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Re: CHAT: Three questions from a lurker

From:Josh Roth <fuscian@...>
Date:Wednesday, November 4, 1998, 3:34
In a message dated 11/2/98 6:53:23 PM, you wrote:

>Hi all list people. I am generally a lurker, but I have to ask: am I the >youngest conlanger on this list? I'm 16
I'm 16 too (born june 14, 1982) tho I joined th elist when I was 15.
> and have made five languages. >Right now I'm working on one based on Welsh. Oh, and I have another two >questions, because somehow I didn't get the responses the first time. >How do you decide on your vocabularies/morphemes?
Some words I just make up---sometimes I think of an English word and then think for a minute or 2 and come up with a word thats sounds right for it in Eloshtan, and sometimes vice versa. Then I have several ways of deriving words, which I use often. I have a bunch of suffixes that I tack on to words to make new words from them,,,for example Kye=literature kye + fe=literature + do/use=read kye + lye=literature + thing/example=document kyelye + ski=document + diminuitive=card, note kyelyeski + gle=card + intensify/special=greeting card kyelye + mbe {this shortens to kyembe}=document + big=book kyembe + gle=book + intensify/special=bible kyembe + hye=book +container=slipcase kyembe + nte=book + medium.sized.place.of=bookcase kyembe + nti=book + large.sized.place.of=library kyembe + ski= book + diminuitive=booklet, pamphlet .....etc........ And then you can combine an adjective or adverb with a noun or verb..... raf=take ob raf=badly take oraf=steal and gepe=animal e gepel=good animal egepe=pet and then there's the rare type: redji tec cafo=hand its language=hand's language redjitecife=sign language in the that example "cafo" changed to "cife" because of vowel harmony; its back vowels were converted to front vowels like the rest of the word, and also the 2 c's merged into 1.
>And what computer >program do you use. I use Excel myself because of the ease of >alphabetizing.
I use ClarisWorks.... it works ok for me. I have 2 separate documents---ENglish-ELoshtan and Eloshtan-English. When I make a new word, I enter it separately into each document, putting it in the appropriate place---I make the alphabetical order myself---its easier to alphabetize as you go along than it is to have a big jumbled list of words and try to alphebetize that.
>Well, I'll go back to lurking. Thanks a lot. >David
I hope you decide to come out again soon! Josh