Re: Volition in Anohim

--- Sally Caves <scaves@...> wrote:

> You know I can't leave this message alone! :)
> Volition is the meat and
> drink of the active Teonim.  I'm still making
> mistakes in it.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "bob thornton" <arcanesock@...>
>
>
> > The nature of volition in Anohim is very
> complicated.
>
> This sounds like a response to a question, Bob.  Did
> I miss a thread that
> was called something else and developed into a
> discussion of volitionality?
No, I just accost the list with Anohim occasionally.

> > Whether a motion is voluntary or involuntary is
> always
> > marked. Several verbs, mainly of transference are
> also
> > always marked. Kill is considered a motive verb.
>
> It is in Teonaht, too, but where the form of the
> word impedes (like lis
> (get) or den (tell), one can always tell from the
> article whether the
> subject is v or nv.  So Teonaht has a peculiar kind
> of active system, one
> that has a volitional S along with a volitional V.
> Many of the verbs are
> ambivolitional (where the meaning changes), whereas
> as some are always
> volitional, others always non-volitional.  So in
> some cases it is the
> subject that determines volitionality, and in other
> cases the verb.  But
> both S and V have to be marked in some way.
Question: What are S and V here?

>
> > Volition sometimes changes the meaning of the
> word.
> > Get/take and kill/die are two volition pairs.
>
> Lisned, bettairem in Teonaht:  get/take.  A subject
> with lis is the passive
> recipient of action, and lisned is often used to
> express what we call the
> "passive":  aid bikar(em) eton-li lis.  "The tree
> gets its chopping."  There
> is a different word for "receive" that is
> volitional, since one can refuse
> to receive something.
>
> However, I don't see kill/die as a volitional pair
> so much as a
> subject/recipient pair.  One can die at the hands of
> one who kills.  One can
> die in one's bed.  One can commit suicide.  I've
> also noted that idioms in
> language don't necessarily have to make sense to us
> in our first language.
> But it sort of feels like making get/give a
> volitional pair.  Do you see
> what I mean?  Get/take I understand.  In Teonaht,
> conceivably, one can kill
> by accident as in manslaughter.  It's an important
> legal verb.
Ah, yes. That makes sense. I hadn't thought of that.

>
> Here are some verbs that are always volitional:
>
> say, talk, do, give, make, go, come, allow, decide,
> attack, read, write,
> chase, conquer, promise, command,  doff, don,
> clothe, feed, cook, eat,
> drink, love, hate, prefer, holler, spit, pray,
> convict, berate, and a host
> of others.
>
> Here are some verbs that are always non-volitional:
>
> be, exist, be ignorant of, be absent, be present, be
> happy, sad, blue,
> fiery, stupid and a bunch of other stative verbs in
> T; get, sleep, fall
> asleep, wake up, sicken, vomit, bleed, die, dream,
> have (inalienable),
> beware, trip, fall down, etc.
>
> The ambivolitional verbs cover the senses, of
> course, and cognition:
>
> hear/listen to; see/watch or look at; smell/sniff;
> feel/touch or caress;
> taste/lick; know of/find out about; perceive/test
> etc.
>
> But the ambivolitional verbs, I find, as I write
> more and more in Teonaht,
> are a much bigger category than those verbs that are
> only one or the other:
>
> cry (in response to)/mourn;
> laugh (at a joke)/deride or make light of
> dislike/hate (to the point of malice)
> like/prefer
> stand (as a tree does)/stand up or take a stand
> lie (as a log does)/lie down, lie low
> follow (as a shadow does)/pursue
> live (breathe)/dwell
> breathe/draw breath
> bounce/rebound actively, return with renewed vigor
> die passively/commit suicide
> walk (as a clock or any machine part does)/walk
> somewhere
> stop/cease purposely
> sit (as a spoon does)/sit down
> rest (out of fatigue)/rest deliberately
> speed up (as a ball does rolling down a hill/hasten
> think (wandering thoughts)/contemplate
> be ignorant of/ignore
> believe (blindly)/believe something you've given
> thought to
> misspeak/lie
> make a mistake/be in wilful error
> defecate (shit one's pants)/defecate on will
> urinate (piss oneself)/urinate, relieve oneself
> etc.
>
>     Then:
> boil (as water does)/boil something in a pot
> freeze (as water does)/freeze something
> heat up (as anger does)/heat someone up
> drown (as a swimmer does)/immerse
> end (as a play does)/put an end to
>
>      (here we are getting into states and creating
> states, and these AV
> verbs are usually distinguished by
> intransitivity/transitivity.  There is
> also a suffix (-ma) that turns an adjective or a
> nonvolitional intransitive
> into a volitional transitive:
Hrrrm... I might just ste-... borrow this.

>
>     worry/make worried
>     anger/make angered
>     cool/make cold
>     bleed/make bleed
>     vomit/make vomit
>     sleep/put to sleep
>     put to sleep (because you are boring)/put to
> sleep (actively hypnotize)
> etc.
>
> > Voluntary actions are marked with a rising tone
> and
> > the prefix a- /?&/-
> >
> > Involuntary actions are marked with a falling tone
> and
> > the prefix i- /?I/-
>
> Do I detect a sense of hierarchy expressed by rising
> and falling tone?  The
> Teonim, little elitests and warriors that they are,
> definitely privilege the
> agents over the experiencers.  This attitude is
> challenged, though, in some
> contemplative practices where the experiencer is
> superior to the agent, the
> visionary superior to the false prophet.
Er, I don't have any sort of conculture yet, which has
caused many problems creating vocabulary.

>
> > The tone is marked on the root, not the prefixes.
> >
> > EX1:
> >
> > I died (recently) (involuntarily)
>
> Who's speaking??  Ghosts cannot use volitional verbs
> in Teonaht, nor can the
> Deity use non-volitional verbs, although the writers
> cheat by combining the
> non-volitional subject with a volitional verb.  This
> is necessary to
> maintain semantic coherence in story-telling and
> religious instruction.
It was just an example. I hadn't anything in
particular in mind except expressing volition.

-The Sock




		
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