Re: SURVEY: Idiomatic Expressions In Your ConLang Or ConCulture

Hi all,

I wrote:
> I expect it will take some long and ingenious thinking to
> produce anything comparable to this variety in any of my
> conlangs.
This would seem to be the only part of my post that
Tom HC did NOT read! :-)  That's your answer, Tom:
I have created nothing irregular or unpredictable in
any of my (three, to date) conlangs, although Far
Strine may have inherited a few from Strine (*), just
as Strine itself may have inherited 'Strewth!' from
BritEnglish.

On 'Strewth!' - there's no way this speaker-of-
Strine-as-L1 (me) could have predicted the meaning
of 'Strewth!' - in particular, that it is a contraction
in which the 'S' stands, as unlikely as it may seem,
for the whole word 'Godz'.  Why?  Because it is sui
generis - one of a kind - a unique construction in
Strine.  WE do NOT say 'Zounds!', even if our British
forebears of the 16th or 17th Century may have.
(Nor do we call anyone a 'toss-pot', as they did;
we are much less subtle, calling them instead a 'piss-
pot' ... .)  So on the grounds of the 'computational
linguist's definition', I'd say that since it is imposs-
ible for even a native speaker to predict the meaning
of any grammatical construction with only one
member, 'Strewth!' is indeed an idiom in Strine.

I'm not clear on why so few readers were clear on
the idiom quoted as 'I'm not clear on ...'.  Perhaps
it came from reading too fast!  The 'translation'
into 'It isn't clear to me why ... ' is, of course, a
metaphor.  I'm unsure whether a computational
linguist would consider metaphors to be idioms, since
the allegorical use of terms that don't strictly apply
to the objects of discussion is a technique common
to most natlangs (I don't say it's universal), and one
which supplies the means for much generalisation
and transfer of meaning.

I'm sorry that my examples from English did not seem
to Ray and others to be germane.  I listed them in
order to show the variety of strange expressions that
are an everyday part of serious discourse in a given
language (the one I know best), hoping to encourage
conlangers to boldly weave buttongrass bridles for
butterflies - or their analogues in their conworlds.
Any natlang has some weird ways with words ...

----

(*) 'Strine' comes from the title of a book by, IIRC,
'Nino Culotta' (John O'Grady), 'Let's Talk Strine',
popular here in Australia in the early sixties, in which
O'Grady's fictional narrator Nino, a 'Noo Orstrylian',
related his difficulties learning our transparent lingo.
If you haven't read it, see if you can find a copy -
recommended for all fans of language 'as she is spoke'.

Regards,
Yahya

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