Re: THEORY: questions

FFlores wrote:
>
> Hi, all! I'm writing a new and improved (I hope) grammar
> of Draseliq, and running into trouble when it comes to
> rigorous linguistic terminology. So maybe you can help
> me. Here are my questions:
>
> 1. What's the difference between 'root' and 'stem'?
>
        For me, the difference between a root and a stem is that in languages
that like compounding, the stem can be made of several roots. This is
true also for languages that prefer deriving. For example, take the verb
"dire": to say in French (and forget about all its irregularities). This
verb comes from the root di- (je di-s: I say, il di-t: he says, nous
di-sons: we say, etc...). Now take the derived verb "predire" (to
predict). There predi- is not a root, as it can be analysed in pre+di-
(even if pre has nearly no meaning by itself, it used to have, coming
from "prae": in front of, before). Predi- is hence a stem, that's to say
the invariable part used then in flexion. The root is just a special
case of stem that is unanalysable (even if it used to be).

> 2. How would you define 'determiner', 'demonstrative',
> 'deictic pronoun' and 'qualifier'? How are they different?
>
        A determiner is "something that determines". Don't laugh, it is only to
show that this definition is very broad means: "any word that narrows
the meaning of a noun". So articles, demonstratives, deictics are all
determiners. A demonstrative is a pronoun or an adjective used to show
where something is (the "where" can be metaphorical or really spatial).
"This, that" are good examples. Deictics for me would be pronouns or
adjectives that show where something is in the sentence, something like
is, ea, id in Latin or y, en in French. I think they are also called
resumptive pronouns. The difference with true resumptive pronouns is
that the deictics have generally a demonstrative origin. About
qualifiers, I don't know really what you mean by that. For me, it could
be "anything that qualifies", that's to say most adjectives.

> 3. I have a class of words that are mostly adverbs in my mind, but
> don't behave like those. They come at the end of sentences and
> I thought 'I think those are discourse markers as we were talking
> about in Conlang months ago!' but I'm not sure. What do you think
> of this? Look at _tadh_:
>
>         Tegem  tadh farfpainet.
>         run.1s TADH NEG.reach.1s
>         'I run, but I can't reach (it).'
> *or*    'I run, however I can't reach (it).'
> *or*    'Not mattering that I run, I can't reach (it).'
>
> Is it a conjunction, or an adverb? And what do I do with this?:
>
        It can be both. In fact, I often find the difference between
coordination conjunctions and adverbs very fuzzy, and diachronic
evidence shows it is (for example Latin "et": so, thus - adverb -
becoming French "et": and - conjunction -).

>         Tegem, farfpainet tadh.
>         'I run -- I can't reach (it), though.'
>
> I think *this* _tadh_ is a discourse marker, since it can't be a
> conjunction, and it doesn't behave like an adverb (which always goes
> before the verb -- God forbid it shifts to final position, since it
> would destroy my grammatical structures!).
>
        It can well be a discourse marker. I could see it also as a kind of
"sentence adverb", a word that completes the whole sentence. Difficult
to say with those fuzzy categories ("adverb" being the fuzziest of all
:) ).

> I'll probably have more questions later -- please bear with me. :-(
>
        Of course! Hope I could help. And don't forget that the definition I
gave are the ones I usually give, that other people can have other
definitions as good as mine, and that sometimes I even use those words
with other definitions that I usually give, depending the language I try
to describe! :)

> --Pablo Flores
--
        Christophe Grandsire

        Philips Research Laboratories --  Building WB 145
        Prof. Holstlaan 4
        5656 AA Eindhoven
        The Netherlands

        Phone:  +31-40-27-45006
        E-mail: grandsir@natlab.research.philips.com