Re: Conlang-to-body-shape connections

--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Christophe Grandsire
<christophe.grandsire@F...> wrote:

> An example is the
> sentence "he kicked the woman and ran away". In English, it means
obviously
> that a man kicked a woman, and then ran away. The unexpressed subject of
the
> intransitive verb is taken to be the subject of the transitive verb. The
> language is thus syntactically accusative, since it maps subjects of
> intransitive verbs with *subjects* of intransitive verbs. But there are
> languages where this same sentence (once translated :)) ) would mean: he
kicked
> the woman, and *the woman* ran away. In that case, the unexpressed subject
of
> the intransitive verb is taken to be the *object* of the transitive verb
(David
> Bell's Amman-Iar does exactly that).
Wow, this is scary.  One of the first sample sentences I wrote for Oro Mpaa
was |Ttou tovea mbao iop.| [to'duvia bau'jup] {man kick dog run} "The man
kicks
the dog, who in turn runs."

Object promotion like this only happens in a serial clause as above.  If it
were
split into two clauses: |Ttou tovea mbao, iop.|, the *subject* of the first
clause
would be inherited by the second one: "The man kicks the dog, and runs."

So the syntax seems to include both accusative and ergative aspects.  The
total lack of declination, even in pronouns, doesn't help the decision.



> So how does Oro Mpaa behave in that respect?
Judge for yourself:  http://www.cinga.ch/langmaking/orompaa.html
(Warning:  Amateur linguist at work.  Expect misused expressions and
incomplete descriptions.  View at your own risk.)


--  Christian Thalmann

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