Re: Non-static verbs?

On Thu, 17 Aug 2000, Yoon Ha Lee wrote:

> My version messed with this somewhat: if you said "rain put the fire out"
> (for example--I did some morpheme-generation for a few hours today, and
> then burned out!--so the words don't actually exist yet), most Qenaren
> (fictitious country) speakers of Chevraqis would mark either "rain" as
> voluntary and "fire" as involuntary, or both as voluntary.  Reason: it's
> a throwback to the mostly-animistic religious views that prevail in the
> area.  An Avren (neighboring fictitious country) would probably mark both
> as involuntary.
>
> I don't know if this is allowable,
Seems rather similar in concept to the Algonkian gender system. Each noun
is either animate or inanimate with the basis coming from their mythology.
Basically, things with power are animate - that include people, animals,
man-made things that run on their own (like steamships and cars, as
opposed to sailboats and carriages), some trees, some fruits, etc.
Everything that does not "have power" is inanimate -- rocks, some trees,
some fruits, clothing, etc.  There are interesting cases that cannot be
predicted, like (IIRC) strawberries are animate, but blackberries are
inanimate.

The marking on the verb is sensitive to the gender of the noun it refers
to.  There are two parallel sets of all agreement morphemes, one for the
animate, the other for the inanimate.

Marcus