Re: Articles, determiners, quantifiers, whatever...
| From: | Sally Caves <scaves@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Wednesday, July 7, 2004, 16:43 |
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Remi Villatel" <maxilys@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Tuesday, July 06, 2004 10:57 PM
Subject: Re: Articles, determiners, quantifiers, whatever...
> Sally Caves wrote:
>
> > In the meantime, though, you haven't demonstrated the use of my articles
in
> > the ways I was describing (you cut off my text): Better: Le Remi
> > zemplim-ilz omlo nehsa, ma nrinan-lo vera etsan celil kalalyan
ingenyoht.
> > "The (volitional) Remi example-an (object) does (volitional)-he seek,
but
> > finds (non-volitional)-he not same (referring to zemplim) in-the
languages
> > invented."
>
> Err... Could you translate in English? My knowledge of Teonaht is very
> limited. I had half of your site in front of me to write my little
> sentence... (Thank you, Mozilla's tabbed browsing!)
>
> "Remi shows an example of what he's looking of but..." That's all I can
> translate. I'm not sure about where to apply the negation. "zemplim" isn't
> anywhere on your site. (I have a copy on my HD... It's easier to search
> through.)
Oh, it's translated above, but verbum pro verbo with intrusive grammatical
descriptions, so it's very hard to read. You got zemplim! Essentially:
"Remi seeks an example, but he doesn't find it in in the invented
languages." :) I'm sorry that my Teonaht-English lexicon is not complete.
I could work some months on it to bring it up to par, but I keep inventing
words that I don't put in there. It's a daunting amount of work, and I'm
engaged in a huge pile of obligations from my university. :(
> Sorry if I cut your text but, although interesting, it wasn't close enough
> to what I was looking for.
>
> > Now Remi, why look for a system of categorization in another person's
> > conlang? Why not just invent your own and put it in a description of
> > Shaquelingua? There it will be "enough" for you.
>
> Then I suddenly realize that I wasn't very clear about what I was looking
> for... ;-) I already have my categorization system: The shaquean
articles
> are "quantifiers" built with "aspects". What I wanted was some ideas on
how
> to organize, how to present this part of the grammar. Now I know that
noboby
> else but me can write it.
No, it was me who was inattentive. When I went back and looked at your
original post, I understood finally what you were asking for. Sorry.
> > I suggest that the problem here is in your use of the word "article." I
> > think of "all" and "every/each" as modifiers (an admittedly vague term),
> > possibly determiners (another fairly comprehensive term). But the word
> > "article" has more traditional and specific connotations in descriptions
of
> > the modern European languages, upon which Teonaht was originally based.
If
> > you are including "all" and "every/each" in your list of what you're
looking
> > for, then I get a much better picture of your concept of "article."
>
> You're right. I say "articles" but I'm thinking "quantifiers"... and if I
> only opened a dictionary, I would have seen that most of what I called
> articles are in fact adjectives. It just sounds too illogical to me.
That's
> certainly why I grouped all that I thought that should be labelled
"article"
> and obtained the "quantifiers". :-)
>
> > Under
> > "pronouns" I have a fairly big list of words like "etsa" in Teonaht
(same or
> > most recent thing mentioned), etsa...ouar (the first and second thing
> > mentioned),
>
> I also call "pronoun" the word used to recall anything previously
mentioned
> but I call it "resumptive" instead as "reiterative" and it can't turn into
> an adjective.
How interesting!
> I can't resist to the pleasure to insert an example... ;-)
>
> vo valhça kik'be djife te'kja.
> [vo va4.ça kik(i)'be: djife te:'kja]
> [from]the sky (descriptor)'(case marking) color (indicative past)'I.
> = I saw the color of the sky.
Where does the concept "see" or "seeing" come in here? I'm confused by the
second line with the brackets around your Shaquelingua, and the numbers. I
guess I need to visit your site. I do like the tense-marked pronoun! :) (I
remember THAT thread!)
> vir'be pølika teo'pevaa.
> [vix(i)'be: p94ika te^o:'peva^a]
> (descriptor)'(case marking) green (indicative atemporal)'*resumptive*
> = *It* is green.
> = *The color* is green.
>
> If I change the resumptive into "povaa", now it means "the sky". It makes
no
> sense here but I could change the resumptive into "pavaa" to represent
"I".
So "I am green"? pevaa, pavaa, povaa... how are these working to suggest
the order of reference?
> sjeo'rja xe sagevo tul'vëë.
> [sje^o:'xja x\e: sagevo tu4(u)'vë^ë]
> (potential atemporal)'thou some belief (descriptor)'*resumptive*
> = You can believe *it.*
>
> This "it" represents the whole previous sentence.
Nice examples with the pronouns and their various antecedants.
> > taiso--or taso (every/each), mimim ("some of"), aiba (this), oba
> > (that), ista (that awful), and I explain how they can be used as
> > "adjectives" (or determiners). Etsa vaiua, "this same bird." Poto is
an
> > adjective: poto randon, "all kings."
> [---CUT---]
>
> Now, I know these are adjectives everywhere except in Shaquelingua.
Or what you might call "quantifiers" or "determiners" or "modifiers." There
are a number of terms you can use besides "adjective."
> > So I'm
> > moved to ask, what exactly is the point of your post? To let us know
that
> > you haven't found a conlang description that conforms to your idea of
> > lexical categorization?
>
> Not one that would conform to my idea but one that would ressemble. But
that
> wasn't the point.
>
> > And that you need one to formulate your own
> > taxonomy? To let us know that we SHOULD be thinking of our "articles"
in
> > terms of a wider category, and revise our descriptions thusly? An
> > interesting suggestion; I'll consider it.
>
> That would be presomptuous.
Not necessarily! You've made me rethink some things, and I've been going
over in my head how I would redo the noun page and its "determiners" and
"quantifiers." Because this is an interesting point you've raised.
> I SHOULD change my mind about what articles are
> in real languages. And my "taxinomy" is already set as I said before. No
> thank you, I don't want to change. I was looking for something I couldn't
> find. I have a twisted mind! I can't help it...
Oh, I haven't been asking you to change. Maybe just to clarify your
request.
> > If none of the above, why not
> > just write your own explanation for "everything that can be used as an
> > article" and put it on the website for your own conlang? I'm sure we
would
Thanks for this URL.
> You'll see what I've already (re-)done. That is not much: Only the roman
> script (the Shaquean scripts aren't online yet), the pronunctiation (with
> funny bad sounds), and the personal pronouns.
Funny bad sounds aren't necessarily bad!
> And you'll see that I've much work to (re-)do according to my plan.
>
> > Essentially, then, anything that can "determine" a noun
> > in a closed list (short of words like "flowery," "shadowed," "unctious,"
> > "unhallowed," "benighted," "free," or any other endless parade of
> > descriptors.
>
> That's more or less the description of an agglutinative language.
Not at all, Remi. Ergative, accusative, synthetic, analytic and
what-have-you languages use articles, determiners, quantifiers and
adjectives. I don't quite understand you. What I was trying to suggest for
your category (but it seems that you have to work this out yourself) is a
"closed class" or list of words that determine or quantify or modify a noun.
This doesn't make it agglutinative. A closed class (you obviously know
this) is a series of words that are not subject to innovation or change,
like our English words "the, that, a, an, each, all, every, his, hers,
theirs, my, your," etc. as opposed to a list of attributive or predicate
adjectives that one can borrow endlessly into the language and expand it.
Words like "flowery, unctious, shadowed, unhallowed, benighted, magnifique,
typical, brazen, agglutinative, bizarre, existential, fast, blue, azure,
muslim, karate-like..." That's what I meant. As you can see from this list
of English adjectives, which continues to grow, there are words that come
from Old English, words borrowed from French, words borrowed from Latin,
from the Arabic, from the Japanese, and so forth. So it's not a "closed
class."
> Shaquelingua is agglutinative sometimes but not that far!
You might be using this term a little loosely just to mean "accretive." I
was giving you a list, not writing a sentence. Or you might be describing
an aspect of Shaquelingua and its use or non-use of adjectives that I'm not
privy to, yet, because I have forgotten which site is yours (I think I got
it mixed up with Jonathan Knibb's T4 site). But I think you need to rethink
your term "agglutinative."
And, although
> there are no real adjectives, the attributes of a noun aren't integrated
in
> the quantifiers.
Aha! No real adjectives. Okay, but not having adjectives does not make
your language non-agglutinative. Do you see my point? German is hardly an
agglutinative language in the strict sense of the term, and yet it commonly
puts a string of modifiers together before the noun, some of them
compounded: "the young, pretty, pink-dress-wearing, yet-to-arrive woman."
It can be accretive. It's one of the features of German I find really cool,
and Mark Twain hated so much as to write an article about it: "That Awful
German Language."
> Any way, that's an idea I may consider for a future conlang... If I find a
> way not to stumble on the old big red house. Besides, it's not so alien.
> Look at english "another". Article+adjective in one word. :-)
Well, it's very common. What you've got here, it seems, is more
challenging.
> > For Teonaht I would list (in a category called Nouns and Determiners)
the
> > definite and indefinite articles with their status as agent,
experiencer,
> > and object including some of, a few of, a lot of, etc; further
determiners
> > like "this," "that," "that yonder," "that awful" with their status as
agent,
> > experiencer and object and their distinct uses as pronouns or
determiners;
> > "all," "each," "same," "other" with their status as free-standing
pronouns
> > and determiners; the possessive pronouns, prefixed or infixed; the
prefixed
> > plural particles...
>
> All the ones I thought they were articles and that I transformed into
> quantifying aspects. Lucky mistake I made!
The lucky mistakes are the good ones! I make them all the time.
> > what am I leaving out? A lot of what I put under
> > prepositions and adverbs: Li beto cel, "the inside boy" (the boy on the
> > inside); vul-, "with respect to (a noun)." But I'm not sure that this
is
> > any more helpful, really, than classifying some of these under other
> > categories. What's needed is the page on Syntax and Grammar. Not
finessed
> > yet, although I have it written out.
>
> No verb in Shaquelingua. No adverb either. For your example, I'd use a
> postposition turned into a kind of adjective that I call "quality".
Right. Now I'm remembering! We had that long exchange about verbless
languages! Sorry to be so forgetful. So no verbs and no adjectives? And
no adverbs? Your language is strictly nominal? That's why I was confusing
it with T4.
> vi leyo lóku [vi: lewo lOku]
> the room inside(post.)
> = in the room
>
> vu kyó-lóku jisso [vu: kwO:lOku jis^so]
> [about]the (physical quality)-inside child
> = the child who is inside
>
> (The particle "kyó" isn't mandatory here; the qualitive role of the
> postpostion is obvious.)
>
> > I'm delighted at the interest you take in everybody else's conlangs,
Remi.
> > That's refreshing!! And it's always a hoot to see my Teonaht written
back
> > at me! :) So I'd love to see something of yours. Such as the snippet
you
> > give below.
>
> Err... I'm a quick reader and I don't leave a site until I have --at
least--
> seen every available page when I feel like it. And I like to read a lot.
Well you also remember a lot.
> If you want so much to read more from me, go to my site and come back to
> tell me that it is beautiful. (I like compliments too...) ;-)
I will! But now I have to go shopping for items for my trip. I'll get back
to you. But I'm a slower reader with a poor memory--so many things going
on--so have patience! :)
Sally
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