T-shirt submissions

Hi!

I finally managed to make some translations just before the dead line. I still
can do two others for my languages O and Chasmäöcho, but I won't be able to send
them before tomorrow. I hope you don't mind Nicole. So here is the T-shirt
sentence translated in three of my languages:

MOTEN:

Ku|lefuj megedumun makneg: ku|ludun belneg!

|l is a single letter, marking the sound /l_j/.

pronunciation (SAMPA):
/kul_jefuj megedumun makneg kul_judun belneg/

interlinear:
LANGUAGE-def-gen.pl DEATH-def-acc.sg FIGHT: LANGUAGE-acc-sg CREATE!

word by word translation:
Fight the death of the languages: create a language!

glossary:
ku|lu: language,
megum: death, to die,
makneg: fight (litterally: make hits -from mak: hit and neg: make),
belneg: create (litterally: artistically make - from bel: art and neg: make).

This language uses lots of infixes. Here, the ones used are:
-e-: infixed definite article (noted def), used to mark definition,
-d-: accusative singular marker (noted acc.sg), marks direct singular objects,
-f-: genitive plural marker (noted gen.pl), marks plural noun complements.
Those infixes are placed in front of the last vowel of the noun, and provoke
various sound changes.

Here both verbs are in the imperative, so they appear as bare roots. Both verbs
I had to coin because they didn't exist previously in the lexicon, but I made
them by compounding already existing roots (what do you think of it? I very much
like the compound belneg: art-make for "create". It can be used for any
artistical activity).

The sentence "Invent a language" is simply "Ku|ludun belneg!"

REMAN:

Kombat i delecho i lengar : feng leng !

pronunciation (SAMPA):
/kom'bat ide'leSjo i'lENgar 'fENg 'lENg/

note: the /r/ is trilled.

interlinear:
FIGHT-imp THE DESTRUCTION THE LANGUAGE-gen.pl: IMAGINE-imp LANGUAGE!

word by word translation:
Fight the destruction of the languages: imagine a language!

glossary:
kombatri: to fight,
delecho: destruction (from deleri: to destroy),
leng: language,
fengri: to imagine.

This is obviously a Romance language as you can see. It has only one definite
article ("i": the) and no indefinite article. The verbs kombatri and fengri
appear in the imperative (noted imp), which is simply the infinitive without the
ending 'ri'. "Lengar" is the genitive plural (noted gen.pl) form of the noun
leng: language, tongue (which means both tongue: the organ, and tongue:
language). Fengri means normally "to imagine", but it's often used with the
stronger meaning "to create", especially in art.

I only had to coin a word for "language" (shame on me, I forgot that word on the
lexicon of Reman), all others I already had.

The sentence 'Invent a language' is simply "Feng leng!"

MY YET-UNNAMED ROMANCE CONLANG:

I'm sorry it currently has no name. It used to be called Roumant, but I didn't
really like this name (not original at all for a Romance language). I'll try to
find a good name as soon as possible :). But here's the sentence:

Bat-te contre a mouert das lingues : bastie-ti une lingue.

pronunciation:
/'bat@ kO~tr a 'mwEr da 'lE~g bas'titi yn 'lE~g/

The /r/ is trilled and the ~ marks nasalisation of the preceeding vowel.

interlinear:
FIGHT-imp-YOURSELF AGAINST THE-fem DEATH OF-THE-fem.pl LANGUAGE-pl:
BUILD-imp-YOURSELF A LANGUAGE.

word by word translation:
Fight against the death of the languages: build your language.

glossary:
battîre-se contre: to fight (pronominal verb, it has to be used with the
preposition contre: against),
mouert: death (feminine noun),
lingue: tongue (feminine noun),
bastîre: to build.

It is a Romance language (possibly a langue d'oc). "a" is the feminine definite
article. "as" is its plural form which conflates with the preposition "de" to
form "das": of-the. "une" is the feminine indefinite article. The -s is the
general form of the plural for nouns, but it's generally not pronounced (except
in case of liaison). Both verbs appear here in pronominal (reflexive) form, with
the 2nd person singular reflexive pronoun after them (because they are in the
imperative). Yet the pronoun used with battîre-se is the direct object pronoun,
while with bastîre it's the indirect object pronoun. It's because the first verb
is pronominal per se (i.e. it MUST be used with a reflexive pronoun), while the
second is not pronominal per se, and the pronoun here means simply "for
yourself". Just like in French, it's quite normal in this language to use a
reflexive construction instead of a possessive adjective to mark the possession
of the object of a verb by the subject of this verb.

This conlang is quite a new project (in fact an old project I took back nearly
from scratch), so I had to coin all words for this sentence.

Of course, the simple sentence "Invent a language" is "Bastie-ti une lingue."

Wow! It's done. Ask if you don't understand my explanations. I'm quite in a
hurry so they may be a little short.

Christophe.