Phonetics: what I found

['Oma Tirea]

After talking to Karyu Pawl at the meetup he was able to answer some of my phonetics questions that have been keeping me up at night.

Prosody
If it's one thing the actors got right, it's the prosody.  If you listen it's about 40/60-50/50 ratio of pitch accent/dynamic accent, so fko shouldn't lean too far in either direction.  The sound appears to be quite natural of most languages, too: high tone/volume is stressed, low tone/volume is unstressed, and there appears to really only be 2 levels of stress, unlike English, which can have 3-4 layers.

As far as global prosody (i.e. what happens across whole phrases and sentences) goes, it seems a little undefined, to be honest.  However I did hear that pieces of it were by design le'Ìnglìsì because of Cameron.  What Cameron wanted is for phrases of the language to be recognizable, and that's why the global intonation sounded like it did.  

An older dialect of Na'vi?
Frommer says he's pondering this, and it may or may not happen, but here are a couple of things that I do which I talked over with Paul about:

• The oe diphthong: instead of shifting to [wɛ] before suffixes, and also in the word oeyk it is [ŏɛ̆], sometimes even something more like [ɔ̆ɛ̆] (by vowel harmony).  Various Spanish sub-dialects do this too, and I expect it may even vary by speaker whether they have an oe diphthong or not.  However, by assimilation, after u, aw, and ew, the [ŏɛ̆] diphthing shifts to [wɛ].
• K → velar H: Instead of shifting to [h] when leniting k, it shifts to [x].  A sound change that may have historically occured is that lenited k, [x], got weakened to [h].  Paul mentioned that this also happens in languages such as Hebrew, where the [x] is still intact.

It turns out we were kinda thinking on the same page that night, and what Frommer has previously described was modern Na'vi

To release or not to release?
Recently, I had observed that the 4 stops of Na'vi (p, t, k, and ') are unreleased in not only in word-final position, but syllable-final position as well.  If clarity is needed, n.k. to distinguish between 'ok and 'o', the stop may be lightly released (however you may want to be careful with releasing the glottal stop so that an extra syllable doesn't get perceived).

[Tirea Aean]

Fascinating stuff there!

* Tirea Aean goes to figure out what in the WORLD ŏ,ɛ̆,ɔ̆, and ɛ̆ are...

['Oma Tirea]

* Tirea Aean goes to figure out what in the WORLD ŏ,ɛ̆,ɔ̆, and ɛ̆ are...

Ningay srak?  Ke smon ngaru IPA? o_o

They are short diphthongs, as short as a short vowel.

[Tirea Aean]

* Tirea Aean goes to figure out what in the WORLD ŏ,ɛ̆,ɔ̆, and ɛ̆ are...

Ningay srak?  Ke smon ngaru IPA? o_o

They are short diphthongs, as short as a short vowel.

I only recognize o, e, ɛ, and ɔ

[Tirea Aean]

• K → velar H: Instead of shifting to [h] when leniting k, it shifts to [x].  A sound change that may have historically occured is that lenited k, [x], got weakened to [h].  Paul mentioned that this also happens in languages such as Hebrew, where the [x] is still intact.

I Also thought about that, and I KNEW someone else was thinking it when trying to rationalize how [k] --> [h] instead of [x] when [p]-->[f] and [t]-->[s]

[Amaya]

Taking a look at a language with a LOT of lenition might give you some idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_initial_mutations

As someone who studied Irish for two years formally and quite a long time casually, I can tell you that Na'vi lenition is, for lack of a better word, very simple

[Tirea Aean]

Spoiler: snip

Taking a look at a language with a LOT of lenition might give you some idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_initial_mutations

As someone who studied Irish for two years formally and quite a long time casually,

I can tell you that Na'vi lenition is, for lack of a better word, very simple

IMO This can be said about MANY traits of Na'vi. YEs, it has its few exceptions here and there, but it is VERY logical and simple in general. does that seem fair to say?

[Ftxavanga Txe′lan]

That old Na'vi dialect thing is very fascinating! Thanks a lot for sharing.

Spoiler: snip

Taking a look at a language with a LOT of lenition might give you some idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_initial_mutations

As someone who studied Irish for two years formally and quite a long time casually,

I can tell you that Na'vi lenition is, for lack of a better word, very simple

IMO This can be said about MANY traits of Na'vi. YEs, it has its few exceptions here and there, but it is VERY logical and simple in general. does that seem fair to say?

I guess so.

[Tswusayona Tsamsiyu]

wow. I ask for a little clarification on that x. do you mean it's like the "kh" you make at the back of your gum (where you make "ng" and "k", "g") (the one that sounds like static noise), or is it the one we in Hebrew and Russian (the "khkhkhkhkh" that most English speakers just can't pronounce)?

[Tirea Aean]

wow. I ask for a little clarification on that [x]. do you mean it's like the "kh" you make at the back of your gum (where you make "ng" and "k", "g") (the one that sounds like static noise), or is it the one we in Hebrew and Russian (the "khkhkhkhkh" that most English speakers just can't pronounce)?

at first I didnt see the [x]. dont forget to use [nobbc][/nobbc] to make sure ipa [] show up correctly. (I edited it in the quote, instead of in your post)

I would want to agree though I think I'm able to pronounce that.

[Tswusayona Tsamsiyu]

wow. I ask for a little clarification on that [x]. do you mean it's like the "kh" you make at the back of your gum (where you make "ng" and "k", "g") (the one that sounds like static noise), or is it the one we in Hebrew and Russian (the "khkhkhkhkh" that most English speakers just can't pronounce)?

at first I didnt see the [x]. dont forget to use [nobbc][/nobbc] to make sure ipa [] show up correctly. (I edited it in the quote, instead of in your post)

I would want to agree though I think I'm able to pronounce that.

agree on what?
I asked which one of those sounds is the "X".

[Tirea Aean]

oh. Well if I'm not mistaken, [x] is the voiceless velar fricative. [ŋ] is the velar nasal, so indeed they are made in the same place, by that definition.

wow. I ask for a little clarification on that x. do you mean it's like the "kh" you make at the back of your gum (where you make "ng" and "k", "g") (the one that sounds like static noise), or is it the one we in Hebrew and Russian (the "khkhkhkhkh" that most English speakers just can't pronounce)?

I'd say it's that one, but "at the back of your gum" seems kinda sketchy, maybe I'm not understanding that correctly.

[ɡ] is the voiced velar plosive, and [k] is the voiceless velar plosive.

the velar region is toward the back.

[Tswusayona Tsamsiyu]

so it wasn't so true of 'Oma Tirea to say it's like in Hebrew.
and also, if this is a different sound from "H", we should use a different letter ("X"?).

['Oma Tirea]

so it wasn't so true of 'Oma Tirea to say it's like in Hebrew.
and also, if this is a different sound from "H", we should use a different letter ("X"?).

No, it's still spelled with an h.  The IPA just uses the letter x for the velar fricative.

I was using Hebrew as an example because Pawl mentioned it, and merely to show that this type of lenition does indeed happen in 'Rrtan languages.  Can anyone else think of any other languages that lenite [k] to [x]?

[Plumps]

Taking a look at a language with a LOT of lenition might give you some idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_initial_mutations

As someone who studied Irish for two years formally and quite a long time casually, I can tell you that Na'vi lenition is, for lack of a better word, very simple

tá an ceart agat

[Tswusayona Tsamsiyu]

so it wasn't so true of 'Oma Tirea to say it's like in Hebrew.
and also, if this is a different sound from "H", we should use a different letter ("X"?).

No, it's still spelled with an h.  The IPA just uses the letter x for the velar fricative.

I was using Hebrew as an example because Pawl mentioned it, and merely to show that this type of lenition does indeed happen in 'Rrtan languages.  Can anyone else think of any other languages that lenite [k] to [x]?

so I just read a bit in Wikipedia about velars and uvulars, and if I understood correctly the Hebrew "x" is voiceless uvular fricative, and the Na'vi one would be voiceless velar fricative.

[Lance R. Casey]

Can anyone else think of any other languages that lenite [k] to [x]?

Sindarin does, under certain conditions -- e.g. Dor Gyrth i Chuinar Land of the Dead that Live (cuina live). To be fair, though, this is not an example of the Sindarin soft mutation (lenition), but of what is called nasal mutation: it is triggered by the final n in the plural article in, which is itself "absorbed" into the resulting spirant. There are several other mutations in the language which would also yield a change [k] > [x], but under lenition proper cuinar would become guinar.

[Plumps]

Can anyone else think of any other languages that lenite [k] to [x]?

Sindarin does, under certain conditions -- e.g. Dor Gyrth i Chuinar Land of the Dead that Live (cuina live). To be fair, though, this is not an example of the Sindarin soft mutation (lenition), but of what is called nasal mutation: it is triggered by the final n in the plural article in, which is itself "absorbed" into the resulting spirant. There are several other mutations in the language which would also yield a change [k] > [x], but under lenition proper cuinar would become guinar.

Same as in Irish: Mostly after certain prepositions lenition occurs, e.g.
cloch (stone) => ar chloch (on a stone)
this is a change from /k/ to /x/ although it can also become /x´/ (don't know what the official IPA sign is for this, it varies greatly, I believe (it's the same difference between the ch for the Composer Bach and the word for 'I' = ich in German). This happens in Irish as well with slender consonants.
ciúin (quiet) changes to bean chiúin (quiet woman) where the ch is the /x´/ I talked about.

What LRC describes for Sindarin is also true for Irish, there it's called eclipse:
cloch (stone) => ar an gcloch (on the stone), where the c /k/ sound remains in writing but it's pronounced /glox/

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

This is all fascinating stuff! But a bit hard to grasp for a person who does not have a thorough linguistic background. I am wondering if 'Oma Tirea or someone else thoroughly versed in pronunciation of these sounds would want to spend some time on Skype going over this stuff with me sometime in the next few days?

[Kamean]

This is all fascinating stuff! But a bit hard to grasp for a person who does not have a thorough linguistic background. I am wondering if 'Oma Tirea or someone else thoroughly versed in pronunciation of these sounds would want to spend some time on Skype going over this stuff with me sometime in the next few days?

Agree