Re: LONG: Latest Wenetaic Stuff

Paul Bennett wrote:
>
>         So there can be a long schwa? Is there a natlang precedent?
> <<<<<<
>
> Sinhalese has a long schwa.  In Sinhala, schwa exists as an allophone of <a> in
> all kinds of situations, most of which can be intuited as something to do with
> stress, but which have been analysed in far greater depth (I forget the
> reference).  It makes learning the spoken language occasionally inconvenient.
> Sinhala has romanised <a> and <aa>, which generally realise as /@/ and
> /{script-a}/, but not always.  The phones /@:/ and /{script-a}:/ are possible.
>
        Kinda strange, but I maybe have a conlang precedent in my own conlangs
now that I think of it! Too bad that my grammar of Astou is in France,
but I think it has a long schwa too.

> >>>>>>
> [snip]
> > 2. Pre-stop aspirated consonants are realised as fricatives near
> > their original POA, ie {ethke} -> [eTke]
> > The actual fricatives they become are:
> >   {ph} -> [f]
> >   {th} -> [T]
> >   {kh} -> [C](SAMPA) the sound in German "ich"
> >
>
>         Personnally I'd better see {ph}->[P] (unvoiced bilabial fricative),
> {th}->[T] and {kh}->[x] (invoiced velar fricative) to keep the PoAs of
> the original phonemes (and it's more common to represent [P] by {ph} and
> [x] by {kh} then the sounds you proposed).
> <<<<<<
>
> Nik said something like that.  I'd tend to agree, except those phones are what I
> instinctively produced when I was trying different readings of my examples.  I
> may or may not comply.
>
        Maybe it's due to a property of aspiration in Wenetaic that would
"centralise" the aspirated stop, so that {kh} is a little palatal (that
would explain its realisation [C]) and {ph} a little retracted, so that
its fricative form would be labiodental instead of dental. {th} would be
more or less in the middle in this process, so its fricative form stays
in the same PoA. I like the explaination, it has a nat-linguistic
flavour :) . What do you think of that?

> >>>>>>
> > These rules apply (in that order) when going from {...} to [...], ie
> > {ethnge} -> [eTge]
> >
>
>         So you can have clusters of different voicing? interesting...
> <<<<<<
>
> There are precedents, and I had a good reason for doing it.  I just don't recall
> exactly what at the moment.  It's an artlang, and therefore as long as it's
> pronounceable, I don't see why any culture wouldn't come up with it.
>
        I know that there are precedents, but I've always been told that they
tend to be very unstable (and how many people complained about the {kv}
of Esperanto!).

> >
> >          NS   NP      VI      VC       LX
> > Minimal  so   sosu    sorsu   sorosu   so(ru)
> > Reduced  ame  arme    amre    amare    ame(r)
> > Regular  taki tatki   takti   takati   taki
> > Extended moru motru   mortu   morotu   moru(t)
> >
> > NS - Noun Singular
> > NP - Noun Plural
> > VI - Verb Instant (or complete)
> > VC - Verb Continous
> > LX - The way the root is presented in the lexicon.
> >
>
>         Oh! I see now what you mean. Is there examples of roots used in a
> different way for related concepts, that's to say, for example 'so(ru)'
> and 'soru' having related meaning? That could make 4 roots per
> conceptual root.
> <<<<<<
>
> I haven't made enough Lexicon.  The trouble with doing as you suggest is that
> 'so(ru)' and 'soru' would only be distinguishable as nouns, the verbal forms
> would be the same.  I'm not sure I like this.
>
        When you have a verb, you can come with various nouns, corresponding to
the concept described, the agent, the experiencer if existant, the act
itself, etc... So it's perfectly possible to have various nouns
corresponding to the same verb.

> >
> > E.g., moru.p is "a corpse", moru.k is "a death", moru.t.s'e.k is "his
> > death", mortu.k is the infinitive "to die", and morotu.s is "you are
> > dying".
> >
>
>         So what is 'moru.m'? "my death"? Is it possible to do that?
> <<<<<<
> Kinda.  "my death" would be "moru.m.s'e.k" (an abstract verb belonging to me),
> "morum" would be used if the first person was dead.  Odd, but technically
> possible within both the language and its metaphysics.
>
        Wow! I wonder what metaphysics :) .

>
> >>>>>>
> > Examples of Attributives:
> > (ap) makhetap - (it is) big
> > (ap) makhetap Yonutrek - (it is) as big as John
> > (ap) makhetap Yonutorek - (it is) bigger than John
> > (ap) makhekrep - (it is) the biggest of its kind
> > (ap) makheprep - (it is) about average size compared to an anaphoric set
> > (ap) makheporep - (it is) the biggest of an anaphoric set
> >
> > /* "Ar makhertar Yonutcerorek" could be used as a very personal compliment,
> > though one that would probably cause mixed emotions <GGG> */
> >
>
>         Well, this is even more difficult to understand than my intensive and
> absolute in Chasma"o"cho, so I think I missed the joke... :(
> <<<<<<
>
> It translates literally as "It's bigger than John's (one)."
>
        <GGG> I got it :)

> >>>>>>
> > >Essive /*provisional term, the first term from Trask that I used*/
> > taa - Essive
> >
> > Wenetaic is essentially zero-copula; <taa> is used to make some forms
> > that take copula in other languages and that aren't marked in any
> > other way in Wenetaic.  In the translation of the English <being tired,
> > he slept> (meaning <he slept because he was tired>), <being tired>
> > is formed using the essive, and could be translated back to english as
> > <the tired (one) slept>.  The essive marks forms sometimes translated
> > by verbal nouns and nominal verbs, or by adjective/adverbial
> > constructions.  The essive is also used to form group nouns from plural
> > nouns, for example <mamnu.r> (the men) vs <mamnu.taa.r> (men in general).
> >
>
>         I like it. Is it a kind of suffixed "to be" kind of "verb"?
> <<<<<<
>
> Kinda.  Ish.  The example Trask give is that in "as a boy, I used to read a
> lot", <as a boy> is the Essive of <boy>.  I guess I've extended the usage a bit,
> but tried to do it fairly intuitively and consistently.
>
        It is. After all, "as a boy" can be seen as "when I was a boy", so the
connection with a kind of "to be" is there.

> >>>>>>
> > >Tense
> > ngkk - past tense
> > ngoo - future tense
> >
> > When combined with positionals, the following specific meanings result:
> >  angkk, angoo - as in English "recent past", "near future".
> >  ongkk, ongoo - as in English "ancient past", "distant future".
> >  kngkk, kngoo - "mythical" past, "prophetic" future
> >  ungkk, ungoo - "obvious", "well known" past and future
> >  engkk, engoo - something like "IMHO", or "IIRC"
> >  ingkk, ingoo - yet to be fully deciphered, often used when describing
> > enemy propoganda and non-orthodox religious beliefs
> >
> > Tenses can be compounded infinitely, each tense mark being taken as
> > reletive to its antecedent.  For example <takti.m.yi.t.k.ngkk.t.a.ngoo.t>
> > {VI.{G1.ACC}.{G3.OBS.PAST}.{G3.NEAR.FUT}.G3} means literally "in the near
> > future of the mythical past, he touches me", but translates as "in the
> > mythical past, he was about to touch me".
> >
>
>         I like this feature, even if it can be very confusing.
> <<<<<<
> To me, it feels like the most logical, beautiful and consistent way to notate
> time.  Compounded tenses kick ass! <G>
>
        I agree, but even if they are logical, they are just as difficult to
handle as multiple compound tenses. But I like them anyway :) .

>
>         What do you know about the people who speak Wenetaic by the way?
> <<<<<<
>
> Their latest incarnation is as Hunter/Gatherers sharing pre-IE north-western
> europe with two of my other concultures.  The Wewnetaar have indeed moved all
> over conspace and contime in my attempt to find them a suitable homeland, so I
> suppose it wouldn't take much more than a cognitive "leap of faith" on my part
> to put their history into their conhistory.  Hmmm....
>
        That could indeed make a people of time-travellers, like kinds of
nomadic time-travellers. Instead of going from place to place, they
would go from time to time. Strange nomads...

> >>>>>>
> > >Location /*long and complex history, basically inspired by hearing about a
> > similar feature in some North American natlangs*/
> > yi  - directional (roughly equivalent to Dative Case)
> > ru  - locational (roughly equivalent to Accusative Case)
> >
> > These combine with Positionals in obvious ways, except for -e- and -i-, about
> > which more research is required.  Available informants (and attested texts)
> show
> > these forms to be very rare, and give a large range of inconsistent meanings
> to
> > them.
> >
>
>         I'd like to know more about them, as soon as you can decipher something
> from them :)
> <<<<<<
>
> Well, I'll throw it to the floor for open discussion:
>
> What could the forms -iyi-, -eyi-, -iru- and -eru- possibly mean?
>
        I understand the difficulty. -iyi- and -iru- could correspond to
unexistent places and directions, to mean that you don't believe in the
existence of something by putting it in a non-existent place or
direction. A kind of euphemism maybe. -eyi- and -eru- would be the
opposite, an euphemism to show that you believe in the existence of
something. Could be used to make presentation of an opinion more
polite...

> I think I may need more cases in this "subset".  Cases meaning "in", "on", and
> other postpositions would really help.
>
        There, using simply nouns with one of the genitives (like in Japanese)
would be enough I think.

>
>         Wow! Those three things promise a great many shadings possible. It
> promises very hot religious and philisophical debates when someone makes
> a mistake in them... :)
> <<<<<<
>
> Thanks to the "<a> elision" rule, 90% of colloquial usage only distinguishes
> <(a)khu> from <(a)thu> and <awe"> from <{absence of we"}>.  All these markers
> (like all the others) are completely optional.  Philosophical discourse is a
> popular activity among teens and adults, and (equivalently) riddle-telling is
> very popular among teens and pre-teens.
>
        Why not having a kind of oratory exercise where they would be
mandatory? That could be a kind of exercise like making poetry for us,
and very good in a people where philosophical discourse is popular (like
Antique Roma).

--
        Christophe Grandsire

        Philips Research Laboratories --  Building WB 145
        Prof. Holstlaan 4
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        The Netherlands

        Phone:  +31-40-27-45006
        E-mail: grandsir@natlab.research.philips.com