Angrex

(T.B.A.) (chio bei nonth)
Spoken in:	(somewhere in North America) ((sämvä en Nof Mäweka))
Conworld:	A possible future timeline (arguments to the contrary are welcome)
Total speakers:	none yet
Genealogical classification:	Indo-European Germanic Anglic (T.B.A.)
Basic word order:	SVO
Morphological type:	isolating
Morphosyntactic alignment:
Writing system:
Created by:
Tropylium	one very late evening in spring 2008

A tentativ name for a future Anglic language. May be switched to a proper geographic-based one eventually.

Owes much to Futurese.

Grand Master Plan

Initial dialect features

Note that these features' current geographical distribution does not necessarily limit Ängrex's, since a few of them are still spreding.

Vowels

• Yod-dropping: Early Modern English /iʊ/ becomes /uː/ (GOOSE) if preceded by an initial consonant. Likewise /iʊɹ/ → /ʊɹ/. Typical exceptions, such as sugar, sure, apply.
• The cot-caught and father-bother mergers apply, i.e. /ɒ ɔː/ both merge into /ɑː/.
• The following rhotic vowels are distinguished: /ɪɹ ɛɹ əɹ ɑɹ ɔɹ/ (NEAR SQUARE NURSE START NORTH). /oɹ/ (FORCE) merges into /ɔɹ/; /ʊɹ/ (CURE) merges varyingly with /ɔɹ/ or the disyllable /uəɹ/. Mergers apply also before medial /ɹ/: e.g. /e.ɹ æ.ɹ/ → /ɛɹ/, /ʌ.ɹ/ → /əɹ/, /i.ɹ/ → /ɪɹ/.
• Collapse to a three-vowel system in final unstressed position: /iː/ (HAPPY) becomes /eɪ/ (FACE), while /ə(ɹ)/ (COMMA, LETTER) becomes /ɑː/. /oʊ/ remains. (Phonetically, these are pretty much [e a o].)

The following changes are best considered phonetic detail, since they do not disturb the phonological system.

• /ɑ æ iː uː ʊ/ → [a ɪə ɪj ʏw ʏ]
  • We'll nevertheless write the quality of the GOOSE and FOOT vowels as /ʉ ʏ/ from here on.
  • need to elaborate on the fate of /æ/ per environment, as well as on other pre-sonorant mergers
• Length is by now secondary to quality (and won't be marked, either).

Consonants

• Whine-wine merger: /ʍ/ merged into /w/.
• /tj tɹ dj dɹ/ are affricated to /ʧ ʧɹ ʤ ʤɹ/. (Note that palatalization of /sj sɹ zj/ is older and applies to all English varieties, AFATAK.)
• Medial flapping of /t d/ (to [ɾ] when posttonic) applies. Glottalization does not (except, as widespred, to zero between a fricativ and a syllabic consonant — soften [sɑfn̩], rustle [ɹʌsl̩])
• Interdental loss: /θ ð/ become /t d/ in onset position, /f v/ in coda.
  • eater [ˈiːɾa], ether [ˈiːta]
• Coda /d/ is lost after /n l/.
• The clusters /ns nz/ insert epenthetic /t d/ to become /nts ndz/.

More vowel changes

• Reduction of unstressed vowels continues. In closed syllables, sufficiently unstressed /i ʉ/ typically reduce to /ɪ ʏ/, /æ ɑ/ to /ə/. Pretonic initial /ə/ (but not /ɪ/) tends to be lost entirely.
• /ɪɹ/ becomes /ɪəɹ/, still monosyllabic but now equal to a former /æ/ follo'd by /ɹ/ (bear in mind that former /æɹ/, as in carry, has turned into /ɛɹ/).

Labial/liquid chainshift

One of Ängrex's most caracteristic features.

• The main chain consists of /ɹ/ → /w/ → /v/ → /b/. Only the onset position is affected.
  • /v/ then devoices to /f/ adjacent to a voiceless consonant
• Coda /l/ ([ɫ]) → /w/ (the syllabic version lingers on for a while more)
• Onset /l/ → /ɾ/ before another consonant

Aspiration development

This series of sound changes forms a major isogloss among the Anglic languages.

• The trigger is the loss of onset /s/ before another consonant. This leads to the phonemicization of aspiration in voiceless stops — as well as of /ɾ/.
• Aspiration also develops before a non-tautosyllabic consonant such as [ɫ̩].
• Additionally, /ts/ → /tʰ/.
• This system is then muddled by application of anti-Grassman's Law, i.e. in a word containing two aspirates within one syllable of one another, the latter is deaspirated.
• /h/ triggers deaspiration regularly; it's however medially lost in all cases (e.g. megahertz → <mägat>)
• /h/ is also lost initially before any high vowel or glide.

Somewhat later

• The postalveolar sibilants become apical in articulation, in enunciated speech even retroflex. These retain their inherent labialization, and a folloing /w/ is assimilated. An /f/ or /v/ from former /w/, however, is metathesized, giving eg. <phafcyk> from patchwork, <defxa> from dishwasher (note the haplology) and <phase(u)jri> from passageway.

A change that, while common in even contemporary English dialects, should be considered a late adoption in Ängrex on the basis of its effects wrt. aspiration.

• A coda stop is lost before another obstruent. If another voiceless stop precedes, it gains aspiration.

Palatal vowel shift

There are two theories to what's going on in here. One is that this is simply palatalization and the glide found in eg. cube → <khioub> is excrescent in nature; the other is that /j/'s actually are broken off vowels, but simply lost in most situations. We'll mark this simply as /ʲ/.

• /e/ → /ʲi/
• /ɪj/ (former /i/) → /ʲej/
• /ɪə/ → /ʲa/.
• /ʏ(w)/ → /ʲo(w)/
• No glide nor palatalization appears after a liquid (/l ɾ/), a labial, or a postalveolar.
• Non-liquid alveolars reddily palatalize: /tʰ t d s z n/ + /ʲ/ → /tɕʰ tɕ dʑ ɕ ʑ ɲ/
• And as stated, before velars a plain [j] appears.
• In conjunction with this, elsewhere /ɪ/ → /e/ (with NO palatalization) and /o/ → /u/.

jth jt jd js jz jn ditto s z > s` z`/ w_

more vowel shifts

• Rhotic vowels have at least by this time merged with the corresponding plain vowels. /ɔɹ/ becomes a new /o/.
• Lo front vowels rotate down & backwards: /ɛ a/ → /æ ɑ/
• The sequences /əw əj/ become /u i/, even before another vowel.

aU aI eI oI oU > Aw &j ji oj u I@ Ij Y(w) > jA jej jo(w) r= l= n= > A o A~ @{m n N}. > &~ v > w / V_ Aw > o w > 0 / _RFX_

various

• Voiced affricates lenite to fricativs: /dz dʐ dʑ/ → /z ʐ ʑ/. Before nasals, however, the opposite development is found.
• Certain awkward consonant clusters are resolved: /n/ after an alveolar stop becomes /ɾ/, and /n/ before /ɾ/ becomes /nd/. (Dialectally, the first of these applies before any stop, not just alveolar.)

Phonology

pʰ	tʰ	tʂʰ	tɕʰ	kʰ
p	t	tʂ	tɕ	k
b	d			ɡ
f	s	ʂ	ɕ	h
v	z	ʐ	ʑ
m	n		ɲ	ŋ
w	l		j
	ɾ

i		u
e	ə	o
æ		ɑ

Difthongs iu eu ei äu äi ou oi (ai ui??)

Orthography

Per IPA, except:

• Obviously (?), <r> is /ɾ/ and a digraph with <h> signifies aspiration.
• /j/ is written as <i>; similarly /w/ as <u> when not in absolute syllable-initial position.
• <c x j> are /tɕ ɕ ʑ/ before an orthographic <i> (itself silent before another vowel), /tʂ ʂ ʐ/ elsewhere.
  • A silent <r> occurs before retroflexes deriving from former /ɻ/, but also between a retroflex and /i/. E.g. jail → <jriu> /ʐiw/, dale → <jiu> /ʑiw/.
  • need to decide what to do with coda position
• <ñ ng> are /ɲ ŋ/.
• <y> is /ə/.
• The lo vowels are <ä a> = /æ ɑ/.
  • or should /æ/ be the unmarked <a>? /ɑ/ could well be spelled with something derived from <ah> or <ar> or <aw>.