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From: John Cowan <cowan@ccil.org>
Subject: Re: universal characteristics that all languages have
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Colin Fine wrote:

> I seem to recall that some Polynesian
> languages do not have distinct /t/ and /k/ phonemes, but I cannot find a
> reference for this.

AFAIK, there is a wave of change affecting the Polynesian languages
that transforms [t] -> [k].  This is complete in Hawaiian and other
Eastern lgs; in Samoan (at least as of about 20 years ago when I
was there), [k] was considered colloquial, and was not used when
talking to social superiors.  The orthography of Samoan also
retains "t".  Unfortunately, I do not recall whether Samoan
has [k] that is not from [t].

-- 
John Cowan						cowan@ccil.org
			e'osai ko sarji la lojban
