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From: iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski)
Subject: Spanish accent marks (Re: Chinese romanization systems (was H and digraphs thereof))
Message-ID: <CyLtoI.I29@cogsci.ed.ac.uk>
Organization: Centre for Cognitive Science, Edinburgh, UK
References: <CyG5K9.ICx@inter.NL.net> <CyHoL7.C67@cogsci.ed.ac.uk> <CyIDMA.Gow@inter.NL.net>
Date: Tue, 1 Nov 1994 19:48:15 GMT
Lines: 54

In article <CyIDMA.Gow@inter.NL.net> mcv@inter.NL.net (Miguel Carrasquer) writes:
<In article <CyHoL7.C67@cogsci.ed.ac.uk>, Ivan A Derzhanski <iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk> wrote:
<>In article <CyG5K9.ICx@inter.NL.net> mcv@inter.NL.net (Miguel Carrasquer) writes:
<>>[...] the Spanish rules for stress-accent spelling,
<>>which would have been simple if not for the desire to minimize
<>>the use of the accent [...] and for some special cases
<>>where the accent is used to distinguish homophones).
<>
<>Only a few monosyllabic words, I think.
<
<I was going to write "monosyllabic", but I left it out
<because it's not quite true.  The complete list is:
<
<solo "alone"		so'lo "only"

Ah, yes.  I had forgotten about this pair.

<aun "yet, even, but"	au'n "still, yet"

Are these two homophones?  I've always pronounced the first as [awn]
and the second as [a'un].

[8 pairs of monosyllabic homophones deleted]

<porque "because"	por[ ]que' "why?"
<que "that"		que' "what?"
<cual "as, which"	cua'l "which?"
<quien "who"		quie'n "who?"
<cuyo "whose"		cu'yo "whose?"  
<donde "where"		do'nde "where?"
<cuanto "how much"	cua'nto "how much?"
<cuando "when"		cua'ndo "when?"
<como "as, how"		co'mo "how?"

<este "this"		e'ste "this one"
<ese "this, that"	e'se "this, that one"
<aquel "that"		aque'l "that one"

I don't think these ought to be counted.  They're cases of polysemy,
not homophony, and there should be rules accounting for them -- two
rules in all, one for the interrogatives and one for the demonstratives.

One good thing about this system is the correlation between
_acento proso'dico_ and _acento ortogra'fico_.  In Bulgarian there is
one word which always bears an accent mark, the short dative form of the
third person feminine pronoun, _i'_, which is distinguished in this way
from the conjunction _i_ `and'.  However, _i'_ is hardly ever stressed.
(Then again, _i_ is never stressed, full stop.)

-- 
`That's yer oan problem, Judas', they telt him.  `It's nae concern tae us.'
Ivan A Derzhanski (iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk/chaos.cs.brandeis.edu)  (The G-- G--)
* Centre for Cognitive Science,  2 Buccleuch Place,   Edinburgh EH8 9LW,  UK
* Cowan House E113, Pollock Halls, 18 Holyrood Pk Rd, Edinburgh EH16 5BD, UK
