Hi, Remi, and thanks for writing back.
--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Remi Villatel <maxilys@T...> wrote:
> tomhchappell wrote:
> > [snip]
>
> [snip]
>
> In an environment with various alien species and different level of
> intelligence for the artificial life forms, what you wrote
> takes all its meaning.
>
The comment below is the kind of comment I was asking to get from you.
> However, I maintain what I wrote: Such a complicate system can only
> disappear. Not totally but partially through simplification.
Well, in a sense, every feature of every language is vulnerable to
diachronic simplification and erosion; most distinctions are "doomed"
to disappear, unless something happens to "save" them.
But it can take centuries or millenia.
Consider the Niger-Kordofanian and Bantu languages with their 20+
noun-class systems.
Then, there are classifier-word languages, some of which have even
more noun-classes than the Bantu languages, and some of which require
verbs to agree with these.
It seems that in extant human languages, at least, the maximum number
of "genders" is just under 30, if it needn't be marked on the noun,
or just over 20, if it must be marked on the noun.
And these systems have been on-going for at least 800 years.
> [snip]
>
> Or more simply, imagine two species which don't met often,
> during such meeting they realize they don't use the same genders
> to speak of similar things, so they start using only the
> most essential genders to make themselves clear.
It seems something like that happened when Danes met Anglo-Saxons in
Medieval England. I'm not sure how big a role "gender" played in it,
but Middle English was a lot simpler than Old English partly because
certain distinctions, like dual number, were indicated differently in
these otherwise very similar Germanic languages.
At the same time, complexity was introduced. If I understood it, and
recall correctly, our current verb "to be" is made up out of pieces
of two Anglo-Saxon verbs (a "be" verb and a "wax" verb) and a Danish
verb ("are" and "am").
(WARNING: next paragraph contains over-the-top generalizations to
which the author does not entirely subscribe.)
Any process which regularizes also introduces irregularity.
Any process which simplifies also introduces new complexity.
Hegel's "every thesis contains its own antithesis" couldn't ask for
better illustrations than language change.
> [snip]
> Well, this is only a theory
Yeah, but I liked it.
> since a multi-species environment is
> something we haven't encountered yet.
>
> [---CUT---]
>
> > A pet or a baby is a Sentient Animate Non-Rational entity.
>
> Ouch! Some mothers may skin you alive if you don't treat their baby
as
> if it were an entire person, i.e. with the genders that apply to a
full
> adult.
> Only English allows you to (linguistically) treat a baby as if it
> were an animal.
I disagree with the "only English" part.
Surely there are many languages that don't make it easy to speak of
babies' similarities to animals rather than to adult humans; but they
don't consist of "all languages but English".
Anyway, that linguist who introduced the term wasn't thinking of
English when he did so; it was some other language that made that
spot on the Animacy Hierarchy between Human and Animate.
However, according to Corbett, you are right in thinking that most
languages do not need any such space. He decided not to use
the "rational" separation as part of his cross-linguistic, universal
Animacy Hierarchy; he decided that only a few languages had more than
a passing use for a category of Humans who would outrank Non-Human
Animates, but be outranked by Talking Humans.
(The "kin to me" or "kin to one of us" or "belonging to our tribe"
distinction, however, Corbett felt is useful enough cross-
linguistically to be included in the Hierarchy above "Humans in
general".)
BTW I wish I could think of the professional linguist who first
published the "Rational" distinction. I'm sure it's in one of
Corbett's books, either "Number" or "Gender". But I don't have those
books. Can someone who does, look up the reference?
> [snip]
> [---CUT---]
> > "Rational" as first used by the first publishing professional
> > linguist to insert it into the Animacy Hierarchy was to
distinguish
> > humans who could talk (Rational Humans) from humans who could not
> > talk (Non-Rational Humans, still higher in the Hierarchy than Non-
> > Human Animates). My use of the term is inspired by that use; but
the
> > concept, for which I appropriated the term, is inspired by the
> > Antique Roman notion of "talking tool".
>
> My Rational/Irrational gender comes from this list, well, only the
name.
> When I create the pronouns I wanted to separate the persons from
the
> objects, or in other words, to have the "it" we don't have in
French.
> Since I didn't have to worry about the male/female distinction for
the
> Shaqueans, I created the Personal/Objective gender. I just decided
to
> find a better name the first time I wrote "Personal personal
pronoun". <g>
>
I think I sympathize.
> [---CUT---]
> I already have a gender that applies to dual and plural 3rd
pronouns.
> It's high time to apply it to the 2nd pronouns.
Hope I helped.
>
> Be the way, please, don't make me laugh with the "Universals". When
it
> comes to alien languages, these Universals are just a checklist of
what
> to violate.
That makes them very useful in conlanging.
> [---CUT---]
> > Imagine this; I have a voice-input-capable computer. In it I
have
> > a "Window" open. I want the window from the room to the outside
to
> > be closed. I say to my room-mate, "Would you-RATIONAL-
FREEANIMATE
> > please close the window?" My room-mate knows it's her I'm
speaking
> > to because of all the pragmatic contextual devices you mention
> > below. My computer knows I am not speaking to it because of the
form
> > of 2nd person pronouon I used.
>
> In this case, with voice-recognition, things get very different but
your
> post didn't mention the level of technology in your conculture.
Now, I'm
> thinking about inserting a gender to my 2nd personal pronouns. With
that
> many artificial life forms cluttering the shaquean space, that may
be
> handy. Your example is very convincing.
I'm glad I helped, if I did.
I hadn't thought about "a lot of A.L.F.s in Shaquiean space".
I guess I need to re-read what you've written about it.
>
> I'm about to remove the plural from Shaquelingua, gendered 2nd
pronouns
> could fill the gap... or add a new bump!
>
> [---CUT---]
Thanks for writing, Remi.
I look forward to hearing from you again.
I hope someone else also reads this, and answers the questions
neither of us could answer.
Tom H.C. in MI