Theiling Online    Sitemap    Conlang Mailing List HQ   

Re: Animacy in active languages (was Re: Non-static verbs?)

From:J Matthew Pearson <pearson@...>
Date:Friday, August 18, 2000, 21:59
Steg Belsky wrote:

> Hmm...a few years ago my brother and a friend invented > "second-and-a-half" pronouns - how you refer to someone who's standing > right there while you're talking to someone else. Does anyone have a > conlang that makes use of those? > > Theirs were: > > RE [ri:] = second-and-a-half person singular. > DRAY (or DRÉ) [drej] = second-and-a-half person plural. > > There were two others to complete the set of object and subject pronouns, > but my brother doesn't remember what they are and whether DRAY is object > or subject. RE is for sure subject.
I love it! I would imagine the objective form of "re" would be either "rim" or "rer" (I vote for "rim" because it sounds nicer), while the objective form of "dray" would be--what else?--"drem".
> He says that he came up with the form RE based on the "pronoun" RU, from > the famous dragqueen Ru'Paul. RU was what it was decided to use to refer > to Ru'Paul, who is really a he, but RUS ([ru:z], like "his") persona as > RU portrays RUSELF in media is decidedly female. So the form of the > (gender-nonspecific) second-and-a-half person singular pronoun was > inspired by the "ru" pronoun.
Ru go, girl! :-) Matt.