Re: "Language Creation" in your conlang

At 08:50 PM 11/12/03 -0800, you wrote:
>Well, I hope I don't distract everybody from the wonderful off-topic
>discussions of corpses and Dutch, but I've got a conlangy request to make
>of everyone.
Well, since I'm the main offender, having started the corpses thread, it
would probably befit me to contribute something actually on-topic to the
list for once.

We got really lucky here.  Índumom Tovlaugadóis (more easily pronounced and
typed by its Trehelish name - Cwendaso) has fewer than 150 roots and
derivational morphemes (and that's after I added 11 yesterday and today,
and many of these items are derived forms.)  There isn't much material to
work with, but it just happens to be the *right* material.

There are two verbs for 'make.'  There is búkhu 'to build, make, or
construct out of separate pieces.'  There is also préida 'to make (not out
of separate pieces.'  Préida is more like 'create,' but búkhu is definitely
'to construct.'  Add a nominalizing suffix, -m, to get the nouns 'creation'
or construction,' respectively préidam and búkhum.

The verb 'to speak' is índumo and adding the nominalizing suffix gives us
índumom 'speech, a speech, or language.'  (The Tovláugad are an oral
culture, so they think of language purely in terms of speaking and hearing
it.)

There is a suffix -óis, which makes a noun into a possessive adjective.  So
we have indumomóis 'of language'.

Word order is fairly free, but the default is Noun Adjective.

préidam indumomóis  'language creation'
búkhum indumomóis  'language construction'

I think that you will want to use búkhum indumomóis, because that would
definitely mean 'language construction,' and conlanging is something that
the Tovláugad don't do, so I know that that particular phrase is not an
idiom already in use for something else, which I cannot guarantee for the
other phrase.  Remember that índumom can also mean 'a speech.'  Unlike
conlanging, giving speeches is something that the Tovláugad do frequently
and which is important in their society.  Good speeches don't just appear
the moment they are given; in many cases, they have to be composed ahead of
time.  I expect that the process of composing a speech ahead of time might
well be called préidam indumomóis, and 'to compose a speech' is something
that I can't say yet, because I don't have the necessary accusative suffix
to stick onto índumom :(   I could just adlib an accusative ending like I
adlibbed a verbal object marker this morning, but I think I'd rather do the
case endings and the verbal agreement markers in a more orderly fashion.

I suppose that préida would also be the verb used when you are composing a
poem or a piece of music, so I can enter the additional meaning of
'compose' into the wordlist.

So, in Índumom Tovlaugadóis (a language which practically doesn't exist and
whose speakers definitely don't conlang), 'language construction' is
<búkhum indumomóis>.

Isidora

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