Re: Group Conlang (was: Re: a Conlang, created by the group?)

On Sun, 11 Oct 1998 23:14:04 -0500, Carlos Thompson
<cthompso@...> wrote:

>muwivo afraro pesi muqaunul dikjakul
>: The red dog bit me hard
>
>mufrari yskjaki diqaunul
>: The dog's bite was hard
I had the impression that "qaun" was "hard, strong" as in "rigid, stiff,
solid, firm, durable" rather than "powerful, forceful" (the adjective =
usage
of "hard", as opposed to the adverb usage). This is a good case for using
examples to clarify the meaning when the definition may be ambiguous.

I think I can accept the interchangeability of noun and verb roots if we
can come up with a good scheme for relating the meanings of the various
forms consistently. I don't want to end up with Esperanto where you have =
to
memorize that you "marteli" [hammer] with a "martelo" rather than a
"martelilo", or English where "bite" can be either the act of biting or =
the
impression left by the teeth.

"Bite" might work well as an action root, with the result of the action
expressed by adding a derivational affix. But other words, such as
"photograph", may be more convenient as concrete nouns, with "the act of
taking a photograph" expressed by derivation. In English, both "bite" and
"photograph" can be used interchangeably as nouns or verbs, but the
relation between the noun and verb meanings is incompatible.