Kiswona

Kiswóna
Pronounced:	[kizwo˦na]
Species:	Ondasi
Typology
Morphological type:	Agglutinating
Morphosyntactic alignment:	Fluid-S
Basic word order:	SOV
Credits
Creator:	User:Babelfish

About

Kiswona is the lingua franca and literary/liturgical language of the Ondasi nation.

Phonology

Phoneme Inventory

Consonants

Consonants
	Bilabial		Dental		Alveolar		Post-alv.		Palatal		Velar		Glottal
Nasal						n /n/
Plosive					t /t/	d /d/					k /k/	g /g/	q /ʔ/
Fricative					s /s/		ŝ /ʃ/		ŷ /ç/		h /x/
Affricate			ts /ts/		c /t͡ʃ/
Approximants		ŵ /ʍ/ w /w/								y /j/
Lateral Fricative					tl /ɬ/
Lateral Approximant						l /l/

Vowels

Vowels
	Front		Near-front		Central		Near-back		Back
High	i									u
Near-high
High-mid			e							o
Mid
Low-mid
Near-low
Low					a

There is a phonemic distinction between short and long vowels, long vowels are indicated in the orthography by doubling.

Phonotactics

Syllables in Kiswóna have the shape (C)(C)V(n/l). Coda l is very rare and tends to be subject to subject to sound changes if the following syllable has an onset. All consonants can be geminate in medial position.

Legal onsets
Initial	Medial	Initial	Medial	Initial	Medial	Initial	Medial	Initial	Medial	Initial	Medial
nd	nd	tŵ	tŵ	dw	dw	ks	ks	gw	gw	sŵ	sŵ
nk	nk	tŷ	tŷ	dy	dy	kŷ	kŷ	gy	gy
ng	ng					kŵ	kŵ	gl	gl
	nq					kl	kl
	ns
	nŝ
	nŷ
	nh
	nts
	nc
	ns
nw	nw
ny	ny
nl	nl

Hiatus is restricted, a glottal stop is inserted wherever it would occur due to morphological processes.

Stress

Kiswóna has lexical pitch accent indicated by an acute accent on vowels, realized as a raised pitch.

Morphology

Verbs

Tense

Kiswóna possesses five tense distinctions: the present, near and distant future and near and distant past. The near tenses are generally used to describe things that took place at a specific, known time within the past season. The distant tenses are used for actions that either took place more than a season ago or whose exact time is unknown or irrelevant. The present (PRS) is unmarked. The near future (NFUT) is marked by [ -nd ] while the distant future (DFUT) is marked by [ -nw ]. The near past (NPST) is marked by [ -tl ] and the distant past (DPST) is marked by [ -t ].

Aspect

A number of aspectual distinctions are made by Kiswóna's verb system. Aspect is the only verb modifier required under all circumstances. The intensive and attenuative markers reduplicate the vowel from the preceding aspect marker after their own marker. Aspects used include the following:

• Perfective (PFV): [ -a ] Describes a discrete, completed action, e.g. I ate yesterday.
• Imperfective (IPFV): [ -e ] Describes an ongoing action, e.g. I was eating.
• Habitual (HAB): [ -i ] Describes an action performed regularly, e.g. I used to eat.
• Gnomic (GNO): [ -o ] Describes basic truths, e.g. People eat.
• Inchoative (INCH): [ -u ] Describes the beginning of an action, e.g. I started eating.
• Cessative (CESS): [ -ul ] Describes the ending of an action, e.g. I stopped eating.

Mood

Kiswóna also distinguishes between a variety of moods.

• Indicative (IND): [ -∅ ] Used for statements of fact, e.g. I eat.
• Conditional (COND): [ -nu ] Describes an action contingent on another condition, e.g. I would eat.
• Potential (POT): [ -ne ] Declares the possibility of an action’s occurrence, e.g. I can eat.
• Subjunctive (SUBJ): [ -gwe ] Covers hypothetical and contrafactual statements not covered by other moods.
• Assumptive (ASS): [ -ya ] The statement is assumed to be true based on past experience.
• Obviative (OBV): [ -swa ] The statement is considered self-evidently true. Often used sarcastically, considered rude in most circumstances.
• Dubitative (DUB): [ -tse ] Expresses doubt as to the veracity of the statement.
• Optative (OPT): [ -du ] The speaker hopes that the statement is true.
• Necessitative (NEC): [ -di ] The agent must undertake the indicated action.
• Exhortative (EXH): [ -ke ] The agent is strongly encouraged to take the indicated action.
• Inhortative (INH): [ -ge ] The agent is strongly discouraged from taking the indicated action.
• Imperative (IMP): [ -so ] The agent is commanded to take the indicated action.
• Intensive (INT): [ -s(v) ] Intensifies the action described, e.g. I devoured.
• Attenuative (ATT): [ -ts(v) ] Diminishes the action described, e.g. I hardly ate.