Re: Umlauts (was Re: Elves and Ill Bethisad)

En réponse à Andreas Johansson :


>Hey, the thought of putting a trema on the not to be pronounced vowel is 
>nifty!
Hehe, in this case the rule that the trema should be on the second vowel 
overrules :)) .

>But now, I assume _exigu_ too is to be pronounced as [Egzigy] - why insist on
>having a separate orthographic form for the feminine?
Because French feminists insist!!!

And I'm not even kidding! :))) Unlike English-speaking feminists (and for 
what I know Dutch-speaking ones), the French feminists are currently 
lobbying for what they call "féminisation des noms de profession", i.e. 
that every noun that describes someone having some activity should have two 
forms: one masculine and one feminine. So nowadays we have "mairesses" 
(female mayors), "députées" (female MPs), "ministres" used with a feminine 
article, etc... while those nouns used to exist only in the masculine. But 
it's true that "madame _le_ ministre" sounds strange :)) . So you can 
imagine how they would react if we got rid of a feminine form in writing, 
even when it's not pronounced. Of course, there are irreductible words: how 
would you call a male "sage-femme"? (midwife) It has been decided: it stays 
"sage-femme" :))) .

In Dutch, they did exactly the contrary: they kept only one form for such 
nouns, the most commonly used. So nowadays they have male "secretaresse" 
(secretary), with the typically female -esse ending :)) .

I guess each way has its limits and stupidities :)) .

>Answer - French couldn't bear being more sensible than Meghean, which has
>silent "h"s indicating definiteness on quite a few words. :)
Don't start me on Maggel ;))) .

And anyway, I find "ambiguë" very nice-looking :)) .

Christophe Grandsire.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr

You need a straight mind to invent a twisted conlang. 

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