Re: Kali-sise Grammar

On Sun, 7 Mar 2004 23:33:05 -0500, Jeffrey Henning <jeffrey@...>
wrote:

>I've come up with my most succinct grammar yet.  I was inspired by the
>spare grammars of Victor Medrano.
*******
I've been meaning to reply, but haven't felt too coherent.

This is an interesting sketch. [I recently started on a language, to be
derived from a small inventory language (both phonemes and roots), and as
usual haven't made much progress.]

The case-marker/pronoun idea is interesting. I have no idea if it's natural
or not. I take it that case-marking is mandatory to avoid ambiguity?

I suppose that since you require se to mark verbs (even for verb-type
notions) this could be considered an all-noun language. It would be good to
see the lexicon. Well, that's all I can think of right now.

Jeff Jones
*****

>Morphology
>The core vocabulary of Kali-sise consists of 400 root nouns, 2 pronouns, 1
>verbal marker (se), 6 case markers and 1 clause marker (ka).  New words can
>be only combined from these roots.  With the occasional exception of names,
>words are never borrowed from other languages into Kali-sise.
>
>Pronouns
>le -- first-person pronoun
>ne - second-person pronoun
>
>Case Markers
>Kali-sise has six root case markers:
>
> Case Marker
>Nominative      pi
>Genitive        ta
>Accusative      ke
>Dative          su
>Locative        li
>Ablative        na
>
>The locative is used to locate actions in time as well as place (e.g., sula
>li, "in an hour").
>
>The ablative acts as a "catch-all" case.
>
>The case markers can be modified to indicate more precise semantic roles
>(e.g., kasu-na, "because of").
>
>The case markers can act as independent particles, in which case they are
>often translated with third-person pronouns (e.g., pi kunune se, "they
>communicate").
>
>The stock order pi su is often used for reflexive actions (e.g., pi su
>kunune se, "they talk to each other").
>
>
>Verbs
>
>Any noun can be converted to a verb by following it with se (e.g., pusi se
>["usage {verb}"], "use"; kunune se ["communication {verb}"],
"communicate").
>
>Serial verbs are ambiguous and can either mean:
>1. two separate actions (e.g., Pi su kunune se nune sunu-senuse se, "They
>speak and do not hear each other")
>2. the first verb affects the second (e.g., Pi pinise se pepe se, "They
>finished creating").
>
>
>Clause Markers
>
>Relative clauses begin and end with ka.  A postposition indicates the role
>the noun would play:  ka pe pi pepe se ke ka pine-tuna, "people making [ke]
>tower", "tower people were making".  In this fragment, ke indicates the
>role the modified noun plays (in this case, the object being made).
>
>Relative clauses cannot be nested.
>
>Other clause markers can be coined.  For instance, long quotations begin
>and end with kalane-ka, "quote/unquote".
>
>
>Syntax
>
>Modifiers precede the words that they modify.  Even relative clauses
>precede the words they modify.
>
>Whether a word is modifying the word immediately after it or a later word
>is ambiguous.
>
>The language defaults to SVO but any order is possible thanks to the case
>markers and verb marker.
>
>
>Sample Sentences
>
>Kelu supaka-sunu ke sese kane ke Kali-sise pi nalike se.
>four vowel(opening+sound) {accusative} six opposite {accusative} possession
>{verb}.
>"Four vowels and six consonants Kalisise has."
>
>
>----
>
>I want to flesh out the description of the grammar, so please let me know
>what questions you have so that I can clarify the description.
>
>Also, are there any natural languages with case markers that act the way
>these do?
>
>Best regards,
>
>Jeffrey
>http://www.langmaker.com