Pronoun systems, Texperanto, ANADEW (was:Re: Mixed person plurals)

Hello, John and others.

Aside from Godie and the Krue languages,
note that Swahili and other Bantu languages often have "overt
genders";
(most or many) noun-classes in which (nearly) all the nouns' singular
forms begin with a certain sound or syllable,
and (nearly) all their plural forms begin with a (sometimes the same)
sound or syllable.

Usually the agreement-marker on whatever target word has to agree
with the noun,
is either a sound or syllable prefixed or procliticized to the front
of the target word,
or is a predictable sound-mutation of the first sound or first
syllable of the target word.

For most or many genders,
the prefixed or procliticized sound or syllable,
is usally the same sound or syllable that marks the overt gender of
the noun.

But some genders require different markers for different categories
of target.

For instance,
it could be that "human" gender nouns all start with i- in the
singular and mi- in the plural;
and any word, other than a verb,
that has to agree with such a noun,
has to start the same way;
but they require verbs starting with a-.

For the most part,
this means most Bantu sentences sound like lines of alliterating
Viking poetry.

-----

Tom H.C. in MI

--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, tomhchappell <tomhchappell@Y...>
wrote:
> From Greville G. Corbett's "Gender" (Cambridge Textbooks in
> Linguestics), (1991);
> Chapter 3, "Gender Assignment II: Formal Systems",
> Section 3.2, "Phonological Systems",
> subsecton 3.2.3 "Godie and other Kru languages",
> pages 53 to 55, tables 3.5 and 3.6.
>
> Godie has four genders and six personal pronouns (five of which are
> vowels).
> One gender is Human; it has one singular and one plural pronoun.
The
> singular pronoun is a single vowel; the plural pronoun is "wa".
> Three genders are Non-Human.  One is "mostly" Big Animate; one
> is "mostly" Small Animate; one is the residue.
> Each has its own singular pronoun; they share a plural pronoun.
> These pronouns are all single vowels.
> Definiteness of a noun is denoted by encliticizing the pronoun on
the
> end of it.
> Except for human nouns,
> any noun whose stem ends in a front vowel is represented by the
> pronoun e,
> any noun whose stem ends in a central vowel is represented by the
> pronoun a,
> and any noun whose stem ends in a back vowel is represented by the
> pronoun o.
>
> The pronoun used for a noun completely determines its gender.
>
> So, a Natlang (Godie) does what Texperanto does, except from the
last
> letter instead of the first, only with vowels (not with
consonants),
> and with the vowels grouped.
>
> -----
>
> Tom H.C. in MI
>
>
> --- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, John Vertical <johnvertical@H...>
> wrote:
> > --- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, tomhchappell wrote:
> > >About your "ordinal affixes" idea;
> > >Here is a quote from
> > >http://www.geocities.com/ceqli/Texperanto.html
> > >where a similar goal is accomplished;
> > >
> > >The names of the letters are: af, bet, ce, del, ep, foy, gam,
hac,
> ic, jey,
> > >kap, lam, mim, nan, om, pi, qa, ro, sig, taw, up, vay, waw, xin,
> yot, zed
> > >They are used as names of letters, of course, and (since a trend
> began in
> > >the late 20th century) they are also used as anaphora, i. e. as
> pronouns
> > >that refer back to the last word that begins with that
particular
> letter.
> > >Example: Me donis karno ad la leono. Lam manjis kap. (usually
just
> written
> > >as "L manjis k.")
> > >
> > >Of course, Texperanto is not a natlang, but...
> >
> > Ah yes, Texperanto. I like the idea, but it clearly needs a few
> more rules -
> > like, what happens if a new word beginning with the same letter
as
> the main
> > topic is mentioned? Can the topic override a sidetrack, or can
any
> > non-sequitur mention demand that the topic is again mentioned by
> its full
> > name?
> >
> > One solution is that the name could be mentioned to such extent
> that it can
> > be exactly identified. Consider a discussion with the following
set
> of
> > topics (and their identifiers)
> > horses (h)
> > mice (mi)
> > marsupials (mar)
> > mammoths (mammo)
> > mammals (mamma)
> > If the topic of hamsters (ha) were brought up, horses would
> become "ho". If
> > marmosets (marm) were brought up, marsupials would
become "mars"...
> when the
> > topic of mammals were done with, mammoths would became "mam" ...
etc
> >
> > Still, this does not circumvent the problem that someone tuning
> into the
> > conversation midway through would not know what exactly is being
> talked
> > about.
> >
> >
> > > > [snip]
> > > > I also think "mixed singulars" could perhaps imply
> > > > 2 persons, and "mixed > dual" 3 ("me and two others"). Does
> this make
> > >any sense??
> > >
> > >There appear to be languages where "I and thou" is singular, "I
> and you
> > >two" is dual, and "I and you three" is trial or paucal.
> > >In other words, the "Inclusive" person (where both the speaker
and
> (one or
> > >more) addressee(s) are meant) takes its grammatical "number"
from
> how many
> > >addressees are included, not from how many people are meant in
> total.
> > >So, yes, I think what you propose makes sense; it's a more-or-
less
> > >obvious-in-retrospect generalization of something which actually
> happens in
> > >natlangs.  (AFAIK, though, nobody ever thought of generalizing
it
> before,
> > >and your idea is something that doesn't happen in a natlang.
I'd
> be
> > >pleased if some other contributor could show examples that
> relieved my
> > >ignorance, if such it is, in this matter.)
> >
> > Good to know. I actually did mean primarily the 1st person cases;
> with eg.
> > the 2nd+3rd person pronoun, there would be no less than three
> distinct
> > "duals" of this form - one with two 2nd persons, one with two 3rd
> persons, &
> > one with two of both. This sounds needlessly complex to me, so
I'll
> probably
> > skip the dual on such cases. The one-of-each form will still be
> > grammatically a singular, tho.
> >
> >
> > >What do you mean by "4th person", exactly?
> > >
> > >Sometimes "4th person" means "obviative"; like, "the 3rd person
> who is
> > >further away, as opposed to the 3rd person who is closer."
> > >Sometimes "4th person" means "the latter", where "3rd person"
> means "the
> > >former".
> > >Sometimes "4th person" means "a 3rd person (in a subordinate
> clause) who
> > >was a participant in the superordinate main clause."
> > >And since I'm no expert, I'll bet there are others, because
AFAIK
> there
> > >could be.
> > >Which one do you mean?
> >
> > I explained this already in my first post on this topic, but the
> distinction
> > between my 3rd and 4th persons is such that a 3rd person is
present
> (can
> > hear what is being said), but a 4th person isn't. So probably
> closest to the
> > first of your choices.
> > Actually, I think it might be more obvious if I used the
> terms "2,5th" and
> > "3,5th": the 3rd person is used instead of the 2nd in one-way
> communication,
> > such as when addressing the reader in a book.
> > Say, does anyone know if there exists a system to classify all
the
> persons
> > more accurately?
> >
> > John Vertical
> >
> > _________________________________________________________________
> > Lataa ilmainen MSN Messenger http://messenger.msn.fi