Re: proposed conlang database & my classification

Garrettí Jonesí nathsakwish:
<I'm actually not clear on this group of terms. Could you give me a
rundown
on what all of isolation, inflection, derivation, and agglutination refer
to
exactly?>

Isolation: use of separate words to add meaning such as verb tenses.
Inflection: use of non-modular affixes to add meaning.
Agglutination: use of modular affixes to add meaning.
Derivation: making new words from roots or old words.

Inflection is shorter than agglutination but is also harder to learn. An
example of an inflecting language is Russian, whose genitive singular has
nothing in common (other than meaning) with the nominative singular or
the genitive plural.

Agglutination allows you to add affixes together. In my Fampónd, there
are tense conjugations that come in between the verb and the
person/number conjugations.

Isolation uses particles that are generally lumped in one lot depending
on what they modify. My Kuanaukuasi is largely isolating, and the verb
tense particles are after the verb, along with any other particles or
adverbs.

Very few are languages that conform to one and only one of these. Most
use affixes for plurals at the least.


The all-too-smug-for-his-abilities,
Chris Wright

The only thing that is more annoying to me—the only problem more
serious—than other people's ignorance is my own.

Replies