Sangi

=Orthography=

Basics
The basic letters, i.e. those without diacritics are pronounced as in English, except j which is pronounces at a y would be. Y is pronounced as it is in Finnish. There is no k, no x and there are 2 additional letters þ and ð which pronounced as the th is in bath and bathe respectively.

Diacritics
An acute accent over a vowel makes it long. An umlaut indicates I-Affection and a circumflex indicates A-Affection. There pronunciations are given below. The letters ę and ų represent the schwa and the u in but in RP. An accute accent over a consonant indicates that it is palatal, so c, g, s, z will be pronouned ch, j, sh and zh respectively.

=Phonology=

Introduction
The most basic of all words in Sangi are derived from Modern (British) English words, mostly of germanic origin, through a series of phonological changes.

There are also a large number of consonant and vowel mutations which occur at morpheme boundaries and within the words themselves.

When creating a new word from an English base, the consonants are changed first according to their environments. Next the vowels are changed. This linear process is followed with only two exceptions. They involve the change of medial and final consonants. If the vowel before the medial or final consonant becomes a vowel followed by a consonant, i.e. r, then this change occurs before the consonant change.

Phonological Changes
The changes which a sound is subject to are dependent (usually) on its position in the word and the surrounding sounds.

Initial Consonant Changes
'w' also becomes 'Ø' before o.

Medial Consonant Changes
'w' also becomes 'Ø' before o.
 * See the table of Other Consonant Changes

Final Consonant Changes
¹ The forms of this new vowel complex can be found in th table for Vowel Changes.

Consonant Cluster Changes

 * These also occur in the spoken and written language at the beginning of words when the final sound of the previous word was a vowel, e.g. “an e ssil – and yet still”. It is a kind a sandhi.

Other Consonant Changes
¹ This applies only to plosives, sibilants and nasals in there basic form.

² The j affects the fricative consonants in the following way: f > p; v > b; th > t; dh > d; ch > c; gh > g; l > jj; r > s.

³ This change means that the only Cl combinations are cl, gl and hl. The after all other consonants becomes i but becomes j before i to avoid the creation of a long vowel and causes palatalisation.

Palatalisation
Palatalisastion is a change which occurs after the new word has been made from the original English. It occurs when a word ends in an -i but is then followed by a vowel ending, e.g. -a for female nouns. It also occurs when and l becomes a j. It only affects a small number of consonants and should not be confused with I-affection, which is a morpho-phonological process.

t > ć

d > ǵ

s > ś

z > ź

When the stem undergoes any form of consonant mutation, the original combination of Cj or Ci re-emerges. It is this combination which goes through the mutation, not the palatalised form. The j is, however, ignored under these processes if the new form can be palatalised, if it can not then the j is taken into account and the stem will not mutate. For example -tji- becomes -ć- under palatalisation. When subjected to plural mutation t becomes ð. ð cannot be palatalised so the plural form of -tji- remains -tji- and therfore becomes -ć-, even though -ć- can undergo plural mutation. The t of the same -tji- combination,when subjected to consonant gradation, becomes d, hwich can be palatalised. The new sequence will be -dji- which becomes -ǵ-.

Vowel Changes

 * syllabic m, n, l, and r.

Phonological Processes at Morpheme Boundaries
As part of the nature of the phonology of the language only voiceless consonants and the r, l, n and m can occur at the ends of words. If a voiced consonant or a consonant cluster occurs, then the letter -i is placed after them.

The phonological processes which occur at morpheme boundaries are dependent on several factors, i.e. the two sounds which appear together and their respective effects on the other sound. These are generally processes of gemination, assimilation and epenthesis. None of the consonantal proccesses can occur at conjugation/declension morpheme boundaries unless the original conjugation/declension is retained phonetically. If it cannot be then epenthesis must be used or the consonants go unaffected, e.g a'trîaźan(i)ma "because he did not treat", where the -i- is the part of the original stem. Epenthesis rarely occurs in nouns as the gender marker is inserted instead of the regular phonological sound. In verbs, however, only the conjugational suffixes of slot 11 are immune to consonantal processes like assimilation and epenthesis which would affect that suffix itself.

Gemination: When a sound occurs after or before itself when the first sound is not preceded by another consonant, they merge to form a long consonant, e.g. pat+tę > pattę [pat:ə] “you are bad”. When a voiceless sound is followed by a voiced sound the voiced sound devoices. When the voiced sound comes first the voiceless stop becomes voiced. When an nasal follows or is followed by an unlike consonant it becomes like it and then undergoes assimilation. When it is followed by another nasal, however, the second nasal becomes like the first.

Assimilation: This process only involves stops and nasals. When a voiceless stop follows a similar nasal, it assimilates to that nasal.

Sibilant Assimilation: This is a series of assimilation processes that occur when sibilants are placed next to each other.

Epenthesis: When a vowel follows another vowel and does not form an allowable diphthong, then a consonant is inserted between them. An h [x/ç] is placed before e which becomes ę at the end of a word, and r before a and i and a z before other vowels. When a consonant follows another and cannot be put together in the above to ways, then a vowel is inserted between them. An ę is placed between like consonants, and i is placed after labials, an a is placed after dentals and an e is placed after velars.

Examples of Epethesis:

i+a > ira “I hit”

An exception to these rules occurs when r is followed by another consonant. Instead of placing an epenthetic vowel between the r and the consonant an ę is placed after the combination.

Morpho-Phonology
As said above, there are a large number of consonant and vowel mutations which occur at morpheme boundaries and within the words themselves. There are, in total, four consonant mutations and four vowel mutations.

Consonant Mutations
The four different consonant mutations are I-affection, A-affection, plural mutation and stem gradation. I-affection and A-affection do not affect the meaning of the word and are simply phonological processes which affect the last consonant[s] of the word. Plural mutation and stem gradation, on the other hand, help in changing the meaning of the word.

I-Affection
I-affection occurs when the last consonant of the stem is immediately followed by the vowels i and e (long, short and diphthong forms) and also the consonant j.

A-Affection
Like I-affection, A-affection occurs when the last consonant of the stem is immediately followed by a vowel, in this case a.

Plural Mutation
This mutation occurs when forming the plural of the four noun stems (see below).

Stem Gradation
Stem gradation is a weakening of the final consonant of the stem to form different noun and verb stems which are used to built up the meaning of the noun or verb as well as to derive words from different classes of words.

pp > p > b > v > f > w > h > hi > he

tt > t > d > j > i > e

cc > c > g > j > i > e

m > mb > mm > mp > mi > me

n > nd > nn > ns > nt > ni > ne

nh > ŋ > ng > nc > nct > ŋi > ŋe

l > ld > ll > ls > lt > li > le

r > rd > rr > rs > rt > ri > re

s > t > d > j > i > e

sp > sw > sl > śi > śe

st > ss > ś > si > se

sc > ś > si > se

h > p > b > w > hi > he

Ø > c > g > j > i > e (if the Ø was originally a c)

Ø > t > d > j > i > e (if the Ø was originally a c)

It should be noted that s, tt, cc and Ø all eventually weaken to the same pattern, causing a certain amount of ambiguity if the gradation is carried through enough times. Also, grades of the pattern Ci and Ce can never be the general stem but i and e can be strengthened.

Vowel Mutations
There are two sets of vowel mutation, both with two further subsets. One set is pure mutation which causes a semantic change is the word. The other is affection, which is caused by pure vowel mutation.

Pure Mutation
Pure mutation has two subsets; A-mutation and I-mutation. I-mutation involves the raising of the final vowel of the stem, while a-mutation involves the lowering of the final vowel.

¹ long a becomes œ in a-mutation, but is written as a two circumflexed “a”s.

² long i becomes jai in i-mutation and long u becomes wá, but are both written as a two umlauted letters.

In the orthography the base vowel is written as it is with a diacritic to mark that it is mutated. I-mutation is shown by the use of the umlaut and the letter y for the sound ü. A-mutation is shown by the use of the circumflex. If the word changes semantic class, e.g. a verb becomes a noun, then the vowel with the diacritic is written with the vowel that marks its pronunciation, e.g. ü > au. This is not the, however, when a plural noun is used as a stative verb, the vowel marked with the diacritic is kept to mark the plurality and a special tense infix is added.

Vowel Affection
Affection comes in two subsets; I-affection and A-affection. Under I-affection the vowel is raised and under A-affection the vowel is lowered, just like in pure vowel mutation and they are represented in the orthography in the same way. The difference is that vowel affection has no semantic effect on the word and occurs under different circumstances. I-affection occurs when the last vowel of the stem was raised to either an i, an y or an e. A-affection occurs when the last vowel was lowered to either an o or an a. This means that vowel affection can only occur in disyllabic or polysyllabic words and only on the penultimate syllable of the stem. i and u, though, are not affected by vowel i-affection and a is not affected by a-affection. Affection also occurs when a derivational suffix is added. This changed the root vowel, but it is marked by pronunciation and not by diacritics as with affection caused by pure mutation.

=Morphology=

Verbs
Verbs are possibly the most important class of words in Sangi. Because their conjugation includes different endings for the subject, object and secondary objects, it is possible to drop all pronouns used in a sentence and it will be understood. This means that the verb is the only part of the sentence necessary for the sentence to be complete.

Nouns
Nouns are nowhere near as complicated, in terms of structure, verbs are, but the number of suffixes available to choose from for certain slots is much higher. They also have a complex set of phonological rules through which number and case are defined.

Adjectives
Sangi Adjectives decline in a simialr way to nouns, but for fewer cases and no number. They have, however, a complex comparitive system and the ability to carry demonstrative and indefinite suffixes in place of the pronouns themselves.

Derivation
Sangi derivation usaually affects verbs in there form. Nouns and adjectives can be used interchangeabley with only a change in how the can be declined.

Pronouns
There are seven classes of pronoun in Sangi, each one declined as if it were a noun. These classes are personal, demonstrative, interrogative, temporal, spatial relative and indefinite.

=Syntax=

Unlike in English, the main sentence structure is VSO (verb-subject-object). The sentence is built around the principle of what is viewed as the most important feature first. This means that verbs always come first, nouns afterwards, adjectives come after nouns and adverbs come after verbs. Pronouns are rarely used in written form, but long winded verb constructions mean that in the spoken language they are used for all cases but the nominative.

A note on "I love you"
The number of intensifiers and pronouns means that single English phrase "I love you" can be said many diiferent ways in Sangi using a single word "Lawel". If it is conjugated with the intensive suffix it can mean "adore" if this is then used with the desirative pronoun it can mean something even stronger. If used with the honorific pronoun it can mean "respect" and "love" at the same time. The combinations vary in meaning from person to person as emotions in any language never convey the actual feeling.

=Context and Culture=

Real-World Development
Sangi was developed using my knowledge of phonetics, morphology and linguistic change. I started with a base vocabulary, i.e. English words of Germanic origin and applied a set of sound change rules to these. Next I developed a series of grammatical suffixes influences by Finnish and Estonian. I wanted to add a bit of a natural feel to the language so I developed a set of sound changes to create a degree of spoken ambiguity. For example, plurality was originally marked by the suffix -i or -t depending on the final sound of the word. This later became -[i]t and then the -t was dropped all together. I looked at languages like Welsh and Norse, dropped the -i and developed an i-mutation rule. I added other morpho-phonological rules to cause further changes of the stem based on context. So the language is almost entirely unnatural but the ambiguity in the spoken language gives it a kind of natural feel.

Fictional History
I had the idea that I should develop a society for this language to actually have some speakers, so I developed the society around what I saw as the perfect one for me. This was a kind of anarchist society (not to be confused with anarchy, but based upon anarchism as well. Trust me, there is a difference, but people are not taught this by those in charge of society). There exist no rules, only personal moral codes, no hierarchy, but direct democracy among the communitites that are affected by an issue. In this type of democracy, no action is taken unless 100% of the community agrees with the idea, so there is a lot of negotiation and debate before anything is done, but so much focus is put on these debates that they can last, at the most, 1 week, or there abouts. War is non-existent so military decisions or not necessary (just in case anyone thought war would be slow or their armed forces would easily be defeated). For this society to work it would have to be the only kind of society in place, so I placed it on another world. The geography of this new world was never considered when colonised by it's settlers from Earth after they knew it could support life long-term. If you want to go somewhere, you know only the climate will change. The people will hold the same general beliefs as you but, as they do on Earth, their personalities will differ.

Art is different in this society. Writing is highly practiced and many novels, poems, etc. of all genres exist. The static visual arts, i.e. painting and scultpure, are rarely produced and those that are produced are rarely viewed. The realm of visual art is dominated by calligraphy and theatre. Theatre is divided into two classes, the opera, which combines the auditory arts and the visual, and the play, which combines the written arts with the visual. The auditory arts are divided in three; instrumental, vocal and mixed. All forms of art focus on the ideals of society. War is only mentioned in terms of a moral war or the war against the oppressive regime of the old home-world, which is never called Earth, but is instead called "the World of Rulers".