Re: draqa syntax - help please?

On Tue, 26 Sep 2000, H. S. Teoh wrote:

> Well, it's certainly possible to redefined "fww't3" as "be seen by", but
> what about "lyy's", where the "subject" is in the conveyant case? Sure,
> let's redefine that one too. But when 80% (i.e., 4/5) of the language's
> verbs give "quirky case" to their subjects and objects, then something
> isn't right with the theory! :-P
Absolutely!  I would never have seriously suggested that you try to do
this.  I was just noting that it would be possible.

> Well, I *did* set out to make my conlang unique, though I'm a bit
> disappointed that I can't really draw that much from current linguistic
> theory when developing it, since it defies categorization.
Categorizations are competely artificial, and they rely on a great deal of
idealization.  That's why we can say active languages are semantically
based, even though when you look at the fine details, they aren't.  Same
is true of accusative languages -- You can have "subjects" that are in the
dative or instrumental cases; heck - some languages like German allow
some objects to be genitive.

 I *am*
> surprised that there is no natlang precedent... this system isn't exactly
> "weird" or anything; I'd have expected some culture, somewhere, to have
> adopted a similar system.
Well, there are probably theoretical reasons for that.

> As to whether I want it to be "natural", the conlang *is* intended for
> human or at least human-like beings. I also made it a point that whenever
> I add something to the lang, I have to be able to assimilate it myself --
> it cannot be so strange or different that even I can't grasp it.
That would make it tough for you to learn your own language. :-)

 If indeed
> Chomsky is right, then my conlang must be "possible" under the universal
> grammar (since I myself can assimilate it), so it *should* be analysable
> by linguistic theory.
That's a misrepresentation of what Chomsky says.  Certainly we can under
understand and fluently use computer programming languages, but Chomsky
would be among the first to say they aren't permissible human languages.

Marcus