There are 15 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1a. Re: Dessert
From: Cíat Ó Gáibhtheacháin
1b. Re: Dessert
From: Padraic Brown
1c. Re: Dessert
From: Dan Sulani
1d. Re: Dessert
From: Iuhan Culmærija
2.1. Re: Bernard Comrie, The World's Major Languages, 2ed (2011)
From: And Rosta
3a. Basic Word Lists
From: John Erickson
3b. Re: Basic Word Lists
From: George Corley
3c. Re: Basic Word Lists
From: John Erickson
3d. Re: Basic Word Lists
From: Dale McCreery
3e. Re: Basic Word Lists
From: Arthaey Angosii
3f. Re: Basic Word Lists
From: Alex Fink
3g. Re: Basic Word Lists
From: Arthaey Angosii
3h. Re: Basic Word Lists
From: Gary Shannon
4a. Re: Pronoun systems that don't mark person?
From: Alex Fink
5a. Re: Fiat Lingua, September: Is a Collaborative Conlang Even Possible
From: Matthew DeBlock
Messages
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1a. Re: Dessert
Posted by: "Cíat Ó Gáibhtheacháin" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 5:14 pm ((PDT))
She's from Gloucestershire quite middle-class, so that's to be expected.
Adam Walker <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 6:14 PM, Cíat Ó Gáibhtheacháin
><[email protected]>wrote:
>
>> No, black pudding is delicious. That is all anybody who says otherwise is
>> a raving lunatic. :-)
>>
>> The word 'pudding' with reference to dessert is very English to my ear.
>> Not just English, mind, but middle-class Home Counties. No doubt it occurs
>> outside of that small sphere too, but that's where 'pudding' as dessert
>> seems native to: I can't imagine--not that it's not possible--somebody
>> outside of there referring to a pie, cake, or tart as "pudding".
>>
>>
>>
>
>Rowling uses pudding with that meaning throughout the Harry Potter series.
>
>Adam
Messages in this topic (22)
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1b. Re: Dessert
Posted by: "Padraic Brown" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 5:59 pm ((PDT))
--- On Wed, 9/5/12, Cíat Ó Gáibhtheacháin <[email protected]> wrote:
> No, black pudding is delicious. That
> is all anybody who says otherwise is a raving lunatic. :-)
Well, call me a raving lunatic then!
> The word 'pudding' with reference to dessert is very English
> to my ear. Not just English, mind, but middle-class Home
> Counties. No doubt it occurs outside of that small sphere
> too, but that's where 'pudding' as dessert seems native to:
> I can't imagine--not that it's not possible--somebody
> outside of there referring to a pie, cake, or tart as
> "pudding".
I wouldn't go quite that far! It is entirely possible that we (Americans)
got our dessert pudding from those parts of England that only eat sensible,
sweet puddings and not that bloody muck! ;))
Padraic
> Padraic Brown <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
> >--- On Wed, 9/5/12, Sam Stutter <[email protected]>
> wrote:
> >
> >> I very rarely hear the word "dessert"
> >> actually used in general conversation unless it's
> in
> >> discussion of a specific foodstuff - things which
> are
> >> branded as such or restaurant desserts. The word
> has always
> >> seemed (to me) an affectation: that somehow this
> food is
> >> light and expensive, possibly something involving
> sorbet or
> >> soufflés. Most of the time the words "afters"
> (which has a
> >> pretty obvious etymology) or "pudding" work fine
> (apparently
> >> it's a C20th thing where pudding generally
> suggests
> >> sweetness - the word "really" means "sausage").
> >
> >Could be. I've never known pudding to be anything other
> than a sweet
> >concoction of milk, sugar, some cornstarch (or other
> thickener) and
> >some flavoring.
> >
> >I'm aware of the pudding in its context of black or
> blood pudding, and
> >although I'm an Anglophile in general terms, the
> conjunction of the
> >two words, blood and pudding, is simply and
> fundamentally wrong. ;))
> >
> >I suppose the word "dessert" comes up only infrequently
> because it is
> >really only associated with meals. Dinner and supper in
> particular. Not
> >usually breakfast. And it usually only appears in menus
> and in the
> >question "what do you want for dessert?" I'm sure a lot
> of words only
> >appear in specific contexts and not in general
> conversation. Projectile
> >vomiting, twin cams, adverse camber. Not your everyday
> topics of general
> >conversation!
> >
> >Padraic
> >
> >> Just me?
> >>
> >> Sam Stutter
> >> [email protected]
> >> "No e na'l cu barri"
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> On 4 Sep 2012, at 06:55, Shair Ahmed <[email protected]>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> > The Finnish word literally means "after
> food".
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > 2012/9/3 G. van der Vegt <[email protected]>
> >> >
> >> >> On 3 September 2012 15:35, Charlie
> Brickner <[email protected]>
> >> >> wrote:
> >> >>> Travlangâs Word of the Day (9/3/12)
> >> (travlang.com/wordofday) is
> >> >> âdessertâ. Many languages use some
> form
> >> of that word. A few use some form
> >> >> of âdolceâ (Greek
> âγλÏ
κάâ).
> >> German, Dutch and Afrikaans use a word based
> >> >> on ânach-â, after (Swedish
> >> âefterrätâ?). Many of the Romance languages
> >> >> (and Basque) use a variation of
> âpostreâ, which
> >> I assume is cognate to
> >> >> âpastryâ.
> >> >>>
> >> >>
> >> >> Dutch uses Nagerecht (After meal) and
> Dessert in
> >> formal situations,
> >> >> while it uses Toetje in most informal
> situations
> >> (diminutive noun
> >> >> based on the adverb 'toe', which means
> after, is
> >> related to English
> >> >> 'to' in its 'until' meaning, and is (IML)
> primarily
> >> used in dinner
> >> >> contexts. So it essentially means the same
> as
> >> Nagerecht.)
> >> >>
> >>
>
Messages in this topic (22)
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1c. Re: Dessert
Posted by: "Dan Sulani" [email protected]
Date: Thu Sep 6, 2012 12:25 am ((PDT))
Hi all!
On 3 Sept, Charlie Brickner wrote:
>Travlangâs Word of the Day (9/3/12) (travlang.com/wordofday) is
>âdessertâ.
>Many languages use some form of that word. A few use some form of âdolceâ
>(Greek âγλÏ
κάâ). German, Dutch and >Afrikaans use a word based on
>ânach-â,
>after (Swedish âefterrätâ?). Many of the Romance languages (and Basque)
>use a variation of âpostreâ, which I assume is cognate to âpastryâ.
>Iâm interested in the etymology of some of the other words:
<snip>
>Hebrew â Kinuâach
AFAIK, it comes from the root "kuf-nun-chet" which signifies " to wipe;
to wipe clean".
The idea of using this for "dessert" seems to be "to wipe the palate clean
after a meal".
In its verbal form /kaneax/, it is used today to refer to wiping one's
nose
(preferably with a handkerchief! ;-) ). I am informed by my native
Hebrew-speaking daughter
that to refer to wiping anything else would require a different verb.
BTW, although finishing a meal with something sweet is widespread here
in Israel, there is also a tradition in the Middle East of finishing a meal
( and cleaning the palate )
with something bitter --- especially strong black "Turkish" coffee.
(One *does* put sugar into the coffee,
but not so much as to completely drown out the bitter flavor. Adding sugar
after the coffee is brewed, also helps to settle the coffee grounds to the
bottom of the cup.)
Dan Sulani
---------------------------------------------------
likehsna rtem zuv tikuhnuh auag inuvuz vaka'a.
A word is an awesome thing.
Messages in this topic (22)
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1d. Re: Dessert
Posted by: "Iuhan Culmærija" [email protected]
Date: Thu Sep 6, 2012 1:37 am ((PDT))
2012/9/6 Cíat Ó Gáibhtheacháin <[email protected]>
> No, black pudding is delicious. That is all anybody who says otherwise is
> a raving lunatic. :-)
>
> The word 'pudding' with reference to dessert is very English to my ear.
> Not just English, mind, but middle-class Home Counties. No doubt it occurs
> outside of that small sphere too, but that's where 'pudding' as dessert
> seems native to: I can't imagine--not that it's not possible--somebody
> outside of there referring to a pie, cake, or tart as "pudding".
>
> [snip]
>
> >> >
> >> > 2012/9/3 G. van der Vegt <[email protected]>
> >> >
> >> >> Dutch uses Nagerecht (After meal) and Dessert in
> >> formal situations,
> >> >> while it uses Toetje in most informal situations
> >> (diminutive noun
> >> >> based on the adverb 'toe', which means after, is
> >> related to English
> >> >> 'to' in its 'until' meaning, and is (IML) primarily
> >> used in dinner
> >> >> contexts. So it essentially means the same as
> >> Nagerecht.)
> >> >>
> >>
>
Interestingly, Afrikaans has "nagereg" (>Ndl nagerecht) and "poeding"
(pudding), but not any relative of "dessert"
"Nagereg" is the general term for what follows the main meal. "Poeding" can
be used in informal (and more anglicised) situations, but usually "poeding"
is used for
dishes like Malva pudding* -- which is _nothing_ like the "sweet concoction
of milk, sugar, thickener and flavouring" to which the English "pudding"
seems to refer. That would also be a "nagereg."
Cakes and tarts are simple cakes (koek) and tarts (tert [>Ndl taart]). One
can eat cakes and tarts as a "nagereg" - but intuitively, as a native
speaker, I feel Afrikaans distinguishes
semantically between cakes and tarts, and desserts:
"I am having (a) dessert" -vs- "I am having cake/some tart (for dessert)"
* Apparently malva pudding is of distinct Cape-dutch origin. The best
discription I can come up with it's like "a warm cake"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malva_Pudding
Messages in this topic (22)
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2.1. Re: Bernard Comrie, The World's Major Languages, 2ed (2011)
Posted by: "And Rosta" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 6:00 pm ((PDT))
Patrick Dunn, On 06/09/2012 01:12:
> And,
>
> I just don't agree. English pronouns are very different from regular nouns:
>
> 1. They're marked for oblique cases, while most nouns are not
Certain personal pronouns have subjective forms, yes. But there's no
inconsistency with these being nouns; personal pronouns are special sorts of
nouns, with all the properties of ordinary nouns plus some special ones.
> 2. They form all plurals through suppletion,
It's debatable if they have any suppletive plurals. There are inherently
plural and inherently singular pronouns, but I can't think of clear reasons to
take them as inflectional variants of the same lexical item.
> and do not take on the usual plural or genitive suffixes of nouns
They do take plural suffixes and the possessive 's (which is an auxiliary,
IMO). The possessive 's shows up with default morphology in _its, hers, one's_,
and with nondefault morphology (for the pronoun or for the clitic) in the case
of all other pronouns. When the pronoun is part of a larger phrase, sometimes
the morphology is regular, e.g. _me and him's_. As for -s plurals, there's
_yous/youse_ in contrast to _you_, where _yous(e)_ refers to multiple
addressees, and there's _the yous/mes/hims/hers I used to know and like_, where
e.g. _yous_ refers to multiple instances of the single addressee. (The contrast
is like that between _The Beatles_, referring to multiple things each of which
is a Beatle, and _The John Lennons of this world_, referring to multiple
instances of John Lennon.)
> 3. They can stand alone as noun phrases, and nearly always do so (the
> examples given before being very much marked to my eye as deliberate
> attempts to play with language, and not ordinary daily usage of language by
> native speakers)
Plenty of nouns tend to stand alone too. It has to do with the semantics of the
noun.
> 4. They can't be marked with definite or indefinite articles, or any other
> determiners
Not so. As with so-called 'proper nouns', personal pronouns tend not to occur
with an article, but that's because they have meanings that only in rare
contexts are compatible with the meanings of the articles.
"A rather bedraggled Patrick presented himself at my door"
"A rather bedraggled me presented myself at his door"
"The him who used to buy me flowers"
"the new you"
"the new Patrick"
> 5. They can't undergo any of the derivational morphological changes of any
> other nouns in English
"meism", "youness", "himhood", "meey", "youish" (e.g. "A meey/youish colour")
cf Patrickism, Patrickness, Patrickhood, Patricky, Patrickish
I'd better clarify that I assume that grammar describes/generates the set of
possible sentences, but doesn't describe or in any way generate patterns of
usage. But patterns in usage are accounted for by the rules of grammar in
combination with pragmatics and fashion and various other factors.
> (I also don't see how this is OT, and I would hope that people would bring
> their personal expertise into matters, otherwise a whole chunk of the list
> is going to have to shut up permanently, as many of us are at least
> part-time linguists)
Surely it is OT; it has nowt to do specifically with conlanging, tho admittedly
at least 50% of all messages seem not to. I could discuss English grammar till
the cows come home. I'm less reticent about discussing linguistic stuff that
isn't my specialism, i.e. where I'm more of an amateur among many very learned
and indeed often expert amateurs. Normally when some English grammar topic
comes up, I make myself not chime in.
--And.
Messages in this topic (33)
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3a. Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "John Erickson" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 8:29 pm ((PDT))
I'm at a point with one of my languages where I'm trying to flesh out the
vocabulary but I'm having a hard time figuring out what new words I need
off the top of my head.
Are there any good basic word/concept lists out there that could help?
Messages in this topic (8)
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3b. Re: Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "George Corley" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 8:37 pm ((PDT))
William Annis's Conlanger's Thesaurus:
http://lingweenie.org/conlang/ConlangersThesaurus.pdf
Not just a word list, but also talks about common derivational and semantic
relationships to help you avoid relexing.
On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 10:29 PM, John Erickson <
[email protected]> wrote:
> I'm at a point with one of my languages where I'm trying to flesh out the
> vocabulary but I'm having a hard time figuring out what new words I need
> off the top of my head.
>
> Are there any good basic word/concept lists out there that could help?
>
Messages in this topic (8)
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3c. Re: Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "John Erickson" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 8:47 pm ((PDT))
Perfect, thanks!
Messages in this topic (8)
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3d. Re: Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "Dale McCreery" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 8:56 pm ((PDT))
Here's my favourite word list to use for this sort of thing - you can use
the headings for a somewhat basic concept list, and then expand as needed.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/473020/ddp4_domain_templates.doc
Muskwatch
> I'm at a point with one of my languages where I'm trying to flesh out the
> vocabulary but I'm having a hard time figuring out what new words I need
> off the top of my head.
>
> Are there any good basic word/concept lists out there that could help?
>
Messages in this topic (8)
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3e. Re: Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "Arthaey Angosii" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 9:30 pm ((PDT))
On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 8:29 PM, John Erickson
<[email protected]> wrote:
> I'm at a point with one of my languages where I'm trying to flesh out the
> vocabulary but I'm having a hard time figuring out what new words I need
> off the top of my head.
>
> Are there any good basic word/concept lists out there that could help?
I maintain a small list of wordlists here:
http://www.arthaey.com/conlang/translationex.html#wordlists
And CALS also has a small list:
http://cals.conlang.org/word/list/
--
Arthaey
Messages in this topic (8)
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3f. Re: Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "Alex Fink" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 10:38 pm ((PDT))
On Wed, 5 Sep 2012 21:30:19 -0700, Arthaey Angosii <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 8:29 PM, John Erickson
><[email protected]> wrote:
>> I'm at a point with one of my languages where I'm trying to flesh out the
>> vocabulary but I'm having a hard time figuring out what new words I need
>> off the top of my head.
>>
>> Are there any good basic word/concept lists out there that could help?
>
>I maintain a small list of wordlists here:
>
> http://www.arthaey.com/conlang/translationex.html#wordlists
Not to be unduly harsh, but I think most of these are not as good than the
previous suggestions on this thread (Annis' thesaurus and SIL's DDP list, both
of which are awesome), or at least not as good for the purpose.
Basic English I think is worst; we should be fighting English-relex bias, not
totally ceding to it like following the BE lists does. Ogden happily exploited
English polysemies, English idioms, etc., in choosing what to include and what
to omit. His antipathy to verbs is also, er, idiosyncratic. The same, but
less harshly, goes of Essential World English.
Then there are the lists which reflect attempts to reduce to a set of primes,
whether mild (Dublex, which ends up looking like a scattershot third or so of
Buck with certain non-general choices (let's all form our numbers with "ten to
the power of") and idiosyncratic additions ("cyberspace!") mixed in) or extreme
(Wierzbicka, for which certainly your language is lacking if you don't have all
of those meanings, but they're only universal if you allow yourself to play
charades on them).
Swadesh misses the point in a comparable way: it's a list of the historically
stable words, not a list of the useful ones.
I do like the Leipzig valency classes deal (most of us could do giving more
thought to sets of argument frame patterns) and the graded sentences for
analysis (though those I think are useful principally for the grammar, not for
the lexis).
Alex
Messages in this topic (8)
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3g. Re: Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "Arthaey Angosii" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 10:59 pm ((PDT))
On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 10:38 PM, Alex Fink <[email protected]> wrote:
> Basic English I think is worst; we should be fighting English-relex bias, not
> totally ceding to it like following the BE lists does.
>
> [snip detailed critique of the other simplistic wordlists]
>
> I do like the Leipzig valency classes deal (most of us could do giving more
> thought to sets of argument frame patterns) and the graded sentences for
> analysis (though those I think are useful principally for the grammar, not for
> the lexis).
What's interesting to me is that the lists you criticize are the ones
I collected way back when I first started conlanging, before I had
ever studied linguistics. The graded sentences I gathered from the
list as I was starting to learn more, and the Leipzig valency classes
list I found only after doing much more linguistic reading. :)
My collection is simply that, a collection. I have collected/hoarded
lists without removing the first ones I found from my list. Perhaps I
should curate my list o' lists more, but I simply haven't spent the
time to do so.
--
AA
http://conlang.arthaey.com
Messages in this topic (8)
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3h. Re: Basic Word Lists
Posted by: "Gary Shannon" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 11:32 pm ((PDT))
Gadzooks! Has it really been four years since I last updated my Graded
Sentences for Analysis. I'd better finish scanning the rest of them and get
that list completed! I have taken the book off the shelf and placed it
beside my computer to remind me tomorrow morning to get right on that!
--gary
On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 9:30 PM, Arthaey Angosii <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 8:29 PM, John Erickson
> <[email protected]> wrote:
> > I'm at a point with one of my languages where I'm trying to flesh out the
> > vocabulary but I'm having a hard time figuring out what new words I need
> > off the top of my head.
> >
> > Are there any good basic word/concept lists out there that could help?
>
> I maintain a small list of wordlists here:
>
> http://www.arthaey.com/conlang/translationex.html#wordlists
>
> And CALS also has a small list:
>
> http://cals.conlang.org/word/list/
>
>
>
> --
> Arthaey
>
Messages in this topic (8)
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4a. Re: Pronoun systems that don't mark person?
Posted by: "Alex Fink" [email protected]
Date: Wed Sep 5, 2012 9:14 pm ((PDT))
On Wed, 5 Sep 2012 16:22:53 -0400, Daniel Burgener <[email protected]>
wrote:
>I'm really, really intruiged by the gripping language. I've started
>reading through the document. Is it in a usable state yet? I might try to
>make my wife learn it with me :) And the pronoun system is really
>intruiging. I guess it does sort of mark person in a way, but definitely
>not exactly.
Thanks! Unfortunately, with the advent of UNLWS our attentions were diverted
and the gripping language hasn't received much love since. It remains in the
state described in the document, pretty much. If you seriously want to learn
it with your wife, you both are probably going to need some good practice
distinguishing the feel of the various presses first! And I guess you could
help fill out the lexicon, and do some translation exercises with it to uncover
(and perhaps fill) the holes...
Alex
Messages in this topic (8)
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5a. Re: Fiat Lingua, September: Is a Collaborative Conlang Even Possible
Posted by: "Matthew DeBlock" [email protected]
Date: Thu Sep 6, 2012 2:18 am ((PDT))
read it,
definatly exactly what the conlang community needs I think!
Everywhere I go in the conlang online world it is dead-links and missing
conent... as if there are a million "ghost towns"
I think Gary is right, the whole approach has to shift in many areas if
success if to be acheived on a significant level
> I forgot to make this post on the 1st, but we're still pretty close to the
> beginning of September, so here goes.
>
> If you've been on the Conlang-L for even a month, you're probably read a
> post or two by Gary Shannon. In addition to his own projects, though,
> Gary's been at the head of some of the most innovative and successful
> collaborative conlang projects this community has ever seen. If you're
> new, though, you haven't heard of them because they fell by the
> waysideeven though they were successful. In this article, Gary asks the
> question: Is it even possible to put together a collaborative conlang?
> It's an interesting question, and I think Gary is in a unique position
> when it comes to providing an answer. You can read his article here:
>
> http://fiatlingua.org/2012/09/
>
> David Peterson
> LCS President
> [email protected]
> www.conlang.org
>
Messages in this topic (2)
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