Deviations from basic inventory: the preploded nasals Deviations from basic inventory: shifted vowels

3.1.4 Basic inventory: vowels

When viewed as a whole, the Semai language can be said to have thirty vowels. Semai has both short and long vowels. The long vowels are not dramatically elongated. Indeed, it may be more accurate to portray the long vowels as the more “normal” and the short vowels as extra short. Overall, there are roughly twice as many words with long vowels as opposed to short in the major syllable. Table 3. Oral vowels Oral, long Front Central Back Close ii ɨɨ uu Close-mid ee oo Open-mid ɛɛ ɔɔ Open ɑɑ Oral, short Front Central Back Close i ɨ u Close-mid e o Open-mid ɛ ə ɔ Open ɑ Table 4. Nasal vowels Nasal, long Front Central Back Close ĩĩ ɨ̃ɨ̃ ũũ Mid ɛ̃ɛ̃ ɔ̃ɔ̃ Open ɑ̃ɑ̃ Nasal, short Front Central Back Close ĩ ɨ̃ ũ Mid ɛ̃ ə̃ ɔ̃ Open ɑ̃

3.1.5 Deviations from basic inventory: the preploded nasals

The southeastern dialects of Semai 13 generally have the full set of consonants. That is to say, they retain the preploded nasals. These dialects include Betau, Cherong, Pos Buntu, and Bertang. In one dialect, Kuala Kenip, the plosive is voiceless, but still has a voiced nasal release. For the rest of the dialects, 14 all of the preploded nasals have become simple voiceless plosives. Hence, for these dialects there are only nineteen consonants. The following examples show the form of these endings in three representative dialects. 13 This region is the Raub district and the southeastern half of the Lipis district in Pahang. 14 That is, the Cameron Highlands district of Pahang, the northwest part of the Lipis district in Pahang, and all dialects in Perak. English Malay Voiced preploded nasals e.g. Betau Voiceless preploded nasals Kuala Kenip Voiceless plosive e.g. Simoi ‘blood’ ‘darah’ [bə.hii b m] [bə.hii p m] [bə.hiip] ‘to die’ ‘mati’ [dɑ d n] [dɑ t n] [dɑt] ‘termite’ ‘anai-anai’ [ɡə.rɨɨ ɟ ɲ] [ɡə.rɨɨ c ɲ] [ɡə.rɨɨc] ‘to fly’ ‘terbang’ [hɛɛ ɡ ŋ] [hɛɛ k ŋ] [hɛɛk] Note that the reduction of the preploded nasal to a voiceless plosive has produced a number of homonyms in these dialects, in those cases where there already existed a phonologically similar word with a simple voiceless plosive. The following examples are given. English Malay Dialects with preploded nasals e.g. Betau Dialects where nasal is now a voiceless plosive e.g. Simoi ‘foot’ ‘kaki’ [ɟu ɡ ŋ] [ɟuk] ‘to return’ ‘pulang’ [ɟuk] [ɟuk] ‘skinny’ ‘kurus’ [soo ɡ ŋ] [sook] ‘navel’ ‘pusat’ [sook] [sook]

3.1.6 Deviations from basic inventory: shifted vowels

Two dialects surveyed have developed shifted vowels. What most dialects pronounce as a long, open central vowel [ɑɑ] is now pronounced in Gopeng and Kampar dialects as a long, open back vowel [ɒɒ]. The entry of this vowel into the back region has caused the open-mid ɔɔ to be phonetically raised to [o̞o̞], and the close-mid oo to be phonetically raised to [o̝o̝]. The following examples demonstrate this phenomenon. English Malay Most dialects Gopeng, Kampar ‘shoulders’ ‘bahu’ ɡəl.pɑɑl ɡəl.pɒɒl ‘bone’ ‘tulang’ ɟə.ʔɑɑk ɟə.ʔɒɒk ‘fire’ ‘api’ ʔɔɔs [ʔo̞o̞s] ʔɔɔs ‘shadow’ ‘bayang’ wɔɔk [wo̞o̞k] wɔɔk ‘woman’ ‘perempuan’ kər.door [kər.do̝o̝r] kər.door ‘roof’ ‘atap’ pə.look [pə.lo̝o̝k] pə.look

3.1.7 Deviations from basic inventory: possible merged vowel