Re: Conlang Irregularities

On Sun, 7 Mar 1999, Sally Caves wrote:

> I know that one of the difficult tasks of getting
> a conlang up and running is to make the rules
> of grammar.  How many of you established
> conlangers, after having done that, deliberately
> introduce irregularities and contradictions into
> your conlang with an eye to giving it dimension
> and realism?  Or maybe you don't do it so
> deliberately... maybe it just happens and you
> decide to leave it be?
It just happens and I encourage it. If I find something that seems
too regular, I assume that I haven't come across the exceptions yet
and stop looking at that particular bit of grammar when I write.
Usually this has the desired effect: that my sloppiness stands in for
the sloppiness of generations.
=20
> In other words, how many exceptions to the rules
> you've made will you tolerate?  One of the
> criticisms leveled at invented languages is that
> they are too regular.  Does that bother you?
Yes, it does bother me sometimes, but deliberately putting in
exceptions would bother me even more; it would stop being organic=20
and start to be an artifact.

[nice example snipped]

> But what do I do with euanrem y euan, "go," "I go," denrem
> y den, "tell, I tell," and uenrem, y uen, "take, I take"?
> Except to make them exceptions to the rule?  These
> are beloved words that I've had for decades and don't
> want to mess with.  And yet I can predict how they might
> change in subsequent usage: _euaned_ "go" but not with
> volition, and a new vol. form,  euarem, y eua--which I'm not
> crazy about.  And an epinthetic vowel inserted between
> root and suffix for uenrem and denrem:  _uenarem, denarem_.
> which are other verbs.  Yikes, what to do?
I'd leave them be if I were you; these are obviously widely-used and
well-worn verbs. Why should they be regular, unless the people
speaking it have something like the Acad=E9mie Fran=E7aise?

The most-used verbs in *any* language tend to be irregular - Valdyan
doesn't conjugate them irregularly, but "go" and "come" use a
reflexive construction: literally "take oneself" (like "take thee to
a nunnery") and "bring oneself".

   Irina

               ira@rempt.xs4all.nl (mailing list address)=20
                     irina@rempt.xs4all.nl (myself)
     http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt/irina/frontpage.html (English)
    http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt/irina/backpage.html (Nederlands)