Re: Mixed person plurals: gender & the (in/ex)clusive distinction; !Ora

Hello, Rodlox, and thanks for writing.

Some of this reply should probably go to the list,
but most of it should probably just go to you as an individual.
Nevertheless, I'm sending all of it to the list.

Thanks for reading the thread, and contributing a comment,
by the way.

--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Rodlox R <rodlox@H...> wrote:
> >From: tomhchappell <tomhchappell@Y...>
> >Reply-To: Constructed Languages List <CONLANG@l...>
> >To: CONLANG@l...
> >Subject: Re: Mixed person plurals: gender & the (in/ex)clusive
distinction;
> >!Ora
> >Date: Wed, 10 Aug 2005 20:11:55 -0000
> >
> >Hello, Remi. Thanks for writing.
> >
> >This is at least my second, probably my third, reading of your
post;
> >I think I missed some things the first (two) time(s) that deserve
> >talking about.
> >
> >--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Remi Villatel <maxilys@T...> wrote:
> > > tomhchappell wrote:
>
>
> > > > In order to be an Addressee, and entity must either be
Rational,
> >OR:
> > > > it must be Sentient and at least Bound-Animate.
> > >
> > > Absolutely not. A lot of people talk to their computer, insult
> >pieces of
> > > furniture which they bumped into, make lectures to their pets,
and
> >so
> > > on. If you have never done any of the above, you're a rare
> >animal.  ;-)
>
> >"Talking to furniture" doesn't really count here; I don't know
> >exactly what you call that, but it's a kind of minor-sentence
> >figure-of-speech in which the speaker is being illogical,
> >and not using the language for a purpose in which
> >the notion of "addressee" makes any sense.
>
> um, in Chinese, there's the verb _majie_ (to curse the street),
since one
> doesn't want to take their anger out on those close to one's-self,
they go
> outside and _majie_.
Hey, that's great!  Thanks.

>
> source: _They Have A Word For It: a Lighthearted Lexicon of
Untranslatable
> Words & Phrases_ by Howard Rheingold.
Thanks for the source.  I hope to look it up as soon as my Google
window gets back from looking up
"Explaining Subjecthood" by Yehuda Falk, which was recommended by
Tom Wier.

>
>
> >If the pet animal, or baby in some non-human species, or the
> >computer, happened to be capable of non-translational automotion
> >(locomotion?) but not of translational (auto/loco)motion, it would
be
> >BoundAnimate.
>
> 'translational'?
"translation" == "movement from one place to another place".
"running-in-place" is a non-translational motion;
"running to the bank" is a translational motion;
"running around in circles like a chicken with its head cut off"
is, technically, translational motion, but it somehow misses the
point of why one would wish to move translatively rather than non-
translatively.

If you look at all the "lative" cases, you will see that all of them
have to do with motion from or to a location or spatial relationship.
ablative == motion from
allative == motion to
elative == motion above
illative == motion into
sublative == motion under or beneath
translative == motion across.

One of the oldest, and formerly the most common, meanings of "to
translate (something)" was "to move (something) across (space)".
This is still the favorite meaning in analytic geometry and other
mathematical disciplines, especially geometric and analytic ones.  It
is also the most popular meaning in physics.

By metaphor, if languages are places, then moving something across
the language-barrier is translating it.

The Latin term sounds a good deal more effortful.  One transduces it,
that is, drags it across, or draws it across, the language barrier.

This leads to a Latin pun that the transducer is always a traducer;
that is, that every translator is a traitor.

>
>
> > > In another society which supports a form of slavery, the bound
> >animate
> > > gender could be the gender of the slaves and of the animals. In
a
> > > technological society, the bound animate gender could aswell be
the
> >one
> > > used to talk to computers and other artificial life-forms.
> >
> >Ancient Romans had "walking tools" and "talking tools".
> >"Walking tools" were slaves;
> >"talking tools" were domesticated animals, livestock.
> >
> >Had they been speaking my conlang rather than Latin they would have
> >put slaves in the Rational Free-Animate (Sentient) Living gender
>
> why?
>
> you don't want to give those slaves ideas.
Well, to be grammatically accurate, when speaking of them, rather
than to them, that is the gender one would use.  Remember, that,
using a particular gender in speech, does not commit one to the label
that a particular grammatist has given that gender.  Using the "Free"-
Animate gender about a slave will not drop any hints that anyone
involved in the conversation is thinking of the slave's "freedom".
It could very well be that nobody within earshot has ever met, or
ever will meet, a grammatist.

>
>
> >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,
>
>   that linguist has a thing against mimes, I'd hazard a guess.
I don't know.  Many people do, so it could be a safe bet.

I am sure, though, that he was particularly distinguishing babies as
human but not rational.

>
>
> > > A non-Rational isn't supposed to hear nor think about whether
it is
> >the
> > > addressee or not. Otherwise, it's very Rational-like.
> >
> >A trained dog or trained horse, or a speech-recognizing programmed
> >computer, may be able to recognize commands -- not /new/
utterances,
> >but still, utterances in a language.  If I have my Labrador
> >Retriever, my Newfoundland, my horse (ha! I can't afford a horse!),
> >and my daughter all out at the same time, and I say to one of
> >them "Come by!", how are they to sort out which one I mean?  (Of
> >course, a bystander could tell this way; if one of the animals
comes
> >up, I was addressing that animal; if nothing happens except that I
> >start looking frustrated, I was addressing my daughter.)
>
> would the bystander care?
Under certain occasional circumstances, maybe sometimes.
The vet or trainer for our kennel or livery stable might care.
My wife would surely care about my daughter ignoring me.
A linguist interested in the language or the pragmatics of the
situation might care.
Mostly, though, most bystanders usually wouldn't care;
but, if they did, they could tell.

>
> would the assembled care whether or not hte bystander understood?
I can't imagine why other bystanders would.  I don't think the
participants would care unless the bystander tried to get involved.

>
>
> > > Will the person next to you close the (real) window?
> > >
> > > It's very unlikely. There are no utterance without a context.
> >
> >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?"
>
> I thought you said that you don't use the "rational/sentient"
genders in a
> sentance when you're talking to the individual.
Nonono (as Henrik would say); the gendered 2nd person is needed so
that Non-Rational overhearers will not "think" themselves to be
addressees.

Admittedly, if everyone in earshot is Rational, they can disambiguate
which of them is the Addressee by the usual pragmatic affordances.

But, in this scenario, there is specifically a Non-Rational computer
which can overhear the request and may misinterpret it as being
addressed to the computer rather than to the room-mate.

Use of the gendered 2nd person helps Non-Rational Hearers disambiguate
whether they are "Hearers of the Word only", or are expected to
be "Doers of the Word" as well (that is,
whether they are not the Addressee, or are).

>
>
>
> > > You don't send letters to non-Rational things to let them move
> >around.
> >
> >People in my conculture speaking my conlang might, or might
> >not, "send letters" to non-Rationals.  Such letters would have to
> >contain only a choice of formulaic "utterances" from a (possibly
> >large) pre-set list.  "Sending a letter" to a non-Rational would
> >depend on the non-Rational being able to "read" it.
>
> if its non-Rational, why would they expect it to respond?
>
> or is it like writing letters to Santa?
In real life one commands or otherwise addresses Non-Rationals
verbally for various reasons; to command it to do something, to
praise it, to get its attention so that one can provide for it, etc.

In a science-fiction setting one might wish to command (or otherwise
address?) a Non-Rational when one is not going to be present at the
time when or in the place where the Non-Rational receives the command.
Programming a computer could be considered such a thing.
A communicator might leave a scent-mark or some such thing that he or
she expects a Non-Rational entity to decode as a command, and then
obey.  This obedience would be all the response one could expect from
a Non-Rational addressee.

You are right, in general. Regardless of the medium of communication,
one big difference between addressing a Rational and addressing a Non-
Rational, is that you can expect the Rational to answer back, and you
can expect the Non-Rational to never answer (unless, for instance, it
has a recorded message which it cannot, itself, understand).

>
>
> >I think many of your caveats or quibbles, or whatever word should
be
> >used, have to do with your conlang understanding the Rational
gender
> >differently from my conlang understanding either the Rational, or
the
> >Sentient, or the Animate (either Bound or Free degree) genders).
>
> it would help if you gave us a tasting of that particular aspect of
your
> conlang.
You are clearly right, and I'm sorry I can't oblige.  I wish I could.
I will try to do so "soon", whatever "soon" means.

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