Re: GROUPLANG: cases (was: noun and verb roots)

At 01:56 18/10/98 GMT, you wrote:
>On Sat, 17 Oct 1998 00:12:04 -0300, Pablo Flores
><fflores@...> wrote:
>
>>We are. I've seen this thing getting too logical too, but I think
>>it's necessary. When I make a conlang, I start by drawing a structure
>>that is completely symmetrical and quite logical. *Then* when I've
>>gained some perspective and I'm more at loose, I begin twisting
>>little things here and here, adding irregularities, using features
>>for functions they didn't originally had, etc.
>
>Hmm... That brings up an interesting question. How do other conlangers
>build their languages? I've always done it by starting with short phrases
>and building up from there. I figure out how a language says "bats fly" or
>"the cat saw the mouse" or "the moon is made of green cheese" before
>working up to more complex sentences. If I don't have quite the right noun
>case or verb aspect for what I want to express, I'll add, rearrange, or
>expand others to fit.
>
>
        I actually do exactly the opposite. My ideas are grammatical, so I
create the syntax (with some words to make examples), and when it's
finished, I recreate it from what I did to rearrange what, I think, doesn't
work (in fact I just improve it in order to find it "self-consistent", what
it is generally not after the first creation). That's why my languages often
lack a vocabulary.

                                                Christophe Grandsire
                                                |Sela Jemufan Atlinan C.G.

"R=E9sister ou servir"

homepage: http://www.bde.espci.fr/homepage/Christophe.Grandsire/index.html