The Complete Lojban Language
trouble correctly hearing any of the suggested buffer vowels otherwise. By this guideline, Example 3.16 (p. 41) would be pronounced
- Example 3.17
- [boːŋ gɪ ˈnaːn baː]
with lengthened vowels.
3.9 Syllabication And Stress
A Lojban word has one syllable for each of its vowels, diphthongs, and syllabic consonants (referred to simply as “vowels” for the purposes of this section.) Syllabication rules determine which of the consonants separating two vowels belong to the preceding vowel and which to the following vowel. These rules are conventional only; the phonetic facts of the matter about how utterances are syllabified in any language are always very complex.
A single consonant always belongs to the following vowel. A consonant pair is normally divided between the two vowels; however, if the pair constitute a valid initial consonant pair, they are normally both assigned to the following vowel. A consonant triple is divided between the first and second consonants. Apostrophes and commas, of course, also represent syllable breaks. Syllabic consonants usually appear alone in their syllables.
It is permissible to vary from these rules in Lojbanized names. For example, there are no definitive rules for the syllabication of names with consonant clusters longer than three consonants. The comma is used to indicate variant syllabication or to explicitly mark normal syllabication.
Here are some examples of Lojban syllabication:
- Example 3.18
- pujenaicajeba
- pu,je,nai,ca,je,ba
This word has no consonant pairs and is therefore syllabified before each medial consonant.
- Example 3.19
- ninmu
- nin,mu
This word is split at a consonant pair.
- Example 3.20
- fitpri
- fit,pri
This word is split at a consonant triple, between the first two consonants of the triple.
- Example 3.21
- sairgoi
- sair,goi
- sai,r,goi
This word contains the consonant pair rg; the r may be pronounced syllabically or not.
- Example 3.22
- klezba
- klez,ba
- kle,zba
This word contains the permissible initial pair zb, and so may be syllabicated either between z and b or before zb.
Stress is a relatively louder pronunciation of one syllable in a word or group of words. Since every syllable has a vowel sound (or diphthong or syllabic consonant) as its nucleus, and the stress is on
