Re: Lïzxvööse Verbs I: Active Tri-Consonantals

On Saturday, August 11, 2001, at 12:45 PM, Dan Seriff wrote:

> Lïzxvööse (formerly Glïzxfööse) is a consonant root language, with roots
> allowable of one to four consonants. Tri-consonantals are by far the
> most common, followed by di-consonantals. There are no monoconsonantal
>
<very sheepish look>  What do the umlauts signify?  I haven't been paying
enough attention to this list.

> verbs, since these are usually basic nouns/pronouns and grammatical
> particles. Four-consonant verbs (and nouns) are almost always compounds,
> and in the case of verbs, are usually conceptuals (like "understanding",
> etc.).
What are some compound-forming processes in--err, I'm afraid to attempt
those umlauts.  <wry look>  Are they regular and "productive" (?  I seem
to remember the term from Payne's _Describing Morphosyntax_) or irregular,
  or some of both?
>
> Lïzxfööse only has two primary tenses, present and future. Past tenses
> are marked by circumfixes, and, as a result, are lumped in with aspect
> and mood (to be dealt with in a future post). The passive voice is
> marked with a prefix ('eng) derived from the verb "to be" (root '-n).
>
Question (also possibly pretty ignorant since I haven't been reading
enough posts): how is "past" (as mere Yoon Ha's might understand it)
expressed, or is it conceptualized in an essentially different manner that
does not divide it from present or future?

> 3-consonant roots:
>
> Present active, example root t-w-zc [t-w-D] - "forcing"
> This root is interesting, because of several pronunciation
> irregularities involving the semi-vocalic nature of /w/, namely:
>         /w/ -> [u] / C_#, V_C
>         /w/ -> [u:] / C_C
> Lïzxvööse is full of sound shifts like this that drastically affect the
> *pronunciation*, but not the underlying form (or written representation)
> of many words.
>
Neat...I'd be mispronouncing words all over the place, but neat.  :-)
Query: how did you choose "zc" for [D]?  I would have guessed [tS] or
something random from the orthography/transliteration/meep?

The sound changes are quite interesting and I would love to hear a spoken
sample.

> Future active (technically it's a future participle and "to be" copula),
> example root g-d-gg [g-d-g"] - "being excited" (general non-sexual
> excitement):
> This verb is actually a stative crossover, or a formerly stative verb
> (with the meaning "being red"), which has been given an active form, and
> an idiomatic meaning. Lïzxvööse has many such crossovers.
>
Are color-term crossovers common?

YHL

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