Iskel

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Phonology

Consonants

Consonants in parentheses currently do not occur in any words, but may appear in the future.

		Labial		Coronal						Palatal		Uvular		Glottal
				Sibilant		Median		Lateral
Stop	Nasal	m	⟨m⟩			n	⟨n⟩			ɲ	⟨ñ⟩	ɴ	⟨ng⟩
	Oral	p b	⟨p b⟩	t͡s d͡z	⟨ds dz⟩	t	⟨t⟩					q	⟨q⟩
Fricative		ɸ β	⟨f v⟩	s z	⟨s z⟩	θ̠ ð̠	⟨sh zh⟩	ɬ	⟨lh⟩	ç ʝ	⟨jx jj⟩	χ	⟨x⟩	h	⟨h⟩
Trill						r	⟨rr⟩					ʀ	⟨gg⟩
Glide	Oral	w	⟨w⟩			ɾ	⟨r⟩	l	⟨l⟩	j	⟨y⟩
	Nasal	w̃	⟨ẇ⟩					l̃	⟨ŀ⟩	j̃	⟨ẏ⟩
Click	Nasal			ᵑʇ	⟨dn⟩	ᵑǃ¡	⟨cn⟩	(ᵑǁ)	⟨łn⟩	ᵑǂ	⟨jn⟩
	Aspirated			ᵏʇʰ	⟨dh⟩	(ᵏǃ¡ʰ)	⟨ch⟩	(ᵏǁʰ)	⟨łh⟩	(ᵏǂʰ)	⟨jh⟩
	Tenuis			ᵏʇ	⟨dk⟩	ᵏǃ¡	⟨ck⟩	ᵏǁ	⟨łk⟩	ᵏǂ	⟨jk⟩
	Glottalized			ᵏʇˀ	⟨d'⟩	(ᵏǃ¡ˀ)	⟨c'⟩	(ᵏǁˀ)	⟨ł'⟩	(ᵏǂˀ)	⟨j'⟩

Vowels

	Front		Central		Back
Close	i	⟨i⟩	ʊ	⟨û⟩	ɯ u	⟨ı u⟩
Close-Mid	e	⟨e⟩	ə	⟨ŷ⟩	o	⟨o⟩
Open-Mid	ɛ	⟨ê⟩			ɔ	⟨ô⟩
Open	a	⟨a⟩			ɑ	⟨â⟩

Iskel has syllabic forms for all of its sonorants.

		Labial		Alveolar				Palatal		Uvular
				Median		Lateral
Nasal		m	⟨m⟩	n	⟨n⟩			ɲ	⟨ñ⟩	ɴ	⟨ng⟩
Trill				r	⟨rr⟩					ʀ	⟨gg⟩
Glide	Oral	w	⟨w⟩	ɾ	⟨r⟩	l	⟨l⟩	j	⟨y⟩
	Nasal	w̃	⟨ẇ⟩			l̃	⟨ŀ⟩	j̃	⟨ẏ⟩

Stress

Iskel has 3 stress levels: primary, secondary, and extra stress, all of which are phonemic. A word can have any number of any type of stress, though words with extra stress have only been observed to have one. If a word does have extra stress, however, it cannot have primary stress. Primary and secondary stress involve increase in syllable pitch and length to a stronger and less strong degree, respectively. Extra stress involves lower pitch, noticeably greater airflow resulting in higher volume, lengthening, and the visible scrunching of the nose during every phone in the syllable. Extra stress has only been observed to occur in syllables beginning with fricatives, and is confirmed to occur in syllables with consonant nuclei.

Primary stress can be written with ⟨»⟩, secondary stress with ⟨›⟩, and extra stress with ⟨!⟩ after the nucleus. Primary and secondary stress are rarely written, but extra stress is written more often. Word-initial primary stress is not written unless there is another primary stress in the word.

Some affixes may make otherwise unstressed syllables stressed. When monosyllabic words become polysyllabic through inflection, primary stress is placed on the syllable of the root. This only does not occur in the case of part of speech suffixes, which do not influence the primary stress placement of the words they inflect.

Allophony

Aside from elisory allophony, discussed in the Phonotactics section, and epenthetic allomorphy, discussed in the Morphology section, Iskel has two allophonic rules.

1. Bilabial articulation during extra stress becomes labiodental.
2. /j/ lowers and retracts from preceding uvulars^{[controversial]}.

These rules exist due to biological limitations. All other articulations are identical to their phonemic form. There is no voicing assimilation anywhere, no nasal assimilation, no retraction from click tongue shape, no place assimilation, etc. The /j/ lowering/retracting rule is debated with many prominent opposers claiming failure to produce a true palatal immediately after a uvular is a "skill issue".

However, the degree of allophonic variation within Iskel exists on a spectrum. More formal speech requires the speaker to make maximum effort to never allow characteristics of one phone to bleed into the articulation of another. More informal speech allows for more lax and natural pronunciations such as plosives including a nasal release when followed by a nasal or nasalized vowels near nasal consonants. Though, even informal speech retains a relatively strict pronunciation. Voicing assimilation in obstruent clusters can create ambiguity since mixed voice obstruent clusters are phonemically distinct from their homogenous counterparts, so it does not occur even in the most informal speech. Similarly, nasal assimilation in approximants will also lead to phonemic ambiguity.

Phonotactics

Clusters

Iskel follows a (C)(C)(C)V(V)(V)(C)(C)(C) structure. A consonant cluster and vowel cluster each may only have a maximum of three, regardless of if it exists within the same syllable or across syllables in a word. When affixes are added to a word, violations of this cluster limit involving 4 members of a cluster result in the deletion of one member at the stem boundary from the longer stem. Violations involving 5 members result in the deletion of one member at the stem boundary from each stem. Violations involving 6 members result in the deletion of one member from the shorter stem and two members from the longer stem, again at the stem boundary.

For example, the prefix ang- /aŋ/ attaching to the root sqwôa /sqwɔa̯/ would create the illegal cluster of 4 consonants *angsqwôa /aŋsqwɔa̯/. Therefore, the longer stem sqwôa must delete the consonant at the stem boundary, creating the word angqwôa /aŋˈqwɔa̯/ with a legal cluster of 3 consonants.

Syllabic Consonants

A nucleus with a syllabic consonant can never contain another syllabic consonant or vowel. Syllabic consonants cannot occur next to vowels. Affixes that pair a vowel and syllabic consonant result in the consonant becoming nonsyllabic. Syllabic consonants have never been observed to have more than one consonant in their syllable's coda or nucleus. Nasalized approximants have never been observed to be syllabic.