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Re: word derivation in sabyuka (some principles)

From:Roger Mills <romilly@...>
Date:Sunday, July 14, 2002, 21:37
Julien Eychenne wrote:
(except 'r' because *sr is an illegal cluster which turns to 'sl'
>(just because I can't pronounce it !!!)).
Others have questioned this; no need for me to do so. True, lots of languages don't allow _sr_. My favorite natlang, however, does (Leti, eastern Indonesia) osri 'chase', pasra 'hit'; even one initial, srani 'Christian (a loan)'; all these result from vowel deletion.
>* from illegal *urru, that I can't pronounce :).
Interestingly, the sequence **/-lVr#/ > /-rnV#/ in Leti, but /-rrV#/ in closely related Kisar (*telur(u) > L. ternu, K. kerra)
>'yol' "to cry" > 'yekol' "to rain" >'teq' "to tell" > 'tekeq' "to sing" >'mat' "to see" > 'mekat' "to desire" >"dem" " to do" > 'dekem' "to build"
Nice. In the first three, one can see that -ek- might mean "a special sort of VERB"; perhaps a more precise gloss for mekat could be "to ogle"? or "to covet"? But dem/dekem looks more like a straightforward causative. Like Christophe and Nik, I'd be curious to know how productive the infix is.

Replies

Irina Rempt <irina@...>
julien eychenne <eychenne.j@...>