Re: New language grammar--what needs work?
| From: | <veritosproject@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Friday, December 2, 2005, 15:11 |
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On 12/2/05, Jim Henry <jimhenry1973@...> wrote:
> On 12/1/05, veritosproject@gmail.com <veritosproject@...> wrote:
>
> > > I think this is called "pro-drop".
> > Yeah, but there are no grammatical "pronouns", only
> > inflections/agglutinations on the verb.
>
> OK, I see how you avoid needing a subject or object
> pronoun because you have the personal endings on the verb;
> but what if you want to mark first or second person
> or some previously mentioned third-person referent
> as being in one of the other cases --- for instance,
> "In spite of you I managed to escape your dungeon"?
> Wouldn't you need a second-person pronoun
> to mark with the obstructive case ending?
Yes, and you do for plurals. Then you can just use the pronoun and
put any cases. It's only pro-drop for subjects and objects.
> > >So are there just the two number marks -- paucal and plural
> > >-- or is there a large (or even open-ended) set of quantifier
> > >morphemes that can fit in between the noun radical
> > >and the case ending? Could you put in quantifiers
> > >like "none", "all", "most of them", "enough", "enough", etc.,
> > >and/or specific numbers like "two", "seventeen", or "pi"?
>
> > Yes...there is no formal plural marking (cars v. car), but you would
> > instead say "car-(a-few)" or "car".
>
> Or really car-FEW-METHOD or whatever, always with
> a case ending after the plurality marker?
> Or
Of course, but FEW isn't a market, it's a separate entity.
> car-hundred-almost-OBJ sell-INDIC-PAST-1P-(given object)
> I sold almost a hundred cars.
That works.
> > "Voluntarity" does not matter. There is a "null object" ending if
> > there isn't an object, so basically "my dog sleeps" would be something
> > like "dog-my-POSS.SUBJ sleep-INDICATIVE-PRESENT-(given-subject)-(no
> > object)".
>
> Hm, sounds like it could get verbose. Can you show some
> examples of actual text in the language? Are some of these morphemes
> just a consonant or a vowel or are some of them mutations
> or whole syllables?
Everything follows the syllable structure (consonant or cluster)(verb,
optionally doubled)n, where the n is only at the end of a word
>
> > >What kind of particle? Are there different particles for
> > >marking subclauses with different relationships to
> > >the main clause, or with different evidentiality/validationality/
> > >etc?
>
> > Subclauses are functionally nouns. So it would be somewhat like
> > (going-to-the-store)-ness bothers me. The ending particle is always
>
> Neat.
Actually I changed my mind. The starting and ending particles would
always be the same but the ending particle would have case markers.
(but would be the obstructive, etc.)
>
> > also a note on the cases--rather than acting like prepositions (like
> > Finnish etc.) they instead fill relations, cause, effect, etc. There
> > will be no prepositions--instead of "to go" it's "to go to a place"
>
> OK. How would you express spatial relationships like
> "under", "inside", etc? Will they be marked by
> affixing the location or motion verb rather than adpositions
> on the noun phrase?
Those would be the verbs. i.e. The phrase "I am sitting under the
chair" would not have a verb "to sit" , but "to sit under".
> What about ditransitive verbs like "send" and "give"?
> Would "I sent a letter to my brother" be something
> like
>
> brother-1P-OBJECT letter-ASSISTIVE send_to-INDIC-PAST-1P-(given object)
>
> or
>
> brother-1P-RESULT letter-OBJECT send-INDIC-PAST-1P-(given object)
there's a separate second object now. brother-OBJECT letter-SECOBJ
send-I-P-1P-(given object)-(given 2obj)
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