Re: restricted semantics language

li_sasxsek@NUTTER.NET wrote:
>> [mailto:CONLANG@listserv.brown.edu] On Behalf Of R A Brown
[snip]

>>>> What I'm attempting is something based on known universals.
>>>> Unfortunately I haven't
>>> found much on the subject
>> A guy called Joseph Scarisbrick attempted this in his auxlang
> called
>> Lips-Kith, which he published in 1912. His vocabulary is
> composed of
>> what of what he considered to be "universal" root words. He
> divided his
>> vocabularies up into what he called 'Mimetic Roots' and
>> 'Structural Roots'.
>
> I see no mention as to whether he researched any universals or
> not, but what he has is interestingly in line with other
> articles I've read.
A very good point. My own interest in Lips-Kith, which I came across at
the end of the 1950s, was partly because of Scarisbrick's claim to have
used "universal" roots. I too could find no evidence of any in depth
research (which does not necessarily mean there wasn't any).

My own feeling is that Scarisbrick knew Latin, Greek and Hebrew and
probably some other European languages and that his universals were
derived by intuition rather than systematic research. But I may be doing
the gentleman an injustice.

--
Ray
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fieri per pauciora.
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