Re: Systematic Word Relationships (Was: Arabic and BACK and a whole lot of other things.)

On 12/21/05, Gary Shannon <fiziwig@...> wrote:
> --- Jim Henry <jimhenry1973@...> wrote:
> > Method, system, way of doing action:
> >
> > to fight -> martial art, fighting style
> > to program  -> programming methodology
> >
> I added this as an enumeration since there are more
> than one system or method.
OK.  I intended this as a way of deriving a
_general_ term for all such fighting styles,
programming methodologies, schools of conlanging,
etc.  Maybe terms for specific styles, methodologies,
schools, etc. could be derived from that
general term with appropriate modifiers.


> > to get into NOUN, to put oneself into NOUN
> > (enlitigxi "to get in bed", etc.)
>
> This seems to fit this group, I think:
>
> V. From PREPOSITION.
>        A. PREPOSITION To VERB.
>                1. Action to result in the position.
>                        a. within -> to enter
>                        b. aboard -> to board
That's similar, but what is different about the Esperanto
examples I gave (and others like "surtabligi",
"devojigxi", etc.) is that they incorporate a preposition
and an object of the preposition into a becoming-verb
or causative-verb.


> > >        B. NOUN To NOUN.
> > >                2. General category of a specific
> instance.
> > >                        a. lake -> body-of-water
> > This can have a mnemonic value, but is not
> necessarily
> > productive.  If I use the general-category affix or
> > vowel-pattern or whatever on a root meaning "dog"
> > does it refer to all members of genus Canis, all
> > members of tribe Canini, all members of family
> > Canidae, or something even more general (mammals,
> > vertebrates, animals; domestic animals; quadrupeds)?
> > I use this kind of affix in gzb but word defined
> with it
> > must be memorized, since the level of generalization
> is not
> > obvious.
>
> My intention was the very next level of abstraction,
> colloquially, so that apple->fruit as opposed to
> apple->mass-of-protons-and-electrons.
Even with the "very next level of abstraction"
the derivations would be idiomatic -- for instance
for one person lemon-GNR would suggest
"citrus fruit", to another just "fruit" in general.


> > A member of the same group
> > E.g. Esperanto sam~ano, kun~anto patterns
> > samlandano, samcxambrano, samdomano,
> > samlingvano, kunludanto, kunlaboranto...
> >
> > A member of a different group
> > alilandano, etc.
>
> I don't understand this one.
Each of these derivation patterns is of the form
( specifier prefix ) + ( root ) + ( person suffix ) + (noun ending)

So:
land-o : country
land-an-o : citizen, inhabitant
sam-land-an-o : inhabitant of the same country
ali-land-an-o : inhabitant of another country

The series with "kun~anto" uses the preposition
"kun" (with) and the active participle suffix;
it derives words meaning "someone one does VERB with,
in whose company one does VERB".   So,

kun-lud-ant-o = someone one plays with
kun-verk-ant-o = someone one collaborates in writing with
kun-kant-ant-o = someone one sings along with

--
Jim Henry
http://www.pobox.com/~jimhenry/gzb/gzb.htm

Reply