Re: Ideas for deriving verbs from nouns

Amanda Babcock sikayal:

> I think, unfortunately, that once one of my sketches dies, it's dead :)
> Attempts to revive them always lead to completely new things :)
I always revive my sketches, but they always look different each
iteration.  My most-changed conlang is probably Hiksilipsi, which was
invented with that name a few years ago, then changed to Paarik, then
changed back to Hiksilipsi with the footnote that it should be
Hiksi*r*ipsi, but I kept the original name because it sounds nicer.

> > My true love conlang Yivríndil derives all verbs from nouns; my friend
> > Brett made a language where all sentences are composed entirely of
> [snip]
>
> Oooh, his language sounds fascinating!  I don't suppose he has a webpage on
> it?
>
> For that matter, do you have a webpage on Yivríndil?
No, and no.  I'm working (slowly) on getting a Yivríndil page up, but
Brett seems content to have no one other than me ever see his work, alas.

> Do you try to avoid the associations of English (or your L1)?  I'm almost
> afraid to do it by "what sounds right" for fear I would simply preserve
> English biases.
Yes and no.  I just go with "what sounds right," but the associations are
sometimes rather oblique to people other than me.  For example the word
for "hand" is <kéha>, and the verb <kéhaya> means "to keep, to hold."
Nothing obvious there.  Likewise, the verb from <roth> "falcon" means "to
act cunningly," which comes from a cultural association of falcons with
cunning and ruthlessness.

> A brief digression - it's fascinating to consider what roles English uses
> as verbs.  Some are focus roles (which end up being direct objects in
> English ditransitive verbs, as far as I can see) like "gift" and "to gift"
> (ok, archaic usage).  Others seem to be utterly practical, highlighting
Heh.  Me and my friends use "gift" as a verb all the time, and it seems
like a neologism, probably because we're transferring it from the noun.

> the aspect of an object that is most *useful* to us - "to fish", for example,
> doesn't mean "to swim like a fish", but "to catch a fish".  (Is this a
> focus role as well?)  The fish's primary meaning is as a food item, not as
> (for example) an agent of swimming.
This verb always gets me, because I have no idea how I'd form it in
Yivríndil.  A verb derived from the noun "fish" would probably mean "to
swim like a fish," and so I have no idea how I'd get "to catch fish."

> > As for the lack of correspondence between nouns and verbs: I can form
> > nouns <rildam> "gift" and <rildasí> "giving", but there are no verbs
> > derived from those nouns--they would either be nonsensical or synonymous
> > with <rildaya>, the verb derived from <rilda>.
>
> Or they could be given subtle differences in meaning...
Which sometimes occurs.  The nouns <pel>, <per>, and <par> mean "lip,
tongue," and "speech" respectively, but their verbs are all variations on
"to say."


Jesse S. Bangs jaspax@u.washington.edu

"If you look at a thing nine hundred and ninety-nine times, you are
perfectly safe; if you look at it the thousandth time, you are in
frightful danger of seeing it for the first time."
--G.K. Chesterton