Re: First report on Conm

En réponse à John Cowan <cowan@...>:

>
> Most of the words for "left" have, or have acquired, some negative
> sense:
> gauche, sinister (Latin), awkward (i.e., backhanded, as I explained in
> an
> earlier posting), etc.  In Russian, I am told, black-market dealings
> are
> "trading on the left".  Christophe would rightly say that this is more
> evidence of the persecution of sinistrals, so I'll say it for him.
>
Hehe, I actually wouldn't have said anything, because it spoke for itself ;)) .

On the subject of lateralisation terms taking negative connotation, I've read
somewhere that there is at least one culture on Earth which gives a *positive*
connotation to the left hand. The article argued that the people of this
culture consider the left positive and the right negative because the right
usually carries the sword, and is thus the death-giving hand, while the left
hand usually carries the shield, and is thus the life-protecting hand. This
stroke me as extremely sensible ;)))) . Anybody would know more on those people?

Christophe.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr

It takes a straight mind to create a twisted conlang.