Re: Basic vocabulary when starting a conlang

Quoting bnathyuw <bnathyuw@...>:

>  --- "Thomas R. Wier" <trwier@...> wrote: >
> Quoting bnathyuw <bnathyuw@...>:
> >
> > >  --- Roberto Suarez Soto <ask4it@...> wrote:
> > >
> > >      What do you think is the basic vocabulary to
> > > > start a conlang?
> > > >
> > > >         I was thinking that there are a few
> > > > verbs that, because of its everyday use or
> > > > significance, should be the first to be "created":
> > > > to be, to have, to live, to die, to go, to come.
> > > > There should also be a few basic words,
> > > > as: man, woman, child, life, death, sky, earth,
> > > > water, fire, god. And of course, the basic personal
> > > > pronouns: I, you, he/she/it, we, you, they.
> > >
> > > not necessarily. if you have a conculture with
> > > either no sexes or more than two, then man and woman
> > > aren's useful concepts. bac isn't based on a conculture,
> > > but as i'm atheist it doesn't have a word for god
> >
> > Pray, tell, why should there be any congruence
> > between your language and reality if you're positing
> > no culture to go along with the language?
>
> simple. bac is a language for _me_ to use ( and anyone
> who wants to communicate with me in it ), so if i
> don't want a generic word for 'god' i'll just go ahead
> and do without
Okay, whatever.  One does wonder, though, how long the language
would exist in actual use without some such word.

> > > ( it borrows specific religions' terms when it needs to
> > > refer to their deities, and would probably nick
> > > the latin |deo| if referring to the western concept of
> > > god
> >
> > Surely you mean "latinate", since the Latin word for
> > "god" is _deus_ (_deo_ only in the ablative and dative
> > singular).
>
> sorry to confuse you. i was quoting the stem form
> rather than the nominative. bac borrows stems, rather
> than dictionary reference forms, and in general i
> prefer to quote these forms anyway
>
> i would have put a hyphen after it, but i thought it
> was easier as the spelling is the same ( for once ) in
> bac and latin to do without
Okay, except that the stem is _de-_, followed by a
thematic vowel -o-, which itself may be followed
by the various declensional endings. (Or, the thematic
vowel morph may be lost, e.g., in the genitive singular,
_dei_, and the irregular dative plural _di:s_. In either
case, the stem is _de-_.)

 =========================================================================
Thomas Wier            "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago   half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street     Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637

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