There are 11 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1a. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
From: And Rosta
1b. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
From: R A Brown
1c. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
From: Jyri Lehtinen
1d. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
From: Jörg Rhiemeier
2a. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
From: Sam Stutter
2b. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
From: Zach Wellstood
2c. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
From: Ph. D.
2d. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
From: Daniel Prohaska
2e. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
From: George Corley
2f. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
From: Nina-Kristine Johnson
3a. Re: New language in OZ
From: Daniel Prohaska
Messages
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1a. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
Posted by: "And Rosta" and.ro...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 1:02 am ((PDT))
Padraic Brown, On 19/06/2013 14:55:
> "From Latin to Romance in Sound Charts" by Peter Boyd-Bowman. I think it is
> more or less this particular work that is ultimately the prototype of all the
> GMPs used by various GMP using conlangers.
> Most of the older grammars (Wright, especially) contain this sort of
> information (for example, sound changes that occur
> between Primitive Germanic and Gothic), but it's often densely packed and a
> bit tedious to sort out. B-B takes away all
> the grammar and all the historical information and leaves you with a number
> of "rules" and examples of their application
> across the Romance speaking world (though I don't think he makes use of
> Romanian). Frankly, I'd like to see just this
> kind of book for Germanic.
Disappointingly, _From Latin to Romance_ includes only the national
Romance lgs, excluding Romanian, so I'd have thought it would be of
pretty limited use for serious Romance-based conlanging of the sort
that strives to model alternative reality plausibly related to ours.
=-And.
Messages in this topic (10)
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1b. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
Posted by: "R A Brown" r...@carolandray.plus.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 1:36 am ((PDT))
On 19/06/2013 09:36, Arnt Richard Johansen wrote:
[snip]
>
> When conlangers describe fictional diachronic languages,
> this set of rules is called a Grand Master Plan, and is
> sometimes specified to such a precision that it exists
> as a machine-readable file that can be used by a sound
> change applier.
Indeed - and natlangs don't change by such mechanical
precision ;)
All sorts other things operate as well such as analogy (i.e.
ironing out grammatical irregularities that change change
alone would produce), borrowings into the standard language
from non-standard dialects, borrowings from other languages
etc. also different sound changes do not all happen at once
as some GMPs seem to suggest.
> In my textbooks I sometimes saw examples of one or two
> sound change rules, but I have never seen a set of sound
> change rules between a proto-language and a daughter
> language, say Latin and French, that was claimed to be
> reasonably complete.
Oh yes, such things do exist. Pages 29 through to 108 in my
1953 edition of Alfred Ewert's "The French Languages" deals
with the sound changes that have taken place in the journey
from Vulgar Latin to modern French, with some very useful
charts.
> So, my question is this: are there any examples of
> scholars in historical linguistics having collected a
> complete set of sound change rules from some pair of
> language and proto-language?
Yes - see above.
> Do they use computerized tools to test those rule sets?
Obviously Mr Ewert did not ;)
But i guess linguists nowadays would make use of computers.
> If so, what do they call their equivalent of the sound
> change applier, and what do they call their Grand Master
> Plans?
Diachronic phonology, presumably. What linguists are doing
is trying to unravel the often complicated development of
the language. Languages do not develop according to some
preordained GMP.
==============================================================
On 20/06/2013 09:02, And Rosta wrote:
> Padraic Brown, On 19/06/2013 14:55:
>> "From Latin to Romance in Sound Charts" by Peter
>> Boyd-Bowman. I think it is more or less this particular
>> work that is ultimately the prototype of all the GMPs
>> used by various GMP using conlangers.
Is that so? It won't be mine ;)
>> B-B takes away all the grammar and all the historical
>> information and leaves you with a number of "rules"
>> and examples of their application across the Romance
>> speaking world
Is that so? Then IMHO this is of very limited value. The
grammar and the historical information IMO is essential for
a proper understanding of how a language has developed. The
grammar often explains the "exceptions.'
>> though I don't think he makes use of Romanian).
Then the title is surely misleading.
[snip]
> Disappointingly, _From Latin to Romance_ includes only
> the national Romance lgs, excluding Romanian,
...and some of the more interesting Romance languages IME
are the non-national ones.
> so I'd have thought it would be of pretty limited use
> for serious Romance-based conlanging of the sort that
> strives to model alternative reality plausibly related to
> ours.
On this, I am in complete agreement with And.
--
Ray
==================================
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
"language
began with half-musical unanalysed expressions
for individual beings and events."
[Otto Jespersen, Progress in Language, 1895]
Messages in this topic (10)
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1c. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
Posted by: "Jyri Lehtinen" lehtinen.j...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 4:41 am ((PDT))
>
> All sorts other things operate as well such as analogy (i.e.
> ironing out grammatical irregularities that change change
> alone would produce), borrowings into the standard language
> from non-standard dialects, borrowings from other languages
> etc. also different sound changes do not all happen at once
> as some GMPs seem to suggest.
>
I fully agree that it's important to remember all of these sources of
irregularity if you are heading at maximal naturalness for your language.
It's of course much easier to mess things up if you are not following a set
of deterministic rules, but I'd say that a large part of the fun is exactly
in that challenge.
If you find a good dialectological study of a language, you'll find that
none of the distinctive features (sound changes, words, uses of grammatical
elements) tend to coincide perfectly. Each new feature happened as an
innovation at different geographical locations and at different periods of
time. There is no reason why the spreading patterns of different
innovations have had to follow each other and often you find features that
have spread over old and well established dialect boundaries. The spreading
also takes time and you might be able to track this for example from the
environments in which a given sound change has been active in a given
dialect.
It's also a very good point that no sound change happens instantaneously in
any dialect. Frequently used words might have different patterns for
adapting to the change than very rarely used ones, such as archaic or
technical words. During this period you observe only a partial sound
change. I can give two such examples from my own speech,both of which are
very common in the form of Finnish spoken around the grater Helsinki area.
One is whether the reflex of the weak grade of /t/ is /d/ as in the
standard language of loss as in the eastern dialect area and the other is
whether the standard language /ts/ gets replaced by /t:/ which is typical
to many western dialects. For commonly used words I tend to use exclusively
the dialectal variants unless I aim for a hyper corrected register to put
someone off. Uncommon words haven't implemented this spread of dialectal
features and get the reflexes of the standard language. There is however a
middle ground between the two extremes where I'm never certain which reflex
to choose and the choice depends sensitively from the register of the
discourse. These examples are somewhat complicated by the fact that both of
the standard language reflexes are in fact historic spelling
pronunciations, but that's beside the point. I'm pretty certain that you
can find similar partial sound changes from your own idiolects as well.
For older stages in the development of a language the complex variations
tend to simplify and the development is easier to catch with a linear set
of change rules. But this is only because the vast majority of historic
dialects has disappeared and left us with a lack of data. You still get
irregular development paths and now, due to the missing data, they appear
to us as true irregularities.
I have seen a couple of sources give a proper list of sound changes between
two stages of a language. The best one has to be in Sammallahti's "The
Saami Languages: An Introduction" which lists the changes from Proto
Finno-Saamic to modern North Saami and gives a couple of reconstructed
examples of each change as well as a paragraph of discussion after most of
the stages. Even that is not a mechanic list as it also has to give
examples of real irregular developments. Most of the works I've read
discussing sound changes of a language have only had descriptions of the
changes inserted into the bulk text with some examples included.
-Jyri
Messages in this topic (10)
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1d. Re: Equivalent to Grand Master Plans in Proper Linguistics?
Posted by: "Jörg Rhiemeier" joerg_rhieme...@web.de
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 6:51 am ((PDT))
Hallo conlangers!
On Thursday 20 June 2013 10:36:32 R A Brown wrote:
> On 19/06/2013 09:36, Arnt Richard Johansen wrote:
> [snip]
>
> > When conlangers describe fictional diachronic languages,
> >
> > this set of rules is called a Grand Master Plan, and is
> > sometimes specified to such a precision that it exists
> >
> > as a machine-readable file that can be used by a sound
> > change applier.
>
> Indeed - and natlangs don't change by such mechanical
> precision ;)
>
> All sorts other things operate as well such as analogy (i.e.
> ironing out grammatical irregularities that change change
> alone would produce), borrowings into the standard language
> from non-standard dialects, borrowings from other languages
> etc. also different sound changes do not all happen at once
> as some GMPs seem to suggest.
Yes. These are the main reasons why I don't use sound change
appliers. Working out how the words evolve in a diachronic
conlang is a creative task, even if you have a sound change
list at hand, and that is something computers just cannot do.
Sound change appliers just churn out bogolangs!
I *do* have sound change lists (I prefer not to call them
"grand master plans", though) for my Hesperic conlangs, but
I prefer going through those sound changes manually, and when
the result doesn't make sense, I fix it creatively.
Historical linguistics has advanced *a long way* beyond the
Neogrammatical paradigm. Irregularities are smoothed out by
analogy; words are borrowed back and forth between dialects;
homophonies and other awkwardnesses falling out from the
regular sound changes are fixed; etc. Considering all this
stuff is what distinguishes the good and creative diachronic
conlanger from the novice who just feeds words into an SCA.
> > In my textbooks I sometimes saw examples of one or two
> > sound change rules, but I have never seen a set of sound
> >
> > change rules between a proto-language and a daughter
> >
> > language, say Latin and French, that was claimed to be
> > reasonably complete.
>
> Oh yes, such things do exist. Pages 29 through to 108 in my
> 1953 edition of Alfred Ewert's "The French Languages" deals
> with the sound changes that have taken place in the journey
> from Vulgar Latin to modern French, with some very useful
> charts.
>
> > So, my question is this: are there any examples of
> > scholars in historical linguistics having collected a
> > complete set of sound change rules from some pair of
> > language and proto-language?
>
> Yes - see above.
Sure. Several examples have been mentioned in this thread.
Of course, there are plenty of sound changes where you just
cannot know which went first as they do not feed, bleed,
counterfeed or counterbleed each other. Hence, you only get
a "partially ordered set" and a kind of "flow chart" rather
than a linear list, as in Ringe's (indeed highly recommendable)
book which David mentioned.
> > Do they use computerized tools to test those rule sets?
>
> Obviously Mr Ewert did not ;)
>
> But i guess linguists nowadays would make use of computers.
Perhaps some even use SCAs to test whether the sound change
lists they have worked out give correct results ;)
> > If so, what do they call their equivalent of the sound
> > change applier, and what do they call their Grand Master
> >
> > Plans?
>
> Diachronic phonology, presumably. What linguists are doing
> is trying to unravel the often complicated development of
> the language. Languages do not develop according to some
> preordained GMP.
Indeed not! Hence, "Grand Master Plan" is a rather inappropriate
term for something that in reality is an _a posteriori_ summary
of an *undirected* development. Of course, when you build a
diachronic conlang, you *can* direct the development, and the
term "Grand Master Plan" becomes somewhat less inappropriate ;)
--
... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
"Bêsel asa Éam, a Éam atha cvanthal a cvanth atha Éamal." - SiM 1:1
Messages in this topic (10)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
2a. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
Posted by: "Sam Stutter" samjj...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 1:31 am ((PDT))
Seeing as so many of us say "remote", rather than "clicker" or whatever, I
suspect it might be a generational thing, rather than something regional, with
perhaps a few outliers. I also tend to use "remote".
However, due to completely forgetting what the word was the other day, I ended
up calling it "black button tube". But surely a more amusing area of research
is what we call the television itself? Currently I've settled on "peeper-box"
and "jellyvision" :)
Sam Stutter
samjj...@gmail.com
"No e na'l cu barri"
On 20 Jun 2013, at 06:35, MorphemeAddict <lytl...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I call it a remote, but my father-in-law calls it a clicker, which I didn't
> understand for a while.
>
> stevo
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 3:16 PM, Jim T <clanrubyl...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>> I found this interesting because at work, the TV remote was stolen. I was
>> last to see it, so I had to cross the river (Fraser) to get the replacement.
>>
>> A facebook acquaintance recently posted this in her status and I though
>> the list might enjoy the debate as our own uses of English vary widely.
>>
>> Clicker, remote, switcher, chanel changer, chanel hopper, channel
>> flipper.... WHAT DO YOU CALL THE DAMN THING?
>>
>> ObConlang, do any of your conlangs have a word for this?
>>
>> Mine don't because their world doesn't have the TV, or the remote.
>>
>> Jim
>>
Messages in this topic (14)
________________________________________________________________________
2b. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
Posted by: "Zach Wellstood" zwellst...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 2:27 am ((PDT))
Remote and clicker are interchangeable for me and I use them pretty
frequently without thinking about it. My dad (he's 62, if it is a
generational thing) says "channel changer" which is odd to me. Now that I
think of it, he has quite a lot of vocab like this that I find odd.
On Jun 20, 2013 4:31 PM, "Sam Stutter" <samjj...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Seeing as so many of us say "remote", rather than "clicker" or whatever, I
> suspect it might be a generational thing, rather than something regional,
> with perhaps a few outliers. I also tend to use "remote".
>
> However, due to completely forgetting what the word was the other day, I
> ended up calling it "black button tube". But surely a more amusing area of
> research is what we call the television itself? Currently I've settled on
> "peeper-box" and "jellyvision" :)
>
>
> Sam Stutter
> samjj...@gmail.com
> "No e na'l cu barri"
>
>
>
>
> On 20 Jun 2013, at 06:35, MorphemeAddict <lytl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I call it a remote, but my father-in-law calls it a clicker, which I
> didn't
> > understand for a while.
> >
> > stevo
> >
> >
> > On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 3:16 PM, Jim T <clanrubyl...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Hi all,
> >> I found this interesting because at work, the TV remote was stolen. I
> was
> >> last to see it, so I had to cross the river (Fraser) to get the
> replacement.
> >>
> >> A facebook acquaintance recently posted this in her status and I though
> >> the list might enjoy the debate as our own uses of English vary widely.
> >>
> >> Clicker, remote, switcher, chanel changer, chanel hopper, channel
> >> flipper.... WHAT DO YOU CALL THE DAMN THING?
> >>
> >> ObConlang, do any of your conlangs have a word for this?
> >>
> >> Mine don't because their world doesn't have the TV, or the remote.
> >>
> >> Jim
> >>
>
Messages in this topic (14)
________________________________________________________________________
2c. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
Posted by: "Ph. D." p...@phillipdriscoll.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 4:35 am ((PDT))
MorphemeAddict wrote:
> I call it a remote, but my father-in-law calls it a clicker, which I didn't
> understand for a while.
>
> stevo
My girlfriend's family is from Croatia. They've always called it a
"zig-zig."
--Ph. D.
Messages in this topic (14)
________________________________________________________________________
2d. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
Posted by: "Daniel Prohaska" dan...@ryan-prohaska.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 6:15 am ((PDT))
In German the Star Wars generation often uses the term "Die Macht" - "The
Force" which I quite like. In our home it was always "Quitscherl" - "Squeakie",
because the remote on our old TV squeaked when you pressed a button.
Dan
On Jun 19, 2013, at 9:24 PM, Mechthild Czapp wrote:
> In German, Fernbedienung (literally: usage from a distance) is pretty common.
> Do Rejistanis need remotes for their few analogue terrestrial channels? If
> yes, anteni'het jenti (literally: distant switch) seems like it should be the
> best term. If only because anteni (switch) is such a nice false friend here :)
>
> Am 19.06.2013 um 20:16 schrieb Jim T <clanrubyl...@yahoo.com>:
>
>> Hi all,
>> I found this interesting because at work, the TV remote was stolen. I was
>> last to see it, so I had to cross the river (Fraser) to get the replacement.
>>
>> A facebook acquaintance recently posted this in her status and I though the
>> list might enjoy the debate as our own uses of English vary widely.
>>
>> Clicker, remote, switcher, chanel changer, chanel hopper, channel
>> flipper.... WHAT DO YOU CALL THE DAMN THING?
>>
>> ObConlang, do any of your conlangs have a word for this?
>>
>> Mine don't because their world doesn't have the TV, or the remote.
>>
>> Jim
Messages in this topic (14)
________________________________________________________________________
2e. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
Posted by: "George Corley" gacor...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 7:18 am ((PDT))
On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 5:45 PM, C. Brickner <tepeyach...@embarqmail.com>wrote:
> I call it the remote. I live in VA.
>
> Sefdaanian culture is pre-technology, so they wouldnt know about remote
> controls.
>
Hmm ... maybe more specific. Pre-technology, to me, could mean that they
don't use any tools whatsoever (unlikely, since even some of the brighter
non-human animals use tools in the real world).
Messages in this topic (14)
________________________________________________________________________
2f. Re: What do you call the damn thing!
Posted by: "Nina-Kristine Johnson" ninakristi...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 7:21 am ((PDT))
Hiya!
My dad used to call it a 'snapper'. Has anyone else heard/called it that?
Or is my dad the only odd ball?
Drove mum mad once when I called it that. Accidentally, of course. I
usually say 'remote'. As does mum, my fiance, even (IIRC) stepdad, who was
born and raised in Sheffield.
This topic reminds me more of an amusing anecdote about my granddad. When
the Chalupa first came out at Taco Bell (we're talking '99 or 2000). He
wanted to try one, but he had difficulty hearing (lost it from being an
airline pilot). He got to the drive through and tried to order it. Couldn't
o
Pronounce it and the kid on the other end couldn't understand. He finally
was like 'The dog thing!'. Referring to the Chihuaha that advertised it.
'What's that damn thing called?!' Indeed! *chuckle*
Cheers!,
Kristine
On 20 Jun 2013 01:31, "Sam Stutter" <samjj...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Seeing as so many of us say "remote", rather than "clicker" or whatever, I
> suspect it might be a generational thing, rather than something regional,
> with perhaps a few outliers. I also tend to use "remote".
>
> However, due to completely forgetting what the word was the other day, I
> ended up calling it "black button tube". But surely a more amusing area of
> research is what we call the television itself? Currently I've settled on
> "peeper-box" and "jellyvision" :)
>
>
> Sam Stutter
> samjj...@gmail.com
> "No e na'l cu barri"
>
>
>
>
> On 20 Jun 2013, at 06:35, MorphemeAddict <lytl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I call it a remote, but my father-in-law calls it a clicker, which I
> didn't
> > understand for a while.
> >
> > stevo
> >
> >
> > On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 3:16 PM, Jim T <clanrubyl...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Hi all,
> >> I found this interesting because at work, the TV remote was stolen. I
> was
> >> last to see it, so I had to cross the river (Fraser) to get the
> replacement.
> >>
> >> A facebook acquaintance recently posted this in her status and I though
> >> the list might enjoy the debate as our own uses of English vary widely.
> >>
> >> Clicker, remote, switcher, chanel changer, chanel hopper, channel
> >> flipper.... WHAT DO YOU CALL THE DAMN THING?
> >>
> >> ObConlang, do any of your conlangs have a word for this?
> >>
> >> Mine don't because their world doesn't have the TV, or the remote.
> >>
> >> Jim
> >>
>
Messages in this topic (14)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
3a. Re: New language in OZ
Posted by: "Daniel Prohaska" dan...@ryan-prohaska.com
Date: Thu Jun 20, 2013 6:05 am ((PDT))
Cool stuff, thanks for this!!
Dan
On Jun 19, 2013, at 6:24 PM, Paul Schleitwiler, FCM wrote:
> New 'Mixed' Language Discovered in Northern Australia
> http://www.livescience.com/37501-australia-language-discovery.html
>
> Provides idea re how your conlangs might "meet and greet" each other.
> God bless you always, all ways,
> Paul
Messages in this topic (2)
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