllable-reversing ludlings

Dear Eric,

Thanks, this is very useful, albeit in a negative kind of way, as it appears to refute my original hunch: whereas Zenzontepec Chatino exhibits the (b) 123 > 231 pattern of Papuan Malay, its final syllable prominence resembles that of Riau Indonesian which exhibits the (a) 123 > 312 pattern.  Thereby suggesting that there's no obvious correlation between the choice between (a) and (b) patterns on the one hand, and the languages' stress patterns on the other.

But I'd still really appreciate more data from other languages, to see if any other correlation emerges, or whether the choice between (a) and (b) patterns is just random.

Best,

David

On 17/05/2020 21:25, Eric Campbell wrote:
Dear David,

The nchakui’ tsū’ ntīlú ‘speaking backwards’ play language of Zenzontepec Chatino (Otomanguean) displays pattern (b) 123 > 231, and sheds light on moraicity, the representation of tone, and other questions.

kutunu → tūnúku  ‘large crayfish’
kūnáɁa → náɁaku  ‘woman’
kʷilīʃí → lʲīʃíkʷi  ‘butterfly’
kilituɁ → lʲītʲúɁki  ‘navel of’
kʷitīɁjú → tʲīɁjúkʷi  ‘lightning

The language doesn’t have lexical stress, but the final syllable is the most prominent syllable of the phonological word, meaning, in this case, it (i) displays the most phonological contrasts (contrastive V nasality, V length, coda glottal stop) and (ii) tends to be the syllable with greatest duration. This was just published open access last month in PD&A: https://phondata.org/index.php/pda/issue/view/5

Best regards,

Eric Campbell

On Sun, May 17, 2020 at 10:27 AM Hiroto Uchihara <uchihara at buffalo.edu<mailto:uchihara at buffalo.edu>> wrote:
Dear David,

According to the Ito et al. (1996), fu.men 'score' > men.fu, mo.dan 'modern' > dan.mo, ya.súi 'cheap' > sui.ya; here, we could say that the syllables are reversed or the same 123 > 231 reversing is being applied. With longer words, they report ba.tsu.gun 'fantastic' > gun.ba.tsu, ki.chí.gai 'crazy' > gai.ki.chi, koo.híi 'coffee' > hii.koo so maybe 123..X > (X-1)(X)123.. with moraic counting is more general.  They also report cases of 123 > 321 (with moraic counting), such as pán.tsu ~ pan.tsu 'pants' > tsun.pa<http://tsun.pa>, tái.pu 'type' > pui.ta.

Hiroto

El dom., 17 de may. de 2020 a la(s) 11:59, David Gil (gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de>) escribió:

Dear Hiroto,

Thanks, this is very helpful. I'm curious about one thing though.  In the examples that you cited, the mora happens to correspond to a syllable, so it is not possible to tell whether it is moras or syllables that are being reversed.  But there are lots of other words where the mora is less than a complete syllable — what happens in such words?

Best wishes,

David

On 17/05/2020 19:35, Hiroto Uchihara wrote:
Dear David,

Japanese Zuu-jaa go does this, although I don't use this ludling so I don't have an intuition (I believe it became obsolete in the 90's). It looks like tri-moraic words follow the pattern 123 > 231 (Ito, Kitagawa & Mester 1996), such as pi.a.no<http://pi.a.no> 'piano' > ya.no.pi, shi.ka.ke<http://shi.ka.ke> 'trick' > ka.ke.shi, ma.zú.i 'tastes bad' > zu.i.ma<http://zu.i.ma>, ku.su.ri 'drug' > su.ri.ku. It appears that the location of the pitch accent doesn't matter: 'tastes bad' have accent on the penultimate mora while others are unaccented.

I hope this helps.

Reference:
Ito, Junko, Yoshihisa Kitagawa & Armin Mester. 1996. Prosodic faithfulness and correspondence: evidence from Japanese argot. Journal of East Asian Linguistics 5.3: 217-294.

Hiroto

El dom., 17 de may. de 2020 a la(s) 11:03, David Gil (gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de>) escribió:
Dear all,

Ludlings (aka play languages or secret languages) are often constructed by reversing the order of syllables in a word.  Using numerals to denote syllables, 12 > 21.  But what happens when there are three (or more) syllables in the word?  For tri-syllabic words, the two most common outcomes are

(a) 123 > 312
(b) 123 > 231

The Riau Indonesian ludling I have written about has the (a) pattern, eg. bahasa > sabaha. But a friend of mine in Papua has recently started writing to me in a ludling using the (b) pattern, e.g. bahasa > hasaba.  Which got me curious.  According to Wikipedia, the French ludling verlan may use either option, e.g. cigarette > restiga or garetsi.

I would appreciate any information you might be able to provide with regard to syllable-reversing ludlings of this kind that you might be familiar with in other languages.  Specifically, I would like to know:

(1) which pattern is followed in tri-syllabic words: (a), (b), or perhaps other?
(2) what is the location of word-stress in the language?

The motivation behind the second question is that I have a hunch that the difference between the ludlings in closely related Riau Indonesian and Papuan Malay might be due to their different stress patterns — a hypothesis that is easily tested by looking at a handful of other languages.

Thanks,

David

--
David Gil

Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History
Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany

Email: gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de>
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Dr. Hiroto Uchihara
https://sites.google.com/view/hiroto-uchihara/home?authuser=0
Seminario de Lenguas Indígenas
Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Circuito Mario de la Cueva
Ciudad Universitaria, 04510, Ciudad de México.
Tel. Seminario:(+52)-(55)-5622-7489
Office: (+52)-(55)-5622-7250, Ext. 49223

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David Gil

Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History
Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany

Email: gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de>
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-556825895
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-81344082091

--
Dr. Hiroto Uchihara
https://sites.google.com/view/hiroto-uchihara/home?authuser=0
Seminario de Lenguas Indígenas
Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Circuito Mario de la Cueva
Ciudad Universitaria, 04510, Ciudad de México.
Tel. Seminario:(+52)-(55)-5622-7489
Office: (+52)-(55)-5622-7250, Ext. 49223
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Eric W. Campbell

Assistant Professor of Linguistics
Director of Undergraduate Studies, Linguistics
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Academic Council, American Indian and Indigenous Collective

Department of Linguistics
South Hall 3432
University of California, Santa Barbara
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--
David Gil

Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History
Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany

Email: gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de>
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-556825895
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-81344082091

rmany Email: gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de> Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-556825895 Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-81344082091

-
David Gil

Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History
Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany

Email: gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de>
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-556825895
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-81344082091

rmany Email: gil at shh.mpg.de<mailto:gil at shh.mpg.de> Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-556825895 Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-81344082091