This section describes the sound system of Mongsen Ao as spoken in Mangmetong village and is based on Coupe (2007).
Vowels Mongsen Ao has 6
vowels: • The
high central is
rounded. • The two low vowels differ in terms of
phonation type. has modal voice (i.e. normal phonation); has
creaky voice (also known as
vocal fry,
laryngealization). Coupe (2003) argues that this is a separate vowel
phoneme and not a
tone, a
glottal stop, or resulting from
prosodic effects.
Consonants Mongsen Ao has 27
consonants: • Dental consonants are
laminal denti-alveolar. • The post-alveolar approximant varies from an
apical post-alveolar to
subapical retroflex: . • The
glottal stop occurs only at the end of words. However, in this position it contrasts with words ending in vowels: 'spear' vs. 'person'. When a suffix is added to such words, the is deleted: 'to eat' + CAUS → 'to cause to eat'. Thus, the glottal stop has a somewhat marginal phonemic status.
Tone Ao is a
tonal language with 3 contrasting lexical tones: • high • mid • low All are register tones.
Syllable and phonotactics The generalized
syllable structure of Ao is abbreviated as the following: :: (C1)V(G)(C2)+T
(C1) • Any of the 20 consonants may appear as an optional
syllable onset (excluding the word-final ).
V • All 6 vowels may occur as the syllable nucleus.
(G) • The optional
glide elements following the head vowel are essentially non-syllabic offglide realizations of the 4 vowels . For example, → 'species of centipede'. • The following are the possible tautsyllabic combinations: .
(C2) • The following consonants may occur in the optional
syllable coda: unaspirated stops, nasals, and the rhotic . The glottal stop with its restricted distribution also occurs but only word-finally.
T All syllables occur with one of the three tones. In a VG sequence, tone only occurs the vowel head. ==Syntax==