Re: Syntactic differences within parts of speech

> Javier BF <uaxuctum@...> wrote:
On Tue, 29 Aug 2006 19:36:56 -0500, Eric Christopherson <rakko@...>
wrote:

>On Aug 29, 2006, at 6:07 PM, Javier BF wrote:
>
> Yes, you can say "aoi desu" for politeness, but that is actually an
> auxiliary use of "desu".......but that actually is a subordinated
> sentence. The literal translation would be "I see the sky that
> is blue", rather than "I see the blue sky"; cf. the past: "Sora-wa
> aokatta" (The sky was blue) --> "Watashi-wa aokatta sora-wo miru"
(I > see the sky that was blue / I see the formerly-blue sky).

Thanks for the excellent explanation of those Japanese verbs.

In reading the explanation, I noticed that there is something
similar in my conlang Senjecas.  Verbs are the principal word class
in Senjecas and I'm beginning to work on the stative verbs.  Right
now these are mainly the colors. There aren't that many adjectives
that aren't already deverbative.

I have recently added a fourth mood, the relative, because there are
no relative adverbs or pronouns.  They take the ending -i.  Because
the language is SOV, all modifiers are preposed.  Thus,"the red
flower" is _rûûðo ânþos_, but "the flower which is red" is "_rûûði
ânþos."  Unfortunately, with this example, if the flower is still
attached to the the plant, and thus still living, "the red flower"
would also be _rûûði ânþis_.  Is this "the red flower" or "the
flower which is red"?

The red flower is on the table.
The flower, which is red, is on the table.

It seems to me that these two sentences are semantically the same.
I guess it's up to the speaker's discretion which one to use.

If anyone can think of a reason for prefering one over the other,
please let me know.

Charlie
http://wiki.frath.net/senjecas

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