Re: CHAT: query: where to start?

dirk elzinga wrote:

> Absolutely. That in mind, don't forget to look at Native America for
> other interesting examples of non-concatenative morphology, especially
> the languages of California (Miwok and Yokuts in particular). There
> are some very interesting patterns which don't look Semitic at all,
> but which play with the stem shape in similar ways.
>
> Tepa, my own project, emulates these languages to a certain extent.
> For example, a predicate word in perfective aspect must have a
> syllabic sequence of light-heavy at its right edge while a predicate
> in imperfective aspect must have a sequence of heavy-light at its
> right edge:
>
>         |pite| 'see'
>         /wapitee/ 'I saw'      /wipte/ 'I see'
>         /kupitee/ 'you saw'    /kipte/ 'you see'
>         /pitee/ 'he saw'       /ipte/ 'he sees'
>         etc.
>
> There are other kinds of modifications made for number and
> transitivity which involve processes such as gemination, infixation,
> and reduplication; person and modality are shown by affixation and
> cliticization, respectively.
Speaking of non-concatenative morphology, I've recently begun toying with a new
scheme for marking certain cases in Tokana.  Currently, the dative case is marked
by adding "-i" (/j/) to words ending in a vowel and "-e" to words ending in a
consonant:

  Absolutive   Dative

  tomla        tomlai [tomlaj]    "mountain"
  uosu         uosoi [wosoj]      "pebble"
  esian        esiane [ESjanE]    "name"
  totsat       totsate [totsatE]  "table"

Now I'm thinking of changing things so that the dative is always marked by an
"-i" glide, which gets added to the end of a vowel-final stem, and before the
final consonant of a consonant-final stem (infixation):

  Absolutive   Dative

  tomla        tomlai [tomlaj]    "mountain"
  uosu         uosoi [wosoj]      "pebble"
  esian        esiain [ESjajn]    "name"
  totsat       totsait [totsajt]  "table"

Not sure if I'll go with that or not, though...

Matt.