Re: Subordination

dunn patrick w <tb0pwd1@...> wrote:
> All right, another question (now I just know I'm getting annoying, but for
> the first time in weeks I've got spare time).
_Carpe diem_, then :-)

>
> What are some of the ways you indicate subordinate clauses in your
> languages?
Here's two of them:

1. In Drasele'q, you leave everything in place but you change
the pronoun (or state it) to show it is "relative". For example:

_Nailel renn._ "I see (the) man"
_Nailel porrn._ "I see him"

But

_Nailel renn imaldu"aq pod oklon._
"I see (the) man (who) ate (the) cherry."

_Nailel porrn imaldu"aq pod oklon._
"I see him (who) ate (the) cherry."

_pod_ is the relative form of _porr_ "he". It stays right
where it's supposed to be, after the verb _imaldu"aq_ "(3s) ate".

If the pronoun is in the same case in the main and the
subordinate clause, then you may omit it:

_Nailel (porrn) thrumu"eq bu"rth pond._
"I see (him) (whom) they killed"

Here _pond_ is the accusative (object) form of _pod_.


2. In Ciravesu, you do just as in Japanese: you place the subordinate
clause before the modified NP, without any other marks, just as if it
were an adjective. (This doesn't lead to ambiguities because the lang
is stricly SOV.)

_Mecotas fan ialcayce somerema ichualcani._
"He saw something he had never seen before."
lit.

[Mecotas fan    ialcayce    ] somerema      ichualcani.
never   before he-hadn't_seen something.ACC he-it.ACC-saw

(the subordinate clause "he had never seen before" modifies
"something".


Not a conlang, but also: Quechua uses participles instead
of subordinate clauses: "The man who plowed my field" comes
like "The-my-field-plowing man". Just an extension to the
subordinate = adjective usage.

> I was thinking in my new language I'm working on -- telu'at'a
> -- that I might have two methods of showing subordination.  In one, the
> subordinate clauses would function as a word, viz:
>
> (definite article/possessive pronoun) + subject noun root + verb root +
> object noun root + case + (distance)  So we'd have "The man who went to
> the store gave me a horse" as "The.man.going.storeward.nom. gave me.dat
> horse.acc".  This could also work with such things as "My hatred of her
> causes conflict" "my.hate.her.nom cause conflict.acc" which isn't
> technically subordinate but kills two birds with one stone.
It certainly does, and wonderfully. But how are you going to handle
those long compound words? I don't know much about this, but maybe
someone in the list is familiar with polisynthetic Native American
languages...

>
> My other thought, was adding a verbal mood specifically for subordinate
> clauses.  But that just sounds boring.
Why? Though I wouldn't call it a verbal mood. I'm sure some natlangs
use a similar approach.

I guess subordinate clauses are one of those fields where you can
invent a lot of things in a conlang -- more or less like in pronouns.


--Pablo Flores

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