Sarim

Sarim (Sarim: Sarim Savet) is a language spoken in Sarim Ari, a nation on the continent of Yandras. It is a largely isolating, head-final language, displaying traits of ergative morphosyntactic alignment.

Phonology

Sarim has a fairly simple phonology; it distinguishes 14 consonants and 9 vowels, as detailed below:

Consonants:

• Labial: /p b m f v/

• Alveolar: /t d n s z ɬ ts) r l/ <t d n s z lh c r l>
• Palatal: /tɕ ɟ dʑ j/ <ch sh j i>
• Velar: /k g x ŋ/ <k g h ŋ>

Vowels:

• /i e ɛ ɨ ɑ o u/

• /ai ei ai ou/
• <ai ei au ou>

Allophony

-The consonants /t d n l/ are realised as dental unless adjacent to one of /s z/, which are always alveolar (and laminal).

-The rhotic /r/ is realised as a tril [r] when intervocalic or word initial. Word-finally or when adjacent to another cosnoant, it weakens to a flap [ɾ] or even an approximant [ɹ].

-/j/ is realised as the voiced palatal fricative [ʝ] word-initially.

-Unstressed /ɨ/ tends to lower to [ə] when unstressed. Likewise, /i u o/ may lower to [ɪ ʊ ɔ].

-/ɛ/'s realisation is quite low, somwhere between cardinal /ɛ/ and /æ/

-/ɑ/ may round to [ɒ] when adjacent to a sonorant.

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Phonotactics

A Sarim syllable consists of an onset and a rime. Both elements are compulsory.

The onset may consist of any single consonant, or a cluster of Cr or Cv, with the exception that /r l j v ɬ/ may not be C, and only velars and /s/ may occur in Cv onset clusters.

The rime may consist of any single vowel, or a vowel plus one of a limited number of coda consonants. Word internally, these consonants are /t s r l x/ or a nasal at the same point of articulation as a following consonant. Word-finally, /m n ŋ/ are distinguished phonemically, /x/ may not occur, and /d ɬ/ do occur.

Stress and Pitch Accent

-Stress in Sarim is not phonemic, and is always on the antepenultimate syllable, unless a syllable neighbouring the the antepenultimate has one of /ai e A o au/ as the nucleus, in which case hte stress shifts there.

-The pitch accent is more complex. For this purpose, syllables can be considered either monomoraic, dimoraic, or trimoraic: Monomoraic syllables consist of an open syllable with one of /i y ɛ æ ɔ/ as the nucleus. Dimoraic syllables consist of closed syllables with one of /i y ɛ æ ɔ/ as the nucleus, or open syllables with one of /ai e A o au/ as the nucleus. Trimoraic syllables consist of closed syllables with one of /ai A au/ as the nucleus.

Pitch accent is always on the penultimate mora.

Stress is realised as a raise in volume and lengthening of the vowel. Pitch accent is realised as a lowering of the tone of the vowel. Pitch accent and stress may occur on the same syllable, or be split across different syllables.

Elision

Elision is a Sandhi feature very common in Sarim, and occurs when two vowels are neighbouring across a word boundary, e.g. 'ti omi that (he) see(s). If the two vowels are the same quality, they are realised together as a long vowel. If the two vowels are of different quality and either the first or last element is one of unstressed /e i/ or /o y/, then these are realised as [j] and [w] respectively, so /ti Omi/ is realised as [tjOmi]. If neither of these conditions is fulfilled, and one of the words involved is a grammatical particle, that particle looses its vowel, which orthographically is represented by replacing the vowel grapheme with an apostrophe. If the two words are lexical words, and removing the final vowel of the first one would not create an illegal consonant cluster, it may be dropped, indicated orthographically by replacing the vowel with an apostrophe. If none of these conditions are met, no change is made.

Syntax

Theta-roles in Sarim

Sarim shows Ergative alignment. This means that Sarim treats the sole argument of an intransitive verb (S) and the patient of a transitive verb (P) the same, and marks the agent of a transitive verb (A) differently.

Sarim ditransitive verbs show dative alignment; the theme (what is given) is marked as absolutive, whilst the receiver is marked as Dative.

Sarim Words

The basic divide in Sarim is between lexical and grammatical words.

• Lexical words are any words referring to an object, state, or action
• Grammatical words show function or position, or modify meaning.

Basic Word Order

Sarim's basic word order is Object-Verb-Agent, or OVA:

'Bâru haik;

• water boil
• The water is boiling

Bâru haik dun

• water boil man
• The man is boiling the water

Oblique arguments are placed after A:

Bâru haik dun oje ye

• water boil man day LOC
• The man is boiling the water today

Bâru datsa dun feyar si

• water give man woman DAT
• the many gave the water to the woman