User:Masako/nkala

This is kata, a simple language with vocabulary based on the most widely spoken languages and an easily understood, mostly analytic grammar.

phonology

kata has nine consonants (/p, t, k, s, m, n, l, j, w/) and five vowels (/a, e, i, o, u/). Stress is word final.

consonants

	Labial	Coronal	Dorsal
Nasal	m	n
Plosive	p	t	k
Fricative		s
Approximant	w	l	j (y)

vowels

Vowels	Front	Back
Close	i	u
Mid	e	o
Open	a

syllable structure

All syllables are of the form (C)V(N), that is, optional consonant + vowel + optional final nasal, or V, CV, VN, CVN.

phonotactics

A few syllables sequences are disallowed; /ji, wu, wo/. Also, a syllable-final nasal may not occur before /m/ or /n/ in the same root.

allophony

The nasal at the end of a syllable can be pronounced as any nasal stop, though it is normally assimilated to the following consonant. That is, it typically occurs as an [n] before /t/ or /s/, as an [m] before /p/, as an [ŋ] before /k/, and as an [ɲ] before /j/. Because of its small phoneme inventory, kata allows for quite a lot of allophonic variation. For example, /p t k/ may be pronounced [b d ɡ] as well as [p t k], /s/ as [z] or [ʃ] as well as [s], /l/ as [ɾ] as well as [l], and vowels may be either long or short. Both its sound inventory and phonotactics (patterns of possible sound combinations) are found in the majority of human languages and are therefore readily accessible.

writing system

kata uses a modified form of Hangul.

consonants

• ㄱㄴㄷㄹㅁㅂㅅㅇ

k n t l m p s a

/k n t l m p s -/

vowels

• ㅏ ㅑ ㅓ ㅕ ㅗ ㅘ ㅛ ㅜ ㅝ ㅟ ㅠ ㅡ ㅣ

a ya e ye o wa yo u we wi yu - i

/a ja e je o wa jo u we wi ju - i/

word order

kata has a strict word order. The basic word order is subject–verb–object.

determiners

Determiners in kata precede the noun they modify.

• kula - all
• pu - this; these
• su - that; those

pronouns

kata has three basic pronouns; wa (first person), ni (second person), and ko (third person). These words do not indicate number or gender, but may be modified to do so if necessary. -lo marks all nouns as plural, and the gender modifiers are -ku (masculine), and -ki (feminine). In cases of singular distinction of gender, koku ("he"), or koki ("she") can be reduced to simply ku and ki.

lexicon

kata word	class	meaning	etymology
ki	pro	she; her	هي
ko	pro	it	هُوَ
ku	pro	he; him	هُوَ
kula	det	all; whole; entire; every; complete	كل
loka	noun	place; location; spot; point	local
ma	part	interrogative particle	嗎
ni	pro	you	你
pu	det	this; these	bu
su	det	that; those	şu
wa	pro	I; me	我

references

• Language list