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Questions tagged [consonant-clusters]

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Why are the word-initial consonant clusters /tl/ and /dl/ absent in English?

The clusters /pr/, /br/, /kr/, /gr/, /tr/, /dr/, /pl/, /bl/, /kl/, /gl/ are all pretty common. But why are /tl/ and /dl/ missing? Is there any linguistic or historical explanation?
9
votes
1answer
183 views

Are /tl/ and /dl/ rare onsets worldwide?

Onsets of stop+liquid are very common, but it seems like /tl/ and /dl/ are much rarer than other stop+liquid onsets, like /gl/ or /pr/. Are /tl/ and /dl/ especially rare compared to other stop+liquid ...
4
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2answers
1k views

Are syllable initial consonant clusters pronounced in Ancient Greek?

A number of loan words and New Latin words derived from Ancient Greek have word initial clusters of a plosive+nasal or dissimilar phonemes like /ps/ or /pt/. I cannot avoid aspirating or inserting a ...
2
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0answers
243 views

Confusion matrix for consonant clusters in English?

I was wondering if anybody knew of a confusion matrix for consonant clusters in the English language. I've seen CV, VC, and CVC phoneme/syllable confusion matrices, but never any with any sort of ...
0
votes
1answer
210 views

Do languages with long clusters have minimal vowel or consonant inventories?

I assume, considering the Onset principle, that there are not many languages that have a structure with VV or VVV but are there languages that have a CV.VV structure? If there is, I would assume that ...
3
votes
4answers
690 views

Are there languages with consonant clusters that include consonants that never occur alone?

In the languages I know more about I can't think of any cases of consonant phoneme clusters that are not made up entirely of consonant phonemes which also occur on their own in the language. But I'm ...
2
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1answer
175 views

Lao orthography: ວ as part of consonant cluster or part of diphtong and placement of tone marks

Lao is a little underdocumented compared to other languages, both in terms of actual linguistics and in terms of prescriptive norms. There is a semivowel letter, ວ, which has a few roles: Consonant /...