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There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Re: Devanagari handwriting?
From: Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2. Re: most looked-up words
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3. Re: The Need for Debate
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: "Elyse M. Grasso" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
5. Re: Devanagari handwriting?
From: Stephen Mulraney <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
6. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: Tristan Mc Leay <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
7. Re: Ladino verb paradigm question
From: Isaac Penzev <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
8. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
9. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: Tristan Mc Leay <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
10. the Tower of Babel in Kur, with glosses
From: azathoth500 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
11. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
12. Re: Preliminary Sketch
From: azathoth500 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
13. Re: most looked-up words
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
14. Icelandic phonology
From: Trebor Jung <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
15. vowels: are they necessary?
From: # 1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
16. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
17. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: Paul Bennett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
18. Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
19. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: "H. S. Teoh" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
20. Re: The Need for Debate
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
21. Re: most looked-up words
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
22. Re: Proto-Germanic
From: Estel Telcontar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
23. Towards a less Preliminary Sketch (was Re: Preliminary Sketch)
From: Paul Bennett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
24. Re: The Need for Debate
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
25. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Message: 1
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 21:35:34 +0100
From: Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Devanagari handwriting?
--- Steg Belsky <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> skrev:
> On Dec 7, 2004, at 9:36 PM, Steven Williams wrote:
> > Since learning the Devanagari abugida, I've been
> > curious as to how it's handwritten in everyday
> usage.
> > The script is _very_ difficult to write out as it
> is
> > printed, especially on account of the top bar. Do
> the
> > users of this alphabet just grin and bear it, or
> do
> > they have some form that they use in informal
> > day-to-day communication?
>
> I've seen a Bengali-speaker write in Bengali, which
> is closely related
> to Devanagari, and she always wrote the dangling
> parts of all the
> letters first, and then wrote the line across the
> top of the word at
> the end.
That's what I do, but my hand often slips and the top
line cuts the dangly parts of the character in half.
Perhaps I shouldn't use a ballpoint for writing
Devanagari :).
Another question: the reference guide I'm using says
that the entire sentence in Devanagari is written as
one word, and hence, the top line can extend all the
way across a page! Gah! Please say it ain't so! I
can't write a straight line all the way across a page
without making at least one detour!
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Message: 2
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 14:45:14 -0600
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
Ray wrote:
> On Tuesday, December 7, 2004, at 06:43 , Thomas R. Wier wrote:
> > > Also, ten points to anyone who can tell me what a 'kudo' is.
> >
> > _kudo_ [k_hudo/@u] is a backformation from _kudos_ [k_hudo/@uz](pl.),
>
> Ach!!
Don't blame me! I'm a classicist enough to use a classicizing
pronunciation.
> > which is itself a reanalysis of Greek _kudos_ [ku:dOs] 'glory',
>
> neuter singular. [ku:dOs] was Doric Greek, [ky:dOs] was Attic &
> Koine, and ['kiDOs] is Byzantine & modern.
That may be, but the British schoolboys probably learnt the word
from reading Homer. If so, then there's the question of whether
the vowel had fronted yet in Attic/Ionic. (Well, Homeric dialect
was a mix of many different dialects anyways.)
==========================================================================
Thomas Wier "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637
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Message: 3
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 20:55:23 +0000
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
John Cowan wrote:
>Steg Belsky scripsit:
>
>
>
>>York comes from Norse "Jorvik"? I thought it came from Latin
>>"Eboricum" or something like that...
>>
>>
>
>"Eboracum", yes, and before that from some Celtic name. But the Old English
>name was "Eoforwic", a case of folk etymology -- the meaningless Latin name
>was reinterpreted as "Wild-boar-town". If the name had descended unchanged,
>it would have come out Everwich.
>
Eaverwich, capital of Eaverishire. Pronounced [i:[EMAIL PROTECTED], obviously.
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Message: 4
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 16:12:39 -0500
From: "Elyse M. Grasso" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
I was born in Hartford (1954), spent my early childhood in Manchester to age
10. Moved to the Norwich/New London area through jr/sr high school, got my BA
at Wesleyan in Middletown and worked for a few years in Danbury.
Grinders were everywhere until the Subway shops started opening up. (I think
also in Rhode Island, where I got my first masters degree.)
A few of the older families in Montville (where the Mohegan Sun casino is)
tended to be non-rhotic, but that was rare and sounded strange when we first
moved there.
I don't think Manchester was non-rhotic, though it is east of East Hartford
and the river. On the other hand, my relatives are Italian and French
Canadian and our neighbors were also second and third generation immigrants.
Montville was largely a bedroom community for the Groton Submarine base and
the Electric Boat shipyard, so many of the kids had parents from elsewhere
and dialects tended to converge.
My 6th grade teacher was sort of non-rhotic (she was a daughter of one of the
oldest families in town). It may have been a class thing: her pronunciation
was more Bostonish than the Lathrops (farm family nearest our house) whose
older generation used a different non-rhotic dialect. (More Maine-ish to my
ears in those days, but probably just Old Connecticut rural, like my
great-uncle Les).
(I once joked that the traditional new England twang comes from peoples'
sinuses being clogged all winter in the days before central heat, and that
its disappearance coincides with the availability of central heat and
decongestants
On Tuesday 07 December 2004 03:29 pm, John Cowan wrote:
> Elyse M. Grasso scripsit:
>
> > "Grinders" were also the normal usage in Connecticut (rhotic), at least
> > through 1980.
>
> What part of it?
>
> The old boundary between non-rhotic east and rhotic west in New England
> used to be the Connecticut River, but it's been moving sporadically
> eastward for half a century. Some lexemes like "grinders" may have
> gotten left behind, or even spread westward.
>
> --
> "Kill Gorg�n! Kill orc-folk! John Cowan
> No other words please Wild Men. [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Drive away bad air and darkness http://www.reutershealth.com
> with bright iron!" --Gh�n-buri-Gh�n http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
>
--
Elyse Grasso
http://www.data-raptors.com Computers and Technology
http://www.astraltrading.com Divination and Science Fiction
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Message: 5
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 21:29:54 +0000
From: Stephen Mulraney <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Devanagari handwriting?
Steven Williams wrote:
> Since learning the Devanagari abugida, I've been
> curious as to how it's handwritten in everyday usage.
> The script is _very_ difficult to write out as it is
> printed, especially on account of the top bar. Do the
> users of this alphabet just grin and bear it, or do
> they have some form that they use in informal
> day-to-day communication?
I've seen examples online (somewhere) of Devanagari written on forms which
have dotted lines (where you fill in your details). I'm not quite sure why
someone was writing in Devanagari on a form written in Latin script, but rather
than writing the letters on top of the dotted lines, they wrote them hanging
from the dotted lines. Curious to see.
s.
--
To be sure, to be sure
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Message: 6
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 08:38:35 +1100
From: Tristan Mc Leay <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
Roger Mills wrote:
> Historically, even in the US, Greek immigrants are noted for the quantity,
>
>if not always the quality, of their restaurants.
>
>
Well, 'quality' isn't much of an issue with fish-and-chips shops :) (And
they're not restaurants either; almost exclusively take-away.)
>The thing about gyros is the nature of the meat: a mixture of beef and lamb
>made into a longish loaf thing (I don't know what holds it together,
>however); run through longitudinally with a spit and roasted vertically in
>(nowadays) an electric oven (it has a red-hot glowing coil like a heater or
>hot-plate; not the sort of equipment found in the average home kitchen,
>though I suppose you could do it over or next to an open fire, but someone
>would have to keep turning the spit).
>As the outside cooks, thin slices are removed vertically and put into a
>pita, along with chopped tomato, lettuce, yogurt and maybe cucumber.
>Delicious but messy. Does that description match your Australian "souvlaki"?
>
>
Yeah, basically.
...
>>Things involving skewers are kebabs, but kebabs can also be
>>souvlaki-like things except with Turkish bread rather than pita.
>>
>>
>
>Is there a difference between Turkish bread and pita? I thought pita (no
>doubt under local names) was common throughout the eastern Mediterranean.
>
>
Most definitely! Turkish bread has obviously risen, but not much; maybe
a centimetre or two thick, with lots of wholes. Pita bread though is
very flat and solid, apart from the fact that it's normally two layers.
One of the best things about Turkish restaurants apart from everything
else is the Turkish bread! You _must_ try some if you haven't already,
certainly one of the nicest kinds of bread in existence.
Whereas souvlaki is wrapped in pita bread, when making kebabs Turkish
bread is cut open like a roll and the stuff shoved inside it. If I
wanted to find more generic terms (to replace sandwich, which I can't
use as pita and Turkish bread aren't normal bread) to describe souvlaki
and kebabs, I would say 'wraps' and 'rolls' respectively.
...
>Tristan:
>
>
>>Aside from the fact that I wouldn't've thought of describing them as
>>sandwiches (sandwiches need normal bread to satisfy my definition)
>>
>>
>
>..irredeemably ethnocentric.....:-)))))))))
>
>
Well, I have an ethnicity of my own t'maintain, y'know!
>>I always assumed Subway was so called because it originated in or near a
>>subway (presumably in the American sense), and that 'sub' came from
>>this. Then when you came up with 'submarine sandwich' just now, it
>>looked like it was some sort of play on Subway's subs.
>>
>>
>
>No, it's Subway that doing the play...subs ~submarine sandwiches are way
>older. Come to think of it, maybe some folk-etymology going on here: a long
>subway car filled with different kinds of people =~ a long bread filled with
>goodies. Perhaps we don't think about (naval) submarines as much as we used
>to.
>
Hm, okay, well I've never heard them called submarine sandwiches ever
before, and the only people in Australia to call them anything like that
(Subs) that I can think of right now is Subway, and they do so in such a
way that I would expect it to be a trademark...
--
Tristan.
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Message: 7
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 23:42:47 +0200
From: Isaac Penzev <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Ladino verb paradigm question
Mike Ellis wrote:
> Table of contents is at:
>
> http://www.orbilat.com/Languages/Spanish-Ladino/Grammar/index.html
Ah, thank you, Mike, muyta s^ukran a ti. I've totally forgotten about this
wonderful Romanistic site! It grew bigger since my last visit!
-- Yitzik
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Message: 8
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 21:49:10 +0000
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
Tristan Mc Leay wrote:
>
>
>>> Things involving skewers are kebabs, but kebabs can also be
>>> souvlaki-like things except with Turkish bread rather than pita.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Is there a difference between Turkish bread and pita? I thought pita (no
>> doubt under local names) was common throughout the eastern
>> Mediterranean.
>>
>>
>
> Most definitely! Turkish bread has obviously risen, but not much; maybe
> a centimetre or two thick, with lots of wholes. Pita bread though is
> very flat and solid, apart from the fact that it's normally two layers.
> One of the best things about Turkish restaurants apart from everything
> else is the Turkish bread! You _must_ try some if you haven't already,
> certainly one of the nicest kinds of bread in existence.
Hmm. what you call a Pita bread, I'd call a Chapati, and what you'd
call Turkish bread, I'd call Pita bread.
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Message: 9
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 08:58:55 +1100
From: Tristan Mc Leay <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
On 8 Dec 2004, at 8.49 am, Joe wrote:
>> Most definitely! Turkish bread has obviously risen, but not much;
>> maybe
>> a centimetre or two thick, with lots of wholes. Pita bread though is
>> very flat and solid, apart from the fact that it's normally two
>> layers.
>> One of the best things about Turkish restaurants apart from everything
>> else is the Turkish bread! You _must_ try some if you haven't already,
>> certainly one of the nicest kinds of bread in existence.
>
>
> Hmm. what you call a Pita bread, I'd call a Chapati, and what you'd
> call Turkish bread, I'd call Pita bread.
Chapatis are Indian and different again...
--
Tristan.
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Message: 10
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 17:00:02 -0500
From: azathoth500 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: the Tower of Babel in Kur, with glosses
A couple things before you read this. First, since Kur romanization
uses multiple diacritics, and not everyone here can see unicode, an
accented vowel followed by ~ would have had the ~ under the accent.
And as for the diacritics themselves, a tilde indicates a nasalized
vowel, an acute accent the high tone, and a grave accent the low tone.
1. Ts�s gz�zi�t z�kz�t z�g�t k�~ z�k�t k�a�t.
2. B�zslupd slyz bokislyga z�kom, hizod gz�zid Zhin�r� pekuk slim, z�t
higabud ti.
3. Hiz�kd slum, "Sl�tz, h�z�ktz soktu, z�t h�z�z hz�~z� slu." Z�t
tets�sly �kt�t dz�dtes k�~ z�ti�t gaju�.
4. Z�t hikz�d, "Sl�tz, h�zsokz zem gebuk k�~ w�esak, hits�s w�it watan
sa, z�t h�zkug�ky zu, h�~ kuhokz�ty gz�zi�t z�kz�t zu.
5. Z�t hizusl�t H�zw�an, hizuh�t gebuk k�~ w�esak, hikusakd slyz�tu z�kes.
6. Z�t hizuz�k H�zw�an, "H�ty, tets�sly z�k�t g�t�t slim, ts�s slum
z�kz�t z�g�t. Z�t ts�s z��t �ktes sle. Z�t h�zts�s z�tu, h�kuz�~�td
slim, h�z�ktd slim.
7. Sl�tz, h�z�tz, z�t h�z�pz kz�tak sle dzu, z�t h�~ h�zg�kd kz�tak sle slim.
8. Z�t hizuhakz�t tiga gugpot gz�zi� slu H�zw�an, z�t hibz�td sokak geb�.
9. Z�t jets�s Babelan blathan sa, h�z� hizuz�p kz�tak gz�zi� k�a�, z�t
hizuhakz�t gugpot gz�zi� k�a� slu H�zw�an.
1. was land-DAT NOM-language NOM-one and word-NOM.PL same-NOM.PL
2. PERF-migrate-3rd.pl as east-ABL person-NOM.PL, AOR-find-3rd.pl
land-LOC Shinar-GEN.WEAK plain-ACC they, then AOR-settle-3rd.pl there.
3. AOR-say-3rd.pl them-DAT, "Come-1st.pl, FTR-make-1st.pl
brick-ACC.PL, then FTR-burn-1st.pl done them-ACC." Then were
brick-NOM.PL stone-GEN.WEAK and bitumen-NOM mortar-GEN.WEAK.
4. Then AOR-say-3rd.pl, "Come-1st.pl, FTR-build-1st us-DAT city-ACC
and tower-ACC, SUBJ-be-3rd sky-LOC top-NOM its, then
FTR-APL-know-indef us-ACC, not APL-scatter-indef land-LOC whole-LOC
us-ACC.
5. Then AOR-3rd-come ONGUR-NOM, SUBJ-3rd-see city-ACC and tower-ACC,
AOR-APL-build-3rd.pl children-NOM person-GEN.PL
6. Then AOR-3rd-say ONGUR-NOM, "See-indef, are-3rd person-NOM.WEAK.PL
one-NOM.PL they, is them-DAT language-NOM one-NOM. Then is
beginning-NOM doing-GEN.PL their. Then FTR-is all-NOM.PL,
FTR-plan-3rd.pl they, FTR-do-3rd.pl they.
7. Come-1st.pl, FTR-go-1st.pl, then FTR-confuse-1st.pl language-ACC
their these-NOM, then not FTR-know-3rd.pl language-ACC their they.
8. Then 3rd-scatter there-ABL surface-TRM earth-GEN them-ACC
ONGUR-NOM, then AOR-stop-3rd.pl building-ACC city-GEN.
9. Then STAT-is Babel-NOM.WEAK name-NOM its, because AOR-3rd-confuse
language-ACC land-GEN whole-GEN, then AOR-3rd-scatter surface-TRM
land-GEN whole-GEN them-ACC ONGUR-NOM.
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Message: 11
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 22:06:04 +0000
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
Tristan Mc Leay wrote:
> On 8 Dec 2004, at 8.49 am, Joe wrote:
>
>>> Most definitely! Turkish bread has obviously risen, but not much;
>>> maybe
>>> a centimetre or two thick, with lots of wholes. Pita bread though is
>>> very flat and solid, apart from the fact that it's normally two
>>> layers.
>>> One of the best things about Turkish restaurants apart from everything
>>> else is the Turkish bread! You _must_ try some if you haven't already,
>>> certainly one of the nicest kinds of bread in existence.
>>
>>
>>
>> Hmm. what you call a Pita bread, I'd call a Chapati, and what you'd
>> call Turkish bread, I'd call Pita bread.
>
>
> Chapatis are Indian and different again...
Yes, I suppose. Okay, my names:
A Pita Bread is about a centimetre risen, puffy, and generally white.
You get things stuffed in it, and you can't wrap anything with it.
Chapatis and Tortillas (Indian and Mexican, respectively - but they're
pretty much the same, I think) are used to wrap things
A Doner Kebab is a Pita bread stuffed with lamb, roasted on a spit.
Generally with vegetables and chili sauce, served with chips.
A Kebab (unqualified) can be either a Shish Kebab(skewer Kebab), or a
doner Kebab, depending on the context.
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Message: 12
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 17:17:24 -0500
From: azathoth500 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Preliminary Sketch
On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 11:12:57 -0800, H. S. Teoh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > tj /c_+C_+)/
> > ch /tS)/
>
> Whoa, this is a hard distinction for me to pronounce.
/c_+/ is basically just putting your tongue across the hard palate,
but with the tongue sticking further out. /C/ is the fricative
version. /c_+C_+)/ isn't all that hard.
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Message: 13
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 23:31:53 +0100
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
Hi!
> On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 00:22:36 -0000, And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> >http://www.merriam-webster.com/info/04words.htm
> >
> >lists the top 10 words most looked up in the online dictionary
> >(excluding hard-to-spell words like _accommodate_ and words
> >whose tabooness imparts a frisson to their looking up).
> >
> >1. blog
> >2. incumbent
> >3. electoral
> >4. insurgent
> >5. hurricane
> >6. cicada
> >7. peloton : noun (1951) : the main body of riders in a bicycle race
> >8. partisan
> >9. sovereignty
> >10. defenestration
Qthen|gai had none of these, but now it has two words for 'sovereignty':
a) The abstract concept of ruling by oneself/independently:
rule+self+abstraction = rqetat�uq� [EMAIL PROTECTED] ta_M tau)_R
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
b) The extension/region of ruling by oneself/independently:
Also 'dominion':
rule+self+extension = rqetat�uks�u [EMAIL PROTECTED] ta_M tau)_R
ksau)_H]
Wow, no clicks in these! :-)
The lexicon is always incomplete, methinks. Any of the above words is
the last word I would have thought of to include.
**Henrik
> >
> [snip]
> >
> >At any rate, I will wager that no conlang has words for all 10.
> >My conlang has no word for any of the 10. But one supersized
> >all-American kudo to the conlang with the words for the most
> >of the 10...
> >
> >--And.
>
> Without cheating, Xinkutlan has _dabulqudz_ /dabulqud'z/ (hurricane)
> from /dabu'l/ "storm" and /qud'zul/ "demon", and "tsizec" /tsIzeS/ (cicada).
>
> I've since worked on "sovereignty", and come up with
> _suepetetlui_ /swepetet'Kuj/ from _petetl_ "king" via _suepetetl_ "kingly,
> majestic".
>
> All the words for the mechanics of democracy (incumbent, electoral et al)
> do not exist in Bronze Age Xinkutlan. And the closest I can come
> to "peloton" (new word to me) is _aguir_ /a'gwir/ from _moiaguir_ (_moia_
> means "wheel"): a word for a pack (?word) of chariots.
>
> The vocabulary I've got masses of words for is animals. It's fitting, I
> suppose, as their tech level isn't too high, but it's getting to be
> overkill. There are too many animals and birds (*especially* birds) to
> name!
> Mind you, I have some interesting domestic animal vocab (the idea stolen
> wholesale from Kazakh and then taken a step further)- numbers of words for
> livestock depending on gender, age, and whether it has all its parts or has
> been castrated.
>
> I need more verbs...
>
> Geoff
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Message: 14
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 17:46:25 -0500
From: Trebor Jung <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Icelandic phonology
There's been some discussion on Icelandic pronunciation recently... Thought
I'd share this with you; it's a file an native Icelandic speaker from the
Zompist Board sent me last month. It's pretty detailed (but unfortunately
doesn't mention <kv>).
Slender vowels
Broad vowels
a + one consonant [A:]
� + one consonant [Au:]
a + two or more consonants [A]
� + two or more consonants [Au]
e + one consonant [E:]
ei/ey + one consonant [Ei:]
e + two or more consonants [E]
ei/ey + two or more consonants [Ei]
� + one consonant [jE:]
� + -ng- [jEi:]
� + two or more consonants [jE]
� + -nk- [jEi]
i/y + one consonant [I:]
�/� + one consonant [i]
i/y + two or more consonants [I]
�/� + two or more consonants [i]
o + one consonant [O:]
� + one consonant [Ou:]
o + two or more consonants [O]
� + two or more consonants [Ou]
u + one consonant [Y:]
� + one consonant [u:]
u + two or more consonants [Y]
� + two or more consonants [u]
� + one consonant [9:]
au + one consonant [9y:]
� + two or omre consonants [9]
au + two or omre consonants [9y]
� + one consonant [Ai:]
N/A
� + two or more consonants [Ai]
N/A
All slender vowels are pronounced as broad vowels before ng or nk, but that
is not indicated orthographically, except if the origin of the word
requires:
engi ["Ei:N.cI:]
tunga ["tu:N.kA:]
k�ngur ["kOu:N.kY:r_h]
b: [p]. silent before -d, -s, -t, and after -m
d: [t]. silent before genitive -s.
�: [D] in most positons (it's not allowed at the beginning of a word) but
becomes [D_0] at the end of a word, if the following word begins with a
consonant, or if the word is at the end of a sentence.
f: 1.[f]- when f is the first letter of the word, or followed by -k or -s.
2. [v] when between vowels or at the end of a word. 3. [b] When followed by
l or n.
g: 1.[k] when followed by a, �, o, �, u, �, �, g, l, n, or when following a
consonant. 2. [j] when a short vowel in consturctions like intervocalic gj,
when followed by i or y, � or �. [c] when followed by i, �, y, �, e, j or �.
4. [G] between vowels, before r or �. 5. [G_0] at the ends of words, if the
next word begins in a consonant, or when the word is at the end of a
sentence.
gt: [xt]
h: [h].
j: [j]
k: 1. [k_h] normally. 2. [c_h] before e, i, �, y, �, j or �.
kk: 1. [hk] normally. 2. [hc] before e, i, �, y, �, j or �.
l: [l]. [K] before voiceless consonants and at the end of a word
m: [m] normally but [m_0] before p, t or k
n: 1. [n] before voiced consonants, b or d or a vowel. 2. [n_0] before p and
t. 3. [J] before allophonic [c] 4. [J_0] before allophonic [c_h] 5. [N]
before [k]. 6. before [k_h].
p: 1. [p_h] normally. 2. [f] before t.
pp: 1. [hp] in all cases, except before t where this becomes [f].
r: 1. [4] normally, 2. [r] when doubled. 3. [r_0] when before p, t or k, or
at the end of a word.
s: [s]
t: [t_h]
tt: [ht]
v: [v]
x: [ks]
z: [s] (Not used anymore, was used to indicate a vanished t, still found in
older busses and in old signs, some old books as well.)
�: [T]
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Message: 15
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 18:25:19 -0500
From: # 1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: vowels: are they necessary?
[This message is not in displayable format]
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Message: 16
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 01:04:51 +0100
From: Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
--- # 1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> When a consonant is fricative or trilled, it can be
> continued as long we want. Is there any languages
> that has some words that are only consonants without
> vowels?
Oh, quite a few. Russian comes to mind; 's' and 'v'
are both legitimate words (I think they're
prepositions). Many languages have a syllabic 'r' or
'l' (such as Czech, Slovak and Sanskrit).
> A little word that is only a rolled [r], a [s], a
> [v], without the vowel releasing. It would be
> conceivable.
Indeed. When DVD's first came out, I (jokingly)
pronounced the acronym as [dv=:d], rather than
[,di.vi."di:].
> Generally, consonant always means that there is
> vowel pasted to, but why?
Generally, most languages have syllabic constraints
that forbid isolated consonants without vowels. But
then again, many languages break those very same
rules; Mandarin, in certain interpretations, has
syllabic [s], [s`], [s\], [ts], [ts`], [ts\] and [r\].
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Message: 17
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 19:08:14 -0500
From: Paul Bennett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
On Tue, 07 Dec 2004 18:25:19 -0500, # 1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> Is there any languages that has some words that are only consonants
> without vowels?
Yeah. Loads. Czech, and a number of other Slavic languages. There are some
North-East African languages, if I'm not mistaken (I want to say Berber,
Tigrinya, and plausibly Ancient Egyptian (and Coptic? Certainly it's
phonotactically allowed, even if none actually exist), if and only if my
memory is not playing tricks), and a number in East and South-East Asia,
where AIUI /N=/ is not uncommon.
Spoken English arguably has a few, depending on dialect. "And" can become
/n=/, for instance.
Paul
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Message: 18
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 00:21:36 -0000
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
Sally, I have a hunch that Eco may be drawing from Genette's
_Mimologies_ (really ought to have been called _Mimetologies_,
imo), but don't have ready access tonight to a copy to check.
This pointer may be a wildgoosechase, mind.
--And.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sally Caves" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Tuesday, December 07, 2004 3:55 PM
Subject: Re: [CONLANG] Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
> Thanks, Muke. So is Eco wrong? Who were the ones being "corrected" that
> you mentioned in your last message? I just posted a message where I
queried
> whether the use of Nomothete is a mistake, and that less learned people
have
> copied it, mistaking nomothete for onomaturge. See below:
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Muke Tever" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Sent: Tuesday, December 07, 2004 8:24 AM
> Subject: Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
>
>
> > On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 01:40:02 -0500, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > wrote:
> >> Socrates: Ouk ara pantos andros, O Ermogenes, onoma thesthai, alla
tinos
> >> onomatourgon outos d'estin, os eolken, o nomothetus, os de ton
demiourgon
> >> spaniotatos en anthropois gignetai.
> >> "Then it is not for every man, Hermogenes, to give names (onoma
> >> thesthai),
> >> but for him who may be called the name-maker (onomatourgon); and he, it
> >> appears, is the lawgiver (nomothetus), who is of all the artisans among
> >> men
> >> the rarest."
> >>
> >> (This seems like an argument for prescriptive grammarians!)
> >>
> >> What this tells me is that the Greek word for lawgiver has become
> >> conflated
> >> or confused with onomatourgon, simply because of the identification of
> >> the
> >> lawgiver with the namegiver. But technically, nomothete is "law-giver"
> >> and
> >> "onomatothete" or "onomatourge" is "namegiver."
>
> Yes, I still wonder about this.
>
> > I'm reading through the Perseus version text online here, and it seems
to
> > me
> > that while Hermogenes believes (with modern linguists, apparently) that
> > "no
> > name belongs to any particular thing by nature, but only by the habit [=
> > Greek
> > ethos] and custom [= nomos] of those who employ it and who established
the
> > usage,"
> > Socrates is trying to tell him further that it isn't just to anyone who
> > can
> > establish a word's usage: it may be that anyone can create a word, or
> > call
> > horses "men" and men "horses", but only the nomothete (the one who can
> > establish _nomos_) can be called a skilled onomaturge.
>
> Yes, I understand the philosophical question, and I read the whole
Cratylus
> last night between twelve and two in the morning. My question is rather
> about the use of misuse of the word in Eco's writings, and those who quote
> him. Has nomothete come to mean, among those who use the Platonic theory
as
> it is given in Cratylus, a "true" giver of names? If so, then I'm happy.
> If Eco has just been sloppy, as he sometimes is, I'm not. But it appears
> that use of Nomothete to mean authorized name giver has been used prior to
> Eco, and been corrected by other classicists, or that is what I took your
> remark last night to mean. Who was correcting whom? :)
>
> comment?
> Sally
>
> Sally
>
> >
> > *Muke!
> > --
> > website: http://frath.net/
> > LiveJournal: http://kohath.livejournal.com/
> > deviantArt: http://kohath.deviantart.com/
> >
> > FrathWiki, a conlang and conculture wiki:
> > http://wiki.frath.net/
> >
>
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Message: 19
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 16:41:13 -0800
From: "H. S. Teoh" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
On Tue, Dec 07, 2004 at 07:08:14PM -0500, Paul Bennett wrote:
> On Tue, 07 Dec 2004 18:25:19 -0500, # 1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote:
>
> >Is there any languages that has some words that are only consonants
> >without vowels?
>
> Yeah. Loads. Czech, and a number of other Slavic languages. There are some
> North-East African languages, if I'm not mistaken (I want to say Berber,
> Tigrinya, and plausibly Ancient Egyptian (and Coptic? Certainly it's
> phonotactically allowed, even if none actually exist), if and only if my
> memory is not playing tricks), and a number in East and South-East Asia,
> where AIUI /N=/ is not uncommon.
[...]
In my L1 as spoken by my grandparents, the word for 'yellow' is
[?N=:]. In my generation it has mutated into [?ui~], however.
Also, [m=] is the negation particle both in my L1 and in Cantonese.
IMHO, all non-obstruents can conceivably be phonemically vocalic, esp.
if they are voiced. Whether such sounds are consonantal or not depends
merely on whether they are articulated consonantally or vocalically in
a particular language's phonology. They could very well be both, as
[N] and [m] are above.
T
--
"You know, maybe we don't *need* enemies." "Yeah, best friends are about all
I can take." -- Calvin & Hobbes
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Message: 20
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 23:49:28 -0000
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
Tom Wier:
> As Ray has already noted, this spawned
> great debates, so great in fact that a papal bull was issued in 1272
> and again in 1277 banning certain topics of debate in the University
> of Paris (not, notably, banning them in general), not so much to
> suppress dissent (the Pope himself had taught there and was a moderate
> theologically IIRC), but to keep tempers to a manageable level.
By analogy, then, this would make John Cowan the (of course, very
liberal) pope of Conlang.
Pope John II, to be exact -- successor to Pope John I, Pope Lars,
and Pope David.
[Am very very tightly crossing my fingers that the above is not
offensive to our papist brethren, but my confidence in my ability
to gauge offensiveness is running at low ebb.]
--And.
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Message: 21
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 23:40:35 -0000
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
Roger:
> > >At any rate, I will wager that no conlang has words for all 10.
> > >My conlang has no word for any of the 10. But one supersized
> > >all-American kudo to the conlang with the words for the most
> > >of the 10...
>
> At the risk of correcting And, IIRC it should be _kudos_ (is Greek, no?,
> plural kudoi?); though we seem to treat it as sing. kudo pl. kudos. It
> seems to mean, generally, "compliments"-- e.g. "Tristan's conlang has
> received kudos from everyone"-- perhaps sometimes prize or reward??
I was embracing American English, which, as others have pointed out,
has become /'kudouz/, an apparent plural, in contrast to the older
(& still BrE) mass noun /'kju:dQs/ (hence presumably the name of the
OS Bill Gates bought, QDOS, "quick & dirty operating system", and
renamed in the characteristically banal way one would expect from
that stronzaccione).
--And.
ps. Speaking of defenestration & the midden of Microsoft, I have
today switched from IE to Firefox: one small step for mankind, one
giant leap for me. Am v. proud of my first small blow for the
proletariat of the e-world.
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Message: 22
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 19:50:20 -0500
From: Estel Telcontar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Proto-Germanic
Benct Philip Jonsson ha tera a:
> Estel Telcontar wrote:
> > Hello everyone,
> > How do the Germanic conlangers out there find proto-Germanic
> > paradigms to develop their languages from? I'm having a hard
> > time tracking them down.
> Author Prokosch, Eduard
> Title A comparative Germanic grammar.
[...]
Does Prokosch actually give Proto-Germanic paradigms? I've looked at
it several times, and all I could find was comparisons of the
descendant forms without reconstructions.
> Author: Haugen, Einar
> Title: Scandinavian language structures : a comparative
> historical survey
[...]
I'll check that out if it's available
> > Also, does anyone know of a good list of the sound changes
> > between Proto-Germanic and Old English?
> The only good source I know of is in German:
Hmm, ironic. Good thing I'm somewhat competent at reading German
[snip]
I suggest you subscribe to Germaniconlang. There is some stuff
in its filesection.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/germaniconlang/>
I'll do that. Thanks.
> >____________________________________________________
> > F� den nye Yahoo! Messenger p� http://no.messenger.yahoo.com/
> > Nye ikoner og bakgrunner, webkamera med superkvalitet og
> dobbelt s� morsom
> Are you Norwegian?
No, I'm Canadian. I don't know exactly why it's sticking Norwegian ads
at the bottom of my email... it must have something to do with the fact
that at one point I switched my language to Norwegian because I heard
that it then doesn't stick any ads at the bottom of your emails at all.
It worked, at least when I first tried it, and I didn't check since.
But the odd thing is, two days ago or so I changed my language back to
(Canadian) English, and now it seems to add Norwegian ads. So I'm not
sure what's going on. It still also does a few other things in
Norwegian, but the main interface is in English.
-Estel
______________________________________________________
F� den nye Yahoo! Messenger p� http://no.messenger.yahoo.com/
Nye ikoner og bakgrunner, webkamera med superkvalitet og dobbelt s� morsom
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Message: 23
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 19:51:35 -0500
From: Paul Bennett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Towards a less Preliminary Sketch (was Re: Preliminary Sketch)
On Tue, 07 Dec 2004 11:12:57 -0800, H. S. Teoh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> On Mon, Dec 06, 2004 at 05:16:42PM -0500, Paul Bennett wrote:
>> This afternoon, during a slightly slack period at work, I jotted down
>> some
>> notes of a language unlike my previous projects.
>>
>> Here are my notes in full. Any thoughts, questions or suggestions?
>>
>> br /B\/
>
> Interesting. I don't know of any lang that uses the bilabial trill
> phonemically. Cool! :-)
There are some, or else the IPA is lying. Either way, I'm bloody well
using it, in part because it's so much fun to say ;-)
>> dr /r/
>> gr /R\/
>
> Nice idea to transcribe different trills by their place of
> articulation.
I thought so.
> [...]
>> tj /c_+C_+)/
>> ch /tS)/
>
> Whoa, this is a hard distinction for me to pronounce.
One is apical, the other is laminal. One has the teeth closed, the other
doesn't.
> [...]
>> ee /i/
>
> This looks a bit too English, IMHO.
>
> [...]
>> oo /u/
>
> Again, this looks a bit too English to me. You could have other ways
> of writing [u]: e.g., /ou/ ala Greek. Just MHO of course.
The whole point of the alphabet is specifically to look as though it were
devised by a person encountering it for the first time for whom
linguistics is not the main field of study. It might become a Lostlangs
candidate.
> [...]
>> Language is modifier-head,
>
> You mean modifier-initial?
Yeah. I've encountered Head-Modifier and Modifier-Head for Head-First and
Head-Last, or modifier-last and modifier-first. For some reason, it sticks
in my head better.
>> with some fusional agglutinative elements, and prefixing
>> incorporation of primary(?) objects. Check the definition of
>> dechticaetiative.
>
> Interesting. Any examples?
Meh. Some. I did a bit more playing this afternoon. Here are some more
unedited notes. I've given up on notions of Dativity vs
Dechticaetiativity, and I've fallen back on my stalwart "A case for
everything and everything in its case" philosophy. I will change this as I
get more ideas.
Verbs of motion supplete for path instead of manner, with adverbs for
manner.
e.g. br'gar "go along", ngana "go toward", shoo ngana "go walkingly
towards", drork ngana "go stealthily towards", drork chovbr'gar
"stealthily traverse a beach", warde ngana "go runningly towards",
cheptjen "go through", tuk' "meander within"
drork digetuk' "stealthily meander through a jungle"
Chon drork digetuk' Bobdoo
/tS)on rOk ,dIge'tVk@ 'bobdu/
chon drork dige -tuk' bob-doo
john stealthily jungle-meander bob-TGT
"John hunts Bob in the jungle"
Chon shoo chovbr'gar Bobdoo
"John walks following Bob along the beach"
Chon warde chovtuk' Bobdoo
"John runs around on the beach following Bob"
meek "move" (transitive) / "give"
Chon peegrimeek Bobna "John ball-gives Bob-RCP"
Paul
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Message: 24
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 01:01:26 -0000
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
Joe:
> >"Eboracum", yes, and before that from some Celtic name. But the Old
English
> >name was "Eoforwic", a case of folk etymology -- the meaningless Latin
name
> >was reinterpreted as "Wild-boar-town". If the name had descended
unchanged,
> >it would have come out Everwich.
> >
>
> Eaverwich, capital of Eaverishire. Pronounced [i:[EMAIL PROTECTED],
> obviously.
By your generation, yes. [i:v(@)rIdZ] by those of years less tender
than yours...
--And.
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Message: 25
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 01:34:56 +0100
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
Hi!
Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> --- # 1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > When a consonant is fricative or trilled, it can be
> > continued as long we want. Is there any languages
> > that has some words that are only consonants without
> > vowels?
>
> Oh, quite a few. Russian comes to mind; 's' and 'v'
> are both legitimate words (I think they're
> prepositions). Many languages have a syllabic 'r' or
> 'l' (such as Czech, Slovak and Sanskrit).
Russian also has 'k'. And there the Kroatian island 'Krk' [kr=k].
Caucasian languages also tend to like consonants.
But I think the languages with the least vowels are Berber languages.
E.g. Tamaziqhth. Or Tashlhiyt as described here:
http://www.phon.ox.ac.uk/~jcoleman/TPS.html
(This link was posted here some time ago.)
**Henrik
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