Bryatesle: Marginal Phonemes and Marginal Allophones

Bryatesle's phonemes basically form the following two tables:

	bilabial	dental	(post)alveolar / alveolopalatal	palatal	velar	glottal
stop	p b	t̪ d̪	t̠ d̠	[c] [ɟ]	k g	(ʔ)
fricative	ɸ β	s̪ z̪	ɕ	(c͜ç)	x (ɣ)	(h)
laterals		l̪	l̠ʲ
trills			r̠ʲ
nasals	m	n̪	n̠ʲ
semivowels	(w)			(j)

Marginal phonemes are present in brackets. In angular brackets, you have c, ɟ, which have been lost as such, but are realized as k g x ɕ r depending on context.
The dental consonants are only distinct from the postalveolar ones when in front of front vowels, but are explicitly written in all positions - morphophonological processes can make a front vowel enable the distinction again.

 The glottal stop appears in hiatuses that coincide with word boundaries. In some urban dialects ʔ replaces most word-final voiceless stops, but this is frowned upon. It also appears in the word paʔɛɕ, mustard seed. The two semivowels appear in one word, wujɨp or wujip, bundle. Orthographically, wujɨp is represented as uβuɟɨp. In some dialects, -βu- is generally pronounced [wu], however, in most of the Bryatesle area this is at most a marginal allophone, expected of people with odd idiolects and speech defects and of children.

[h] appears in complementary distribution with /x/ in clusters with other fricatives, laterals and the trill (so /lx/, /sx/, /zx/, /rx/ -> [lh], [sh], [zh], [rh]) but it appears exceptionally in the word s̪ɛhɨl̠ʲ (fem), exhalation, release of tension, relief. This is probably due to loss of l̠ʲ in the underlying sɛl̠ʲxɨ-, exhale, but all other comparable situations have the -x- appear as [x].

/ɣ/ appears in three interjections and in one verb. The verb is paɣa-, to smoke fish or meat (with the near-minimal pairs ɸaga-, snore, axa-, to place a longish thing at an inclination towards a wall or other relatively tall thing, to be placed at an inclination towards a wall or other relatively tall thing (when used of a longish thing as subject). Orthographically, this appears in several forms: pagxa, paga, paxa, paxβa, paβxa.

/c͜ç/ appears in ɨc͜çu, the onomatopoeic representation of a sneeze. It also appears in the verbal form ɨc͜ça-. Beyond this, it also appears in some baby-speak, and words related to babies including words such as n̪ec͜çe (m), milk, and buc͜çi (f), cradle. Of these, only basically buc͜çi has any widespread use when babies are not part of the situation. The written forms use cɕ or t̠ɕ.

c and ɟ are not as such phonemes, and are thus never heard. However, their realization is strongly conditioned by morphophonological concerns. If one of these has appeared in a position where there never are morphophonological changes, most authors would use the letter corresponding to the expected realization, but some authors that are influenced by old texts may use these instead.

{c} appears in a velar form when close to back vowels, and as /ɕ/ when close to front vowels. Between back and front vowels, the vowel after the consonant determines what form it takes. {c} is realized as the stop /k/ before stops and nasals if preceded by a back vowel, as /x/ before other consonants, and as /x/ after all non-nasal consonants. After a nasal consonant it also appears as /k/. {ɟ} basically has a similar distribution, but with /r̠ʲ/ standing in both for /x/ and /ɕ/, whereas /g/ stands in for /k/.

i	ɨ	u
ɛ	(ɘ)	(o)
		ɑ

In the vowel system, we see an even more disconcertingly large relative number of marginal phonemes. /o/ appears in the words 'flu', ɸomsa (written ɸamsa, sometimes ɸumsa) and 'goat kid', βobɨm (written fvubim). ɸamsa is a distinct word signifying a species of fish, and thus we even have a single minimal pair for the word. There's also the interjection [o:], which basically is the Bryatesle equivalent of 'er'. In other contexts, [o] and similar almost never appear. Using such phones as realizations of either ɑ or u is frowned upon. It appears in some dialects that are considered very rural, and also associated with certain disapproved religious movements.

ə appears in a few interjections, such as ələ, which appears after mistaken words and thus before corrections, gə/xə which correspond to ew, and əb! which expresses disbelief and disagreement. It also appears in the verb xərz̪e- (to shave)

The dental consonants are only distinct from the postalveolar ones when in front of front vowels.