Phonology


English alphabet is being employed in this blog to write Apatani for two obvious reasons:
It is known well to all literate Apatanis; and

It is quite convenient, as well, to write Apatani with slight customization of phonological rules of English.

For the purpose of writing Apatani with English alphabets, following points have been considered:

All the consonants, that is, b, c, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, q, r, s, t, v, w, x, y and z, sound as in English.

Combinations of consonants such as ch, kh, ng and double consonants (nn, tt etc.) are used specifically as in check, Sikh, ring, sinner and attend respectively
Vowels are a, e, i, o, u – as in English, plus two additional vowels e and ii which are unique to Apatani

Each vowel in Apatani has a unique sound-
‘a’ as in America
‘e’ as in set
**‘e’ also as in tader /tad...r/ (means intestinal worm in Apatani), taker (star)
‘i’ as in sit, India etc
‘o’ as in pot, old etc
‘u’ as in bush
‘ii’ as in siibin /s…bin/ (means goat in Apatani)
**[e may be used for two distinct sounds as mentioned above; their use in words are understood from context.]

Apatani being a tone language, all the speech sounds mentioned above except e have variant forms depending on length, pitch and aspiration of the vowel. These variant forms are represented in words with certain combination of letters which are nearest to the sound represented in English words with similar combinations of letters.

Representation of speech sounds on basis of length, pitch and aspiration:
Variants of vowel sound a:
a /as in Papa, ask/ e.g, apu (flower), owpa (about to cut work with spade), ane (mother)
aa /as in aag (fire), raat (night) in hindi/ e.g, aane (came), owpaa (remove by cutting with spade)
ah /as in ah!/ e.g, miinah (too busy in doing something), owpah (chance of working with spade or chance to find something while working with spade)

Variants of vowel sound e:
e /as in pen, pet, set/ e.g, ene (shot), tape (pumkin)
ay /as in pay, day, ray/ e.g, tapay (leech)
eh /as in Eh!/ e.g, niipeh (pierce across)

Variants of vowel sound i:
i /as in pin, sin, dim/ e.g, inne (went/ walked), alyi (air, wind), tito (pour)
ee /as in deep, deem, heed/ e.g, eemi (floor by the fireplace), alyee (arrow)
ie /as in eerie, Barbie doll/ e.g, riemi (spider), alyie (pig)
ih [short and rising as in oh, eh etc.] e.g, tihto (rub as in lighting match sticks)


Variants of vowel sound o:
o /as in open, over, old/ e.g., opaa (leave), rowto (pull), atobo (grand father/father in law)
ow /as in row, bow, low/ e.g., owne (cut with spade), rotow (spacious)
oh /as in oh!/ e.g., moh (he/she)

Variants of vowel sound u:
u /as in bush, put/ e.g., tune (kicked)
oo /as in too, loose, root/ e.g., toone (picked)
uh /as in huh!/ e.g., tuhne (plucked)
ooh /as in pooh!/ e.g., toohne (pushed)

*Variants of vowel sound ii:
ii e.g, siine (died) /s...ne/
iiw e.g, siiwne (scratched) /s.....ne/, aniiw (leaf)
iih e.g, aniih (hurry, haste)

*for pronunciation of variants of speech sounds 'ii', comparison may be drawn with that of variants of speech sound 'o'.

Letter n when written in the middle (not preceding a vowel) or in the end of a word, becomes nasal n (ñ) - similar to bhindu in Hindi as in nahin (no), ankhen (eyes) etc.

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