Phonology

Phonology is the system of sounds in a language's speech.

## Orish Phonology

Because Or Hoshmand is a native Hebrew speaker, Orish phonology is naturally very similar to Israeli Hebrew phonology since the beginning of the history (2008), before Orish was based. However, even in this period Or Hoshmand felt the need of making Orish phonologically stable, he made it even more simple than Hebrew.

* /p/ and /f/ were historically allophones of the same phoneme in Hebrew which is spelled with the letter ⟨פ⟩ (/p/ at the beginning of words, after a consonant that comes after a short vowel or when it's doubled; and /f/ after a vowel and when it's not doubled, or after a consonant that doesn't come after a short vowel, and most conspicuously at the end of words), but because today Hebrew speakers are naturally aware that they are different sound, and today there are even words that break the traditional pronunciation rules, their complementary distribution is difficult and not natural for Hebrew speakers to be strict of anymore, so they were splitted into two separate phonemes in Orish.
* /b/ and /v/ were historically allophones of the same phoneme in Hebrew which is spelled with the letter ⟨ב⟩ (/b/ at the beginning of words, after a consonant that comes after a short vowel or when it's doubled; and /v/ after a vowel and when it's not doubled, or after a consonant that doesn't come after a short vowel, and most conspicuously at the end of words), but because today Hebrew speakers are naturally aware that they are different sound, and today there are even words that break the traditional pronunciation rules, their complementary distribution is difficult and not natural for Hebrew speakers to be strict of anymore, so they were splitted into two separate phonemes in Orish. Also, /v/ replaced /w/ which is spelled with the letter ⟨ו⟩ in native Hebrew words, but /w/ was reintroduced in Hebrew through borrowing words from foreign language, and the easiness of the sound /w/ to pronounce caused it to remain the same in loan words that originally had /w/, so in Orish there is also /w/.
* In Hebrew there was a distinction between /t/ (plain, which is represented by the letter ⟨ת⟩) and /tˤ/ (emphatic, which is represented by the letter ⟨ט⟩) in the past, but they were merged into one phoneme pronounced like /t/ and /tˤ/ is difficult and not natural for Hebrew speakers to pronounce anymore, so in Orish there is no distinction between them.
* In Hebrew there were fricative allophones for /t/ and /d/ ([θ] for /t/ and [ð] for /d/) though not for /tˤ/, but they were lost and Hebrew speakers are not strict to pronounce them anymore. However, Or Hoshmand asked his teacher how to pronounce the digraph ⟨TH⟩ in English lessons and she told him to stick his tongue out, and he thought to add these sounds to Orish (see below why they don't exist in Orish yet).
* /k/ and /x/ were historically allophones of the same phoneme in Hebrew which is spelled with the letter ⟨כ⟩ (/k/ at the beginning of words, after a consonant that comes after a short vowel or when it's doubled; and /x/ after a vowel and when it's not doubled, or after a consonant that doesn't come after a short vowel, and most conspicuously at the end of words), but because today Hebrew speakers are naturally aware that they are different sound, and today there are even words that break the traditional pronunciation rules, their complementary distribution is difficult and not natural for Hebrew speakers to be strict of anymore, so they were splitted into two separate phonemes in Orish. Also, both of them replaced with other phonemes that are difficult and not natural for Hebrew speakers to pronounce anymore: /k/ replaced /q/ which is represented by the letter ⟨ק⟩ and /x/ replaced /ħ/ which is represented by the letter ⟨ח⟩, so in Orish /q/ and /ħ/ don't exist.
* In Hebrew there was a fricative allophone for /g/, [ɣ], which is relatively easy to pronounce for Hebrew speakers, at least for Or Hoshmand, but Hebrew speakers don't pronounce /g/ like that anywhere anymore. Also, /ɣ/ is likely to be to be confused with /r/, which is pronounced by Hebrew speakers, at least by Or Hoshmand as a uvular trill (see below more details).
* In Hebrew there is a phoneme that was pronounced as /sˤ/ in the past and as /t͡s/ today which is spelled with the letter ⟨צ⟩. Beside this change, two postalveolar affricates, /t͡ʃ/ and /d͡ʒ/ were introduced in Hebrew through borrowing words from foreign languages probably because they are easy to pronounce for Hebrew speakers, so /sˤ/ doesn't exist in Orish and /t͡s/, /t͡ʃ/ and /d͡ʒ/ exist in Orish.
* In Hebrew /ʃ/ which is represented by the letter ⟨שׁ⟩ (with the right dot, unlike ⟨שׂ⟩ which is pronounced as /s/ just like ⟨ס⟩) has always existed while /ʒ/ is as new as /t͡ʃ/ and /d͡ʒ/, and in the good case was only an allophone of /ʃ/ before voiced consonants. Although for an extremely long period /ʒ/ didn't exist in Hebrew it was introduced through borrowing words from foreign languages, and remained the same probably because it's easy to learn to pronounce it when there is /ʃ/ in one's native language, so it was confirmed in Orish.
* In modern Hebrew some speakers are strict to pronounce the phoneme /h/ and some speakers are not, this phoneme is probably in a trend of decline today. However, Or Hoshmand is strict to pronounce it, but only since he heard that this is the sound of the letter ⟨ה⟩ when he was 5 years old. Also, this phoneme exists in English, something that in Or's perception justifies its presence in Orish.
* In Hebrew there is /ʔ/. This phoneme is extremely weak, and most Hebrew speakers usually drop it. This phoneme actually comes before vowels that are initial in their syllables, and it's represented by the letter ⟨א⟩ which is perceived as a letter that represents a syllable that starts in a vowel. In the past there was another phoneme, /ʕ/, which is represented by the letter ⟨ע⟩ and Hebrew speakers are not strict to pronounce at all today, and they pronounce it just like /ʔ/. Because of the difficulty in noticing them, neither exist in Orish.
* Hebrew script without diacritics doesn't represent vowels very much while with diacritics it represents more vowels than there are in modern Hebrew. The diacritics were built for 7 vowels with partially a distinction between them in length while in modern Hebrew there are only 5 vowels: /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, and /u/. Also, before 2017 Or Hoshmand didn't know that in English there are more than 5 vowels because there are 5 vowels in English, no one of his English teachers taught him to pronounce the vowels in English correctly, the large number of spelling forms of vowels in English that most of them are digraphs meant nothing to him, and until then Or Hoshmand didn't know other vowels, so in Orish there are 5 vowels just like in Hebrew.
* In Hebrew there was a phonemic distinction between short and long consonants in the middle of words after vowels in the past, but modern Hebrew speakers are not aware of that anymore, so in Orish this distinction doesn't exist.

In this period, Or Hoshmand's phonological perception can be shown like that:

 Mid
 Low

###### Notes:

* /ʔ/ was perceived as an absence of a consonant.
* /h/ was acquired when Or Hoshmand learned about the letter ⟨ה⟩, not before, but he naturally acquired when he heard it.
* /θ/ and /ð/ discovered by Or Hoshmand in English lessons when he saw the digraph ⟨TH⟩ and asked his English teacher how to pronounce it and his English teacher told him to stick his tongue out, but he wasn't sure that he was pronouncing it correctly when he tries to, he was even confused between them and /s/ and /z/, probably because he had lisp though he wasn't aware of that yet. However, he still considered to add it to Orish.
* Or Hoshmand was sure that the letter ⟨R⟩ in English is parallel to the letter ⟨ר⟩ in Hebrew even after he heard his English teacher pronouncing it differently (/ɹ/ in English while in Hebrew this is /ʀ/). He was afraid to ask his English teacher how to pronounce it because he heard it as /w/ and was afraid to discover it, and still perceived /ʀ/ as an alternative way to pronounce it.
* Although Or Hoshmand's English teacher pronounced vowels in English correctly she didn't teach him to pronounce them, so all vowels that don't exist in Hebrew were foreign to Or Hoshmand. Instead, when Or Hoshmand pronounced any word in English that contains any vowel that doesn't exist in Hebrew, he replaced the foreign vowels with vowels that he was more familiar with that are phonetically similar, or fit to the spelling in his perception. However, diphthongs were perceived by him as combinations of a vowel and a semivowel and all of them are consist of sounds that he is familiar with so he didn't tend to mispronounce them as long as the spelling is not misleading.
* /ŋ/ was heard by Or Hoshmand as /ng/ at the end of words or before vowels and as /n/ before velar consonants, and his English teacher didn't try to teach him to pronounce it.
* Or Hoshmand's English teacher told him that /w/, /t͡ʃ/, /d͡ʒ/ and /ʒ/ don't exist in Hebrew but he disagreed with her, because he already knew some words in Hebrew that contain them and they weren't difficult for him to pronounce.
* /ħ/ and /ʕ/ in Hebrew were perceived by Or Hoshmand as distorted pronunciations of /x/ and /ʔ/ rather than correct or separate phonemes.
* The complementary distribution of /p/ and /f/, /b/ and /v/, and /k/ and /x/ (when they are spelled with the letter ⟨כ⟩ was not naturally noticed by Or Hoshmand, and he even knew words that break their pronunciation rules, so he naturally perceived them as separate phonemes.
* The emphatic consonants /tˤ/, /q/ and /sˤ/ were never heard by Or Hoshmand until 2016, o they were foreign to him and he wasn't aware that in the past they existed in Hebrew. Just like emphatic consonants, length of vowels and consonants were never perceived by him as phonetic features and he was not aware that in the past it created phonemic distinctions in Hebrew.

In 2018 Or Hoshmand had more linguistic knowledge that he gained through trying to improve his pronunciation in English, and his considerations for choosing phonemes for Orish were more based.The phonemes still were roughly like in Hebrew, but then he already found good reason for that. In comparison to other languages, the phonemes in Hebrew are relatively easy to pronounce even for speakers who don't have them in their native language.

* Complementary distribution of plosives and fricatives is more likely to make the language harder than easier, so that's more practical to have them as separate phonemes than as allophones of the same phoneme. The reason is because in most languages they are separate phonemes and even speakers of languages in which they are allophones of the same phonemes are likely to feel the difference between them and have difficulties with that. Even Hebrew speakers are usually not aware that the two sounds of ⟨ב⟩, ⟨כ⟩ and ⟨פ⟩ were originally two allophones of the same phonemes.
* Emphatic consonants are not very common, and they are difficult to pronounce and hear differently from their plain counterparts, so that's not practical to add them to the language. Even Hebrew speakers are usually not aware that in Hebrew there were phonemic emphatic consonants in the past, and they don't even know what is it.
* Although Or Hoshmand considered to add interdental fricatives to Orish in 2008, he regretted it. That happened because they are not common enough in the world, and Or Hoshmand discovered that he has lisp and that makes it harder for him to distinguish alveolar and interdental fricatives, so that's not practical to add interdental fricatives to Orish.
* The uvular trill Or Hoshmand naturally pronounces is in complementary distribution with other consonants in the world that are classified as rhotic consonants, and it is likely to be difficult to pronounce for people who don't have it in their language. To deal with this problem, Or Hoshmand added only one phoneme for all rhotic consonants that can be pronounced in many different ways, and he calls it in the neutral name "the rhotic phoneme".
* Distinction between unvoiced and voiced obstruent consonants is common in the world, and Or Hoshmand's assumption point is that when someone knows how to pronounce an unvoiced obstruent consonant he or she would easily be able to learn to pronounce its voiced counterpart. Exceptionally, /x/ doesn't have a voiced counterpart because it is classified as a rhotic consonant. However, distinction between unvoiced and voiced sonorant consonants and vowels is uncommon and they are almost always voiced, so that's not practical to make this distinction in Orish.
* Although some Hebrew speakers are not strict to pronounce the phoneme /h/ and there are some languages without this phoneme such as Russian and French, Or Hoshmand claims that this phoneme is relatively easy to learn to pronounce so it was confirmed in Orish. But pronouncing its voiced counterpart consciously is likely to be difficult so that's not practical to make a distinction between them in Orish.
* /ŋ/ might be easy to pronounce for many people, but it's not as common as /m/ and /n/ in the world and it can be difficult to hear differently from /n/. Languages like English and German have it but almost only after vowels and before velar consonants and at the end of words, so Or Hoshmand claims that it's not practical to add to Orish this sound, and nasal consonants other than /m/ and /n/.
* /x/ doesn't exist in English but Or Hoshmand claims that this sound is not as difficult to pronounce as English speakers commonly think, and it sounds unique and clearly different from other sounds so it was confirmed in Orish.
* When people know to pronounce plosives and fricatives with the same or a close place of articulation they can easily learn to pronounce affricates by combining them, so Or Hoshmand claims that it's practical to add them to Orish even if they are uncommon.
* /a/, /e/, /i/, /o/, and /u/ are the most common vowels in the world and they are easy to learn to pronounce. Or Hoshmand added only one vowel, /ə/ only to break difficult consonant clusters to pronounce. However, there is a high risk that other vowels will be difficult to learn to pronounce, so that's not practical to add other vowels to Orish.
* Pronouncing the phoneme /w/ should not be difficult for people who have the vowel /u/ in their native language even if they don't have /w/ in their native language, and /u/ is a near-universal vowel so that's not practical to replace /w/ with /v/ like in Esperanto for example, they are also very different sounds so this replacement is likely to be unnatural and counter-intuitive for many people.

After choosing the phonemes for Orish in 2018 with such considerations, Or Hoshmand built and alphabet for Orish, with one letter for each one of the phonemes in Orish, except for the affricates which are spelled in combinations of letters.