Re: Case

now-im-nothing@geocities.com writes:
>I'm just curious, but those of you who do use case in your language, how
>many do you have?
Hmm if i can remember right =). My conlang has about 6 cases for personal
pronouns: nominative, genitive, reflexive (for lack of a better term),
instrumental, and two prepostitional.

The instrumental roughly translates as by + pronoun, and uses the genitive
to render it (compare:   The house was built by me. - Ganjayo koa ng
bahay. My house-  Ng bahay koa ). With verbs, this construction can be
used to get around using the instrumental focus.

The two prepositional pronouns are: ga + pronoun - to + pronoun ( ga koa =
to me) , and den ga + pronoun (den ga koa = for me) . "Ga" is a
preposition meaning the action is happening towards something (it covers:
to, into, in, or on) "Den" just means "for".

There are really only four main prepositions demonstrating spatial
relationships. Wa = means something is away, out of, from something. Ga =
means something's going to, into , or towards something. Ta = means
something's going up and away, in front of, beside, or around something.
Na = means something's going under, below, or behind something. There is
also one specific spatial preposition: Jaka, which means "from". From can
be denoted by wa, but jaka is preferred when one wants to be specific.

> Where does it go from being "cool" to just plain
>unworkable?

Well, it depends on the person. I don't like having too many cases, even
though it makes a language more specific. My conlang gets along fine with
just 6 for pronouns ( three if you discount the two prepositional
pronouns, and the instrumental pronoun (which is the same as genitive)) .
I was actually thinking of using only one case for the pronouns in another
language i was toying with.

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                    "Bailando en el fuego con un gran deseo" - India

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