Re: THEORY: Xpositions in Ypositional languages {X,Y}={pre,post}

In the last episode, (On Saturday 22 September 2007 15:36:25), Eldin Raigmore
wrote:
> ---In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Andreas Johansson <andjo@...> wrote:
> >Quoting Eldin Raigmore <eldin_raigmore@...>:
> >>(As near as I can tell nobody thinks there are suprapositions or
> >>transpositions.)
> >
> >A supraposition, I suppose, is a suprasegmental feature that serves
> >the function of  an adposition,
>
> Right, basically a "suprafixed adposition".
>
> >but what is a transposition?
>
> Some people sometimes refer to what happens in the Triconsonantal Root
> Systems of some Afro-Asiatic languages as "transfixes".  By parallel with
> prepositions, postpositions, inpositions, and circumpositions, I made up
> the terms "supraposition" and "transposition" to mean a "a suprafixed
> adposition" and "a transfixed adposition".
>
> >I was going to say I could easily imagine a supraposition, supposing
> >my supposition as to meaning be correct, coming into existence from
> >a postposition first becoming asyllabic and then turning into a
> >toneme - imagine a development like _aba su_ > _abas_ > _abà_ where
> >_aba_ is some noun and the grave is low tone - but then it struck me
> >if we discover such a beast in the wild, we would likely call it a
> >case-form, not an adpositional phrase, at least by the third stage.
>
> Dryer's paper says that many of the things he calls "adpositions" for
> purposes of this paper are sometimes called other things (e.g. "relators")
> by some other authors.  He goes on to say that adpositions and case-affixes
> are included in a somewhat larger class he calls "case markers".  So, yes,
> for purposes of this paper, I suppose a suprafixed case-marker would count
> as a supraposition (though nobody actually uses that term); a transfixed
> case-marker would count as a transposition (though aren't the Semitic
> triconsonantal roots mostly verb-roots? so natlangishly attested transfixes
> are mostly in conjugations rather than in declensions?); an infixed
> case-marker counts as an inposition; a circumfixed case-marker counts as a
> circumpositions; etc.
>
> >I guess I should go read the paper you linked to and find out
> >exactly why
> >
> >Dyer
>
> "Dryer", n'est-ce pas?
>
> >thinks the Tagalog inpositions are just that
>
> I've read it.  I'm not confident I've understood it, but I think I could if
> I tried hard enough long enough often enough.
>
> >and not case inflections.
>
> I think he might think some of them are inpositions _as_well_as_ case-
> inflections, rather than _instead_of_ case-inflections.
>
> >Perhaps the same distinction, if there be one, is applicable to
> >suprasegmentals ...
>
> I'd be interested in any natlang examples anyone comes up with.
>
> I'd also be interested if anyone feels like putting any of them in a
> conlang; or knows of a conlang where anyone has already done so.
>
> >Andreas
>
> Thanks for writing!
>
> -----
> eldin
You can go too far, of course. For example, suppose a language has nouns with
a "normal case" and a "construct case", where e.g. the normal case of "beit"
means "house" and the construct case "bet" means "house of" (yes, this is
inspired by Semitic). Would the lack of an "i" in the construct case qualify
as a "minus-" or "teleposition" (where "minus-" or "tele-" means "take away"?
I think not! And even if it were, how would it deal with cases
like "sefer/sifrei" (scroll - normal case/construct case), where the
difference is not the extraction of an "i" but the changing of the first "e"
to "i", of the disappearence of the second, and suffixing of "ei" (or if you
prefer, of the switching of "er" to "re" and the suffixing of "i")?

Jeff
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