There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Another word generator I've made
From: Sam Drost
2a. Re: Saruban tadayam ayedawi -- or, Goodbye for now!
From: Julia "Schnecki" Simon
2b. Re: Saruban tadayam ayedawi -- or, Goodbye for now!
From: Peter Ara Guekguezian
3. Another one going nomail...
From: Julia "Schnecki" Simon
4a. Re: Second person/polite pronouns (fuit Re: Another Ozymandias)
From: Philip Newton
4b. Re: Second person/polite pronouns (fuit Re: Another Ozymandias)
From: Paul Roser
5a. composite preposition with two opposite meanings
From: René Uittenbogaard
5b. Re: composite preposition with two opposite meanings
From: Roger Mills
6. FW: Translation Challenge: Foucault's Pendulum
From: Carsten Becker
7a. USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
From: Benct Philip Jonsson
7b. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
From: Kalle Bergman
7c. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
From: Henrik Theiling
7d. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
From: Damien Perrotin
7e. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
From: Andreas Johansson
8a. Aspect + Mood combinations
From: James W.
8b. Re: Aspect + Mood combinations
From: Roger Mills
8c. Re: Aspect + Mood combinations
From: James W.
9. Re: Takiyyudin phonology
From: John Vertical
10a. Re: Translation Challenge: Foucault's Pendulum
From: Roger Mills
10b. Re: Translation Challenge: Foucault's Pendulum
From: Damien Perrotin
11. Re: THEORY: Laxness?
From: John Vertical
12. OT: English -uice
From: Mark Reed
13a. Re: English -uice
From: Roger Mills
13b. Re: English -uice
From: Andreas Johansson
14. Nahuatl sound files?
From: Henrik Theiling
Messages
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1. Another word generator I've made
Posted by: "Sam Drost" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Thu Jul 27, 2006 10:00 pm (PDT)
I've finally gotten around to converting my word generator scripts to Java.
If you want to look at the new app, it's at
http://www.fantomx11.com/conlang/index.php
I did not make it as an applet (I personally hate those) that runs in your
browser, it is a downloadable application. In case you are unfamiliar with
how Java applications work, the .jar file is the executable.
I've also included a saved file so one can immediately see what it does and
a text file briefly explaining how to use it.
Messages in this topic (1)
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2a. Re: Saruban tadayam ayedawi -- or, Goodbye for now!
Posted by: "Julia "Schnecki" Simon" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Thu Jul 27, 2006 10:39 pm (PDT)
Hello!
On 7/25/06, Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I am sorry, but I want to tell you that I have to leave
> quite soon. As some of you may know, I am going to start an
> apprenticeship in Braunschweig on August 1st.
*sniff* We're gonna miss you...
But anyway, all the best for your apprenticeship! :-)
> Unfortunately,
> the flat I am hiring has no telephone connection, so I will
> not be able anymore to access the List until I have found a
> solution.
Argh. I'm so glad that I have Internet access at work (and a nice
employer who allows us to use it for our own private purposes as long
as we do this in our own time)! At least I don't have to worry about
finding flats with telephone connections, or expensive Internet cafes,
or the like...
But I'm sure you'll find a solution. :-)
> NB: I had, BTW, originally written the mail some days BEFORE
> Sally came up with the 'What is it we are saying ...'
> thread. I wrote this in Ayeri just for fun and to gain some
> new entries for the dictionary. That I can write such stuff
> in Ayeri as well as translate a whole computer program
> proves that with some clever changes, one can use one's
> conlang for 21st-century-world related topics as well,
> although the culture that is supposed to speak this
> language is maybe not yet as advanced as we are today.
Well, if they can do it with Latin, then why not with other
languages? ;-)
Regards,
Julia 8-)
--
Julia Simon (Schnecki) -- Sprachen-Freak vom Dienst
_@" schnecki AT iki DOT fi / helicula AT gmail DOT com "@_
si hortum in bybliotheca habes, deerit nihil
(M. Tullius Cicero)
Messages in this topic (6)
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2b. Re: Saruban tadayam ayedawi -- or, Goodbye for now!
Posted by: "Peter Ara Guekguezian" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 12:05 pm (PDT)
Carsten Becker wrote:
> <very impressive stuff in Ayeri>
>
> Hello List,
>
> I am sorry, but I want to tell you that I have to leave
> quite soon. As some of you may know, I am going to start an
> apprenticeship in Braunschweig on August 1st. Unfortunately,
> the flat I am hiring has no telephone connection, so I will
> not be able anymore to access the List until I have found a
> solution. I won't go completely NOMAIL, but I will lurk most
> of the time -- it is not the case that I cannot access the
> internet at all, my internet access will just be very much
> limited as far as I can tell. It is a pity to lose contact
> to the List, the ZBB, my former classmates and my friends.
> I know there are internet cafés and that libraries
> are often offering internet access as well, but these
> options are just too expensive.
>
> Yours,
> Carsten
>
> --
> "Miranayam kepauara naranoaris." (Kalvin nay Hobbes)
> Palayena, Tyemuyang 14, 140B
IIRC, Jörg Rhiemeier is from Braunschweig (at least it says so on his
ZBB profile). Is it impossible for him to be sort of a conduit or
internet-enabler for you to speak with us?
-kodé (PAG)
Messages in this topic (6)
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3. Another one going nomail...
Posted by: "Julia "Schnecki" Simon" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Thu Jul 27, 2006 10:59 pm (PDT)
Hello!
I haven't been posting much lately, so the difference may not even be
noticeable, but I thought I'd better tell you anyway. ;-)
My summer holidays start tomorrow (technically on Monday, but since I
don't work on weekends anyway, weeeellll... ;) . This means that,
starting tonight, I won't have Internet access for about a month.
As usual, I'll spend most of the time in southwestern Germany,
visiting friends and relatives (and eating way too much, probably).
With any luck, I'll also be able to squeeze in some conlanging -- for
some reason, long train and plane rides seem to inspire me...
See you all in September!
Regards,
Julia 8-)
(hoping that temperatures in Germany will go
down to tolerable levels (from the current
"Satan's sauna" weather) before her plane
lands)
--
Julia Simon (Schnecki) -- Sprachen-Freak vom Dienst
_@" schnecki AT iki DOT fi / helicula AT gmail DOT com "@_
si hortum in bybliotheca habes, deerit nihil
(M. Tullius Cicero)
Messages in this topic (1)
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4a. Re: Second person/polite pronouns (fuit Re: Another Ozymandias)
Posted by: "Philip Newton" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 2:13 am (PDT)
On 7/27/06, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> From: "Paul Roser" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
> > I'm having
> > difficulty envisioning a language with a pronoun that doesn't distinguish
> > person or number...
>
> Well, Sie in German (takes same verbal ending as sie plural)... a huge
> confusion to me always in spoken German. Context is all.
Not bad -- the same forms are used for 2sg, 2pl, and 3pl.
Confusing for Germans even in writing, occasionally -- the most common
mistake being to capitalise 3pl "Sie", usually leading to a rather
humorous meaning.
To make up a random example, someone might write "Erdbeeren müssen in
Stroh gepackt werden bevor Sie exportiert werden", which means,
"Strawberries must be packed in straw before you are exported". The
intended meaning being, of course, "... before *they* are exported"
(which would require "...bevor *sie* exportiert werden" with
lower-case "sie").
And then there's "sie" which is 3sg.f. ... though the verbal forms are
different.
Maybe people should start using "sie" for first person as well, just
to add to the confusion. One single general-purpose pronoun. Or extend
it to 3sg.m. & 3sg.n. at least, so that the pronoun distinction in
German would be "1st" vs "non-1st", a bit like the past-nonpast
distinction in some languages' tense systems.
Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Messages in this topic (36)
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4b. Re: Second person/polite pronouns (fuit Re: Another Ozymandias)
Posted by: "Paul Roser" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 11:42 am (PDT)
On Thu, 27 Jul 2006 11:41:49 -0400, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Paul Roser" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>
>> I can easily envision a polysynthetic language where person & number
>> marking are on the verb and pronouns have dropped from the language
>> or evolved into something else (but what? emphatic markers, perhaps?),
>> and I'd be willing to wager that there are natlangs that have gone
>> to polypersonal marking of the verb with only pronouns for speech
>> act participants, but I'm having difficulty envisioning a language
>> with a pronoun that doesn't distinguish person or number...
>
[...]
> I guess a conlang could do the same, using context, and specify only
> animate and inanimate in its pronoun. Pronouns usually do have
> antecedants.
On the analogy of Swedish reducing all verb forms to third person pointed
out by BP previosuly in this thread, what I was thinking of was a language
that has reduced *all* pronouns to one form - which would probably render it
useless, though the notion of a pronoun that distinguishes only
animate/inanimate is intriguing.
And that reminded me that the (extinct) Lardil ritual language Damin has
only two pronouns corresponding to 'I/us' and 'other', so that's probably as
close as any natlang comes to bleaching pronouns (which is stretching things
a bit, since Damin isn't considered a true natlang).
-Pfal
Messages in this topic (36)
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5a. composite preposition with two opposite meanings
Posted by: "René Uittenbogaard" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 4:09 am (PDT)
<philosophical>
Apparently the expression "in possession of" can mean two opposite things.
This book is in possession of my brother.
I have been in possession of this book for years.
</philosophical>
Curious. Are there any more of these?
Greetings,
René
Messages in this topic (2)
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5b. Re: composite preposition with two opposite meanings
Posted by: "Roger Mills" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:40 am (PDT)
Remé Uittenbogaard wrote:
>
> Apparently the expression "in possession of" can mean two opposite things.
>
> This book is in possession of my brother.
> I have been in possession of this book for years.
>
Disagree. I think there has to be a "the" in the first case. Consider also:
Satan is in possession of my brother = Satan owns/controls my brother
Satan is in the possession of my brother = my brother somehow controls
Satan.
All our bases are _in the possession of_ the enemy.
The enemy is _in possession of_ all our bases.
Agreed, it's a curious construction, which frankly I'd never thought about
before... it seems to be a sort of passive/active distinction.
X possesses Y : X is in possession of Y
Y is possessed by X: Y is in the possession of X
And offhand I can't think of any comparable expressions.
Messages in this topic (2)
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6. FW: Translation Challenge: Foucault's Pendulum
Posted by: "Carsten Becker" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 4:13 am (PDT)
As seen on the ZBB. It's a real challenge, but worth it.
See: www.beckerscarsten.de/conlang/ayeri/xmp_pendulum.pdf --
I translated the text from German, as explained in that
file. The German version of the extract adds some extra
pepper to this, so I translated it into English for those
who want to try. I don't know which version of both is
closer to the Italian original, the official German one,
which I used, or the English one. You'll see the
differences.
----- Original Message: -----
TRANSLATION CHALLENGE: FOUCAULT'S PENDULUM
Or, a challenge for the semioticians - the first page of
Umberto Eco's _Foucault's Pendulum_.
This is a relatively complex passage, which should put any
conlang through its paces. Is your conlang up to it? Go on,
I dare you.
<< That was when I saw the Pendulum.
The sphere, hanging from a long wire set into the ceiling
of the choir, swayed back and forth with isochronal majesty.
I knew - but anyone could have sensed it in the magic of
that serene breathing - that the period was governed by the
square root of the length of the wire and by pi, that number
which, however irrational to sublunar minds, through a
higher rationality binds the circumference and diameter of
all possible circles. The time it took the sphere to swing
from end to end was determined by an arcane conspiracy
between the most timeless of measures: the singularity of
the point of suspension, the duality of the plane's
dimensions, the triadic beginning of pi, the secret
quadratic nature of the root and the unnumbered perfection
of the circle itself.
I also knew that a magnetic device centred in the floor
beneath issued its command to a cylinder hidden in the heart
of the sphere, thus assuring continual motion. This device,
far from interfering with the law of the Pendulum, in fact
permitted its manifestation, for in a vacuum any object
hanging from a weightless and unstretchable wire free of air
resistance and friction will oscillate for eternity. >>
(Dewrad, www.spinnoff.com/zbb/viewtopic.php?t=17730)
--------------------
In the thread on the ZBB this is from there are also
translation of the above into Icelandic and Indonesian -- by
native speakers, but unfortunately without interlinears or
any other explanations.
Have fun,
Carsten
--
"Miranayam kepauarà naranoaris." (Kalvin nay Hobbes)
Tenena, Tyemuyang 19, 2315 ya 10:54:38 pd
Messages in this topic (1)
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7a. USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
Posted by: "Benct Philip Jonsson" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 4:45 am (PDT)
Well, the subject line says it all:
What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
Sure _paidía_ is feminine in Greek, but
one can never be sure. It might even be
neuter plural! ;-)
--
/BP 8^)>
--
Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se
Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant!
(Tacitus)
I'm afraid the current situation in the Eastern
Mediterranean forces me to reinstate this signature...
Messages in this topic (5)
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7b. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
Posted by: "Kalle Bergman" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 5:19 am (PDT)
> What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
Okay, not an answer to your question, and tangential
to the subject, but... what gender is "wikipedia" in
swedish? "En wikipedia", "ett wikipedia"... it's
neither, right, because "wikipedia" is a proper name?
(Begin rant)
Makes me think of my dad's dialect, which has a
special set of clitics used with names of people, when
those names are used to refer to a person by that
name. (So, for instance, you use the clitic when
saying things like "I met Ove yesterday", but not when
saying "His name is Ove", because in the latter case,
"Ove" refers to the name itself, rather than to
someone called "Ove"). The clitics were en-/n- in the
case of men, and a- in the case of women, so you got
things like:
Jag såg n'Ove
I saw Ove
And
Jag såg a'Karin
I saw Karin
I think it's an interesting feature.
/Kalle B
--- Benct Philip Jonsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> skrev:
> Well, the subject line says it all:
> What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
> Sure _paidía_ is feminine in Greek, but
> one can never be sure. It might even be
> neuter plural! ;-)
> --
>
> /BP 8^)>
> --
> Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se
>
> Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant!
>
> (Tacitus)
>
> I'm afraid the current situation in the Eastern
> Mediterranean forces me to reinstate this
> signature...
>
Messages in this topic (5)
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7c. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
Posted by: "Henrik Theiling" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 5:51 am (PDT)
Hi!
Benct Philip Jonsson writes:
> Well, the subject line says it all: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in
> German? Sure _paidía_ is feminine in Greek, but one can never be
> sure. It might even be neuter plural! ;-)
It's indeed feminine. (I suppose they'd better translated it as
,Wikipädie', though).
**Henrik
Messages in this topic (5)
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7d. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
Posted by: "Damien Perrotin" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 7:57 am (PDT)
Skrivet en doa Henrik Theiling:
> Hi!
>
> Benct Philip Jonsson writes:
>
>> Well, the subject line says it all: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in
>> German? Sure _paidía_ is feminine in Greek, but one can never be
>> sure. It might even be neuter plural! ;-)
>>
>
> It's indeed feminine. (I suppose they'd better translated it as
> ,Wikipädie', though).
>
> **Henrik
>
>
In French it is masculine. Don't ask why, it just /feels/ that way.
Messages in this topic (5)
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7e. Re: USAGE: What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
Posted by: "Andreas Johansson" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 3:35 pm (PDT)
Quoting Kalle Bergman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> > What gender is _Wikipedia_ in German?
>
> Okay, not an answer to your question, and tangential
> to the subject, but... what gender is "wikipedia" in
> swedish? "En wikipedia", "ett wikipedia"... it's
> neither, right, because "wikipedia" is a proper name?
As for my idiolect, "Wikipedia" is a proper name, but _wiki_ [vi:kI] is an
n-gender noun. Eg _Wikipedia är den mest kända och använda wikin, men inte den
enda_.
(Tho "n-gender" may be a bad term to use when speaking of my 'lect, since I have
a masculine of sorts; _den enda kvinnan_, _den enda grejen_, but _den ende
mannen_.)
Andreas
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8a. Aspect + Mood combinations
Posted by: "James W." [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:31 am (PDT)
Hey all,
I've been working on the TAM system of my current
project a:seka`eni. Right now there are 3 aspect
particles and 7 mood particles. I've been combining
them to see what would happen and have come across
a few that I can't think of an English equivalent
for. I list the 18 combinations (interrogative
particle is separate from the other 6 modals.)
Aspects: perfective, imperfective, inceptive
Moods: imperative, dubitative, negative, optative,
permissive, conditional
Have I interpreted these correctly? And what would
the ones with question marks mean, if anything?
Are there any others that you can think of from
any con- or natlang examples?
combinations
ASPECT MOOD ENGLISH equivalents
(perf) + (imperat) [none?]
(perf) + (dubit) doubted that
(perf) + (neg) did not
(perf) + (optat) “wanted to ----”
(perf) + (permiss) could/may have
(perf) + (cond) would have
(imperf) + (imperat) [none?]
(imperf) + (dubit) was doubting
(imperf) + (neg) smth wasn’t happening
(imperf) + (optat) was wanting
(imperf) + (permiss) had ongoing permission
(imperf) + (cond) ??
(incept) + (imperat) basic command form
(incept) + (dubit) ??
(incept) + (neg) smth not beginning
(incept) + (optat) want smth to start
(incept) + (permiss) permission to begin smth?
(incept) + (cond) would begin
Thanks,
--------
James W.
Messages in this topic (3)
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8b. Re: Aspect + Mood combinations
Posted by: "Roger Mills" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:43 am (PDT)
James W. wrote:
>
> I've been working on the TAM system of my current
> project a:seka`eni. Right now there are 3 aspect
> particles and 7 mood particles. I've been combining
> them to see what would happen and have come across
> a few that I can't think of an English equivalent
> for. I list the 18 combinations (interrogative
> particle is separate from the other 6 modals.)
>
> Aspects: perfective, imperfective, inceptive
> Moods: imperative, dubitative, negative, optative,
> permissive, conditional
>
> Have I interpreted these correctly? And what would
> the ones with question marks mean, if anything?
> Are there any others that you can think of from
> any con- or natlang examples?
I suppose each A+M is also subdivided by Tense??
>
> combinations
> ASPECT MOOD ENGLISH equivalents
> (perf) + (imperat) [none?]
What about: "Have your report finished by noon tomorrow" ?? Sort of a Future
Perf. Imperative?? Or would it be Imperf., since the report is unfinished at
the time of speaking?
> (perf) + (dubit) doubted that
> (perf) + (neg) did not
> (perf) + (optat) “wanted to ----”
Where would "have (always) doubted that...", "have not.../do not..." et al.
fit in? Generic statements?
(snips)
> (incept) + (dubit) ??
"beginning to doubt..., becoming uncertain that..., (it's) likely to... "???
Never having studied a Slavic language, I'm a little bit uncertain just how
perf/imperf. aspects work :-((((
Messages in this topic (3)
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8c. Re: Aspect + Mood combinations
Posted by: "James W." [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 11:26 am (PDT)
(Fixing the [EMAIL PROTECTED]&# codes in my original message)
On Fri, 28 Jul 2006 13:27:05 -0400, "Roger Mills" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
said:
> James W. wrote:
[snip]
> > Aspects: perfective, imperfective, inceptive
> > Moods: imperative, dubitative, negative, optative,
> > permissive, conditional
> >
> > Have I interpreted these correctly? And what would
> > the ones with question marks mean, if anything?
> > Are there any others that you can think of from
> > any con- or natlang examples?
>
> I suppose each A+M is also subdivided by Tense??
Yes, there are future and non-future tenses.
> >
> > combinations
> > ASPECT MOOD ENGLISH equivalents
> > (perf) + (imperat) [none?]
>
> What about: "Have your report finished by noon tomorrow" ?? Sort of a
> Future
> Perf. Imperative?? Or would it be Imperf., since the report is unfinished
> at
> the time of speaking?
I will definitely look into this possibility. Thanks!
> > (perf) + (dubit) doubted that
> > (perf) + (neg) did not
> > (perf) + (optat) wanted to ----
>
> Where would "have (always) doubted that...", "have not.../do not..." et
> al.
> fit in? Generic statements?
Hmmm. More thought needed on my part, obviously. For
"have (always) doubted that..." I would need some way to
express habitual action.
For "have not..." (you mean like "I have not taken the trash out
yet"?), That will require some thought. I don't know how to do that
with my current system.
> (snips)
> > (incept) + (dubit) ??
> "beginning to doubt..., becoming uncertain that..., (it's) likely to...
> "???
"Beginning to doubt..." This could work. I like it :)
> Never having studied a Slavic language, I'm a little bit uncertain just
> how
> perf/imperf. aspects work :-((((
Well, my knowledge of anything linguistic is quite uncertain :). My
understanding is that perfective indicates a completed, single event.
I had to review on sil.org what Imperfective means:
"Imperfective aspect is an aspect that expresses an event or state,
with respect to its internal structure, instead of expressing it as
a simple whole." So I interpret that as meaning unspecified completion,
focusing more on the process of the event itself. (Which is more or
less what I thought.)
Thanks,
--------
James W.
Messages in this topic (3)
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9. Re: Takiyyudin phonology
Posted by: "John Vertical" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:43 am (PDT)
Shreyas Sampat wrote:
>So I was musing about vowel harmony, and wondering, what's it look like
>when it starts bleeding into consonants, so I threw together this here baby
>conlang.
>
>The vowels are organised into two groups, 'green' and 'blue'; the names
>don't mean anything, obviously. Some of the consonants take different forms
>depending on the colour of a word. In the table below, consonant PAIRS
>indicate the blue form followed by the green form. The affricate TRIPLETS
>are (almost) simply a shorthand for two overlapping pairs; blue <chetsun>
>corresponds to green <chwe'chon>, except in a few cases where the simple
>postalveolar form doesn't alternate (thus green <che'chon).
>
>Inventory, with doubled lines for cxs, sometimes:
>
>Blue vowels: i e a u u'
>Green vowels: i e' o' o u
>u' o' e' are /U O E/; I prefer to write them with the Vietnamese horn
>diacritic but that's obviously not good usage on the list.
>
>Consonant system:
[or the relevant parts of it]
>p-k^w ts-tS-tS^w tz-dZ-dZ^w G-g
> s-S-S^w
[Later in the thread:]
>I'm imagining that it was a tidier, more transparent system sometime in the
>past, that got obscured and warped by vowel shifts and mergers.
>The consonants, incidentally, sort of indicate to me that maybe the green
>system was historically a less rounded system, which might mean that it was
>front, or unrounded, or something, this being the reason it maintains a
>labialization contrast in the affricate series.
At first glance that looks like an irregularily collapsed ATR harmony
instead: start with /i e a o u I E A O U/ and apply a back-vowel raise chain
of /u U o O A/ > /u\ u U o O/; then collapse /i u/ with /I U/, and loop /u\/
back to a new /U/. Nothing *too*atrocious, altho I suppose a chain shift of
that sort would be unlikely in an ATR harmonic system, as it would totally
wreck its articulatory basis.
As far as the consonants go, RTR vowels causing palatalization does make
some sort of crazy sense (to me anyway), since it does involve mooving the
tongue backwards, but I have no idea what the hell might have caused the
labialization or G<>g alternations then... But let's try the rounding
harmony, too. Maybe you could have the *blue* system be unrounded instead,
and then have the postalveolars retain their rounding after rounding was no
longer contrastiv ... Nah, now the palatalization is left unexplained! I
could try to combine the two, maybe in a baroq double-harmony system, or
possibly just an ATR system spiced with transparent rounded vowels + some
moderately contrived vowel shifts, but I don't think I'll bother. I mean,
this *was* just a random example that doesn't necessarily have a solution,
right?
Anyway, I bet a harmony system that complex would be already opaq to nativ
speakers, so you'd have loanwords and new derivation paradigms messing the
system up all over...
The idea *is* neat, tho, so thanks for the food for thought. As a conlanger
with a vowel harmonic L1, I shur' ought to have a conlang with one already,
too, wouldn't I? And in fact, I do have a draft lying about sumwhere of an
ATR system with /y Y/ added ... maybe I ought to have a 2nd look at it. And
maybe start trying to partially collapse it in various quirky ways. I think
I abandoned that phonology when choosing the side projects focus on because
I didn't like the consonant system - which was also harmonic, independantly
of the vowels...
<is essentially thinking out loud by this point>
>I'm thinking that there's basically a toggle, a morpheme can be either
>dominant or recessive; some combination of dominance and 'head-ish-ness'
>(probably the most headly dominant bit, or the most headly bit if no
>dominant bits are present) determines the colour of a word. I can imagine
>that occurring in a language where harmony has sort of run away with the
>spoon and become grammaticalised, rather than merely something in the
>phonology.
Yeah, that would be cool to come across.
>Maybe 'switch the colour of a word' is a way to pronounce it emphatically
>or humorously...
>--
>Shreyas
For the record, there's half a dozen or so Finnish words that have
historically switched their harmony gruop, usually achieving a deminutiv
meaning in the process. A still slightly transparent example (& one where
the original form still survives as well) would be <tuhma> "naughty" vs.
<tyhmä> "stupid".
(Hanlon's Razor anyone? :)
---
Also, kudos to David for mentioning the interesting article! 'Twas good food
for thought as well.
John Vertical
Messages in this topic (11)
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10a. Re: Translation Challenge: Foucault's Pendulum
Posted by: "Roger Mills" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:15 am (PDT)
Carsten Becker wrote:
> As seen on the ZBB. It's a real challenge, but worth it.
> See: www.beckerscarsten.de/conlang/ayeri/xmp_pendulum.pdf --
> I translated the text from German, as explained in that
> file.
Fascinating!! There is, or used to be, one of those devices at the Museum of
Science in Chicago, which I saw as a child. It had a stylus/pen attached,
that made a mark on paper at the bottom of each swing. Over the course of 24
hours, the marks produced a rosette-like figure, since apparently the
pendulum always moved in a constant plane, while the earth turned.
IIRC........:-)))
I don't recall any mention of a magnet.
Save for a few words, I think Kash is ready for this, except for the very
compound sentences....There is, amazingly, a word for "pendulum"......I
suppose Foucault will be a Gwr name (Fu Kòw [fukOw], Fukawu in Kash) .....
> In the thread on the ZBB this is from there are also
> translation of the above into Icelandic and Indonesian -- by
> native speakers, but unfortunately without interlinears or
> any other explanations.
How much Ayeri vocabulary did you have to devise for this?
It would be helpful if someone would provide the original Italian.
I was encouraged to see that I could still figure out the Indonesian ^_^
Carsten, you are really going out with a bang!! Don't be no-mail for too
long.
Messages in this topic (2)
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10b. Re: Translation Challenge: Foucault's Pendulum
Posted by: "Damien Perrotin" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:34 am (PDT)
Skrivet en doa Roger Mills:
> Carsten Becker wrote:
>
>> As seen on the ZBB. It's a real challenge, but worth it.
>> See: www.beckerscarsten.de/conlang/ayeri/xmp_pendulum.pdf --
>> I translated the text from German, as explained in that
>> file.
>>
>
> Fascinating!! There is, or used to be, one of those devices at the Museum of
> Science in Chicago, which I saw as a child. It had a stylus/pen attached,
> that made a mark on paper at the bottom of each swing. Over the course of 24
> hours, the marks produced a rosette-like figure, since apparently the
> pendulum always moved in a constant plane, while the earth turned.
> IIRC........:-)))
>
> I don't recall any mention of a magnet.
>
> Save for a few words, I think Kash is ready for this, except for the very
> compound sentences....There is, amazingly, a word for "pendulum"......I
> suppose Foucault will be a Gwr name (Fu Kòw [fukOw], Fukawu in Kash) .....
>
Guthisk is definitely ready, but of course it's an altlang, so it's
easier. Most of the "difficult" vocabulary has been borrowed from Latin
and I see no reason why a germanic language spoken in Crimea could not
have done the same :-)
Of course, for Lautopaei, it will be a bit more difficult
Messages in this topic (2)
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11. Re: THEORY: Laxness?
Posted by: "John Vertical" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:23 am (PDT)
>Why is [I] lax and [i] tense, [E] lax and [e] tense? I understand the
>terms "tense" and "lax" are relatively poorly defined, but if a
>language has spots in which vowels go that differ in length (e.g.
>because of a length distinction, or open vs closed syllables), it is
>common to find the "lax" one in the short position, and the "tense"
>one in the long position. This is often described in terms of
>undershoot: in short spots, in order to reach the tense target, the
>tongue would have to move too fast (or something similar), and so it
>doesn't quite reach the target; this failure may become phonologised
>so that these accidents become standard allophones or even even
>distinct phonemes with loss of the earlier length.
>
>This description implicitly takes as its starting point a neutral
>resting position of the tongue, something in the vicinity of [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>(or
>perhaps even lower; [E] and [O] are lower than [EMAIL PROTECTED]). But in
>connected
>speech, vowels don't alternate with a neutral resting tongue position,
>nor (for the most part) with other vowels (which might draw them to an
>average position likely around [EMAIL PROTECTED]). They alternate with
>consonants,
>which mostly involve closures towards the top of the mouth, and draw
>the tongue upwards (the main exceptions to this are pharyngeals, which
>draw the tongue down, bilabials, which do not involve the tongue, and
>possibly uvulars---I'm not quite sure). So wouldn't undershoot
>encourage [i] and [e] in comparison to [I] and [E], which are further
>away from where the tongue is, and where it's going to?
>
>Am I missing something comparatively obvious here?
>--
>Tristan.
I'm not shur' if it should be obvious, but there's the fact that the tongue
is not a single entity. Coronals (=dentals, (post/)alveolars & retroflexes)
mostly use the front part; vowels and dorsals (=palatals, velars & uvulars)
use the middle part. So just like gutturals and labials, a coronal such as
/t/, in itself, does not really en- nor discourage /i/ nor /I/. Laxing,
AIUI, is more of a Sprachbund-like feature. A seemingly mutually exclusiv
alternate would be palatalization; so if a language tends to lax the tongue
during consonant articulation, you'd be more likely to get [ti] > [tI]; if
it doesn't, you already have [t_ji].
A follow-up question might be why even velars, however, seem to just about
never raise vowels...? A partial explanation could ibe that an allophonic
[q] or [k_-] before low back vowels is more common that we realize, while
low front vowels are equally far from all POAs to default to [k]... But I'm
just speculating by now.
Ooh, wait! One more thing. I've understood that with lax vowels, the
rounding (or lack of it) tends to be much less exagerrated than with tense
vowels. I remember when I introduced sum'one to the concept of vowel
rounding & he proceeded to classify (English) /U/ as "unrounded" and /i/ as
"wide" ("anti-rounded"?)...
John Vertical
Messages in this topic (3)
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12. OT: English -uice
Posted by: "Mark Reed" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 2:16 pm (PDT)
Where did the orthographic <i> come from in words like juice and
sluice? In ME they apparently had -use, so I'm confused. Was the -i-
ever pronounced?
"Juice" is second-nature, but "sluice" still throws me. Makes me want
to say /sluwIs/ or something.
--
Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Messages in this topic (1)
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13a. Re: English -uice
Posted by: "Roger Mills" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 2:34 pm (PDT)
Mark J. Reed wrote:
> Where did the orthographic <i> come from in words like juice and
> sluice? In ME they apparently had -use, so I'm confused. Was the -i-
> ever pronounced?
>
> "Juice" is second-nature, but "sluice" still throws me. Makes me want
> to say /sluwIs/ or something.
"Suit" also (vs. suite).
In juice/suit it could be a half-hearted attempt to duplicate the French
pronunciation.
Is sluice in ME? I'd suspect a later borrowing of Dutch sluis, again with an
attempt to get the weird diphthong right.
Just speculating.
(Just noticed-- my little Hugo's pocket dict. gives "-ow-" for the
pronunciation of "ui" words, "hows, slows, slowten" for huis, sluis, sluiten
et al.... Contrary to everything I've ever heard/read.)
Messages in this topic (2)
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13b. Re: English -uice
Posted by: "Andreas Johansson" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 3:36 pm (PDT)
Quoting Arthaey Angosii <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> OED has this to say about "sluice":
>
> [ad. OF. escluse (-clusse, -clouse, etc.; mod.F. écluse), = Sp. and
> Pg. esclusa, late and med.L. exclusa (also sclusa, etc.), fem. sing.
> of L. exclūsus, pa. pple. of exclūdere to shut out, EXCLUDE v.
>
> OF. is also the source of MDu. sluse, sluyse, sluus (Du. sluis, WFris.
> slús), MLG. sluse, sluze (LG. slüse, slüs, G. schleuse), Da. sluse,
> Sw. slus. For the English forms which represent the late L. clūsa see
> CLOW n.1
The Swedish is _sluss_, with a doubled final, actually.
Andreas
Messages in this topic (2)
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14. Nahuatl sound files?
Posted by: "Henrik Theiling" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Jul 28, 2006 2:52 pm (PDT)
Hi!
Can anyone point me to WWW resourses for spoken Nahuatl?
Bye,
Henrik
Messages in this topic (1)
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