There are 13 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1a. Bilinguingal Children
From: Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews
1b. Re: Bilinguingal Children
From: Patrick Dunn
1c. Re: Bilinguingal Children
From: Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews
2a. Re: Creating a Proto-language
From: Patrick Dunn
2b. Re: Creating a Proto-language
From: Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews
2c. Re: Creating a Proto-language
From: Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews
2d. Re: Creating a Proto-language
From: Gary Shannon
2e. Re: Creating a Proto-language
From: DM
2f. Re: Creating a Proto-language
From: Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews
2g. Re: Creating a Proto-language
From: Garth Wallace
3.1. Re: CHAT: Does etymology awareness affect your speech?
From: George Corley
4.1. Re: Pesky morphemes
From: R A Brown
4.2. Re: Pesky morphemes
From: R A Brown
Messages
________________________________________________________________________
1a. Bilinguingal Children
Posted by: "Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 4:30 pm ((PDT))
In a previous message, I mentioned I could work in a girl into my work who
speaks Silknish. When she learns Yardish, does that make her a binlingual
child, since silknish is a dieing language. I'm thinking she and her family
are the last line of Silknish speakers.
Messages in this topic (3)
________________________________________________________________________
1b. Re: Bilinguingal Children
Posted by: "Patrick Dunn" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 6:16 pm ((PDT))
Bilingual simply means speaking two languages. The living or dead nature
of those languages is irrelevant in terms of whether or not someone is
bilingual. If you speak English and Latin, you're still bilingual even
though Latin is dead.
On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 9:29 PM, Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews <
[email protected]> wrote:
> In a previous message, I mentioned I could work in a girl into my work who
> speaks Silknish. When she learns Yardish, does that make her a binlingual
> child, since silknish is a dieing language. I'm thinking she and her
> family
> are the last line of Silknish speakers.
>
--
Second Person, a chapbook of poetry by Patrick Dunn, is now available for
order from Finishing Line
Press<http://www.finishinglinepress.com/NewReleasesandForthcomingTitles.htm>
and
Amazon<http://www.amazon.com/Second-Person-Patrick-Dunn/dp/1599249065/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1324342341&sr=8-2>.
Messages in this topic (3)
________________________________________________________________________
1c. Re: Bilinguingal Children
Posted by: "Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 6:30 pm ((PDT))
Thanks.
-----Original Message-----
From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of Patrick Dunn
Sent: Friday, March 22, 2013 6:16 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Bilinguingal Children
Bilingual simply means speaking two languages. The living or dead nature
of those languages is irrelevant in terms of whether or not someone is
bilingual. If you speak English and Latin, you're still bilingual even
though Latin is dead.
On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 9:29 PM, Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews <
[email protected]> wrote:
> In a previous message, I mentioned I could work in a girl into my work who
> speaks Silknish. When she learns Yardish, does that make her a binlingual
> child, since silknish is a dieing language. I'm thinking she and her
> family
> are the last line of Silknish speakers.
>
--
Second Person, a chapbook of poetry by Patrick Dunn, is now available for
order from Finishing Line
Press<http://www.finishinglinepress.com/NewReleasesandForthcomingTitles.htm>
and
Amazon<http://www.amazon.com/Second-Person-Patrick-Dunn/dp/1599249065/ref=sr
_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1324342341&sr=8-2>.
Messages in this topic (3)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
2a. Re: Creating a Proto-language
Posted by: "Patrick Dunn" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 6:14 pm ((PDT))
The Power of Babel is a good, accessible, and entertaining book. I don't
know the other one.
You might also like Guy Deutsch's The Unfolding of Language.
On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 5:02 PM, Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews <
[email protected]> wrote:
> I'm going to use it to explain the present language's etimology. But
> because
> it's a dead language, does it still count as a proto-language, or is it a
> dead language period. Also, how do I account for it dieing out, since no
> Yemorans came into contact with Yardish, the present form of the language.
>
> Also, here's a slightly off-topic question, how far back in time should I
> go
> to get linguistic material, is 2003 to out-of-date, I'm thinking so, but am
> curious to know what you think. I had a book called The Power of Babel, but
> it was written in 2001, and I have a book called Language Endanger, I think
> it was written in 2003.
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:[email protected]] On
> Behalf Of Jyri Lehtinen
> Sent: Friday, March 22, 2013 10:14 AM
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: Creating a Proto-language
>
> 2013/3/22 Roger Mills <[email protected]>
>
> > --- On Thu, 3/21/13, Patrick Dunn <[email protected]> wrote:
> > You don't *need* to have a protolanguage. A lot of us like to do that
> > because we find figuring out the sound changes to be fun, but if you
> think
> > it's a chore, skip it.
> > ======================================
> >
> > Ah sad but true. And if you've created a living, modern language from
> thin
> > air, it's VERY HARD to devise it's proto-language, though it can be
> > done..... Imagine, trying to get back to Proto-IE just on the basis of
> > modern English.
> >
>
> Well, you don't have to go many millennia back in time with your
> proto-language. It all depends on what you want to do with it. Is it going
> to function as a way to explain where the grammar of the "present" language
> comes from or are you going to use it to derive some sister languages, or
> maybe its an older form of the language that you see in old literature.
>
> I think the hardness goes the other way around. When you have created the
> grammar out of thin air it can be very hard to come u pwith a logical and
> plausible history for it. But on the other hand, you can have a lot of
> freedom explaining your word forms if you go by the way of extensive
> simplification of the sound system (complicated words becoming simpler and
> tidier ones).
>
> -Jyri
>
--
Second Person, a chapbook of poetry by Patrick Dunn, is now available for
order from Finishing Line
Press<http://www.finishinglinepress.com/NewReleasesandForthcomingTitles.htm>
and
Amazon<http://www.amazon.com/Second-Person-Patrick-Dunn/dp/1599249065/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1324342341&sr=8-2>.
Messages in this topic (24)
________________________________________________________________________
2b. Re: Creating a Proto-language
Posted by: "Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 6:27 pm ((PDT))
I'll look for it.
-----Original Message-----
From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of Patrick Dunn
Sent: Friday, March 22, 2013 6:15 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Creating a Proto-language
The Power of Babel is a good, accessible, and entertaining book. I don't
know the other one.
You might also like Guy Deutsch's The Unfolding of Language.
On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 5:02 PM, Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews <
[email protected]> wrote:
> I'm going to use it to explain the present language's etimology. But
> because
> it's a dead language, does it still count as a proto-language, or is it a
> dead language period. Also, how do I account for it dieing out, since no
> Yemorans came into contact with Yardish, the present form of the language.
>
> Also, here's a slightly off-topic question, how far back in time should I
> go
> to get linguistic material, is 2003 to out-of-date, I'm thinking so, but
am
> curious to know what you think. I had a book called The Power of Babel,
but
> it was written in 2001, and I have a book called Language Endanger, I
think
> it was written in 2003.
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:[email protected]] On
> Behalf Of Jyri Lehtinen
> Sent: Friday, March 22, 2013 10:14 AM
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: Creating a Proto-language
>
> 2013/3/22 Roger Mills <[email protected]>
>
> > --- On Thu, 3/21/13, Patrick Dunn <[email protected]> wrote:
> > You don't *need* to have a protolanguage. A lot of us like to do that
> > because we find figuring out the sound changes to be fun, but if you
> think
> > it's a chore, skip it.
> > ======================================
> >
> > Ah sad but true. And if you've created a living, modern language from
> thin
> > air, it's VERY HARD to devise it's proto-language, though it can be
> > done..... Imagine, trying to get back to Proto-IE just on the basis of
> > modern English.
> >
>
> Well, you don't have to go many millennia back in time with your
> proto-language. It all depends on what you want to do with it. Is it going
> to function as a way to explain where the grammar of the "present"
language
> comes from or are you going to use it to derive some sister languages, or
> maybe its an older form of the language that you see in old literature.
>
> I think the hardness goes the other way around. When you have created the
> grammar out of thin air it can be very hard to come u pwith a logical and
> plausible history for it. But on the other hand, you can have a lot of
> freedom explaining your word forms if you go by the way of extensive
> simplification of the sound system (complicated words becoming simpler and
> tidier ones).
>
> -Jyri
>
--
Second Person, a chapbook of poetry by Patrick Dunn, is now available for
order from Finishing Line
Press<http://www.finishinglinepress.com/NewReleasesandForthcomingTitles.htm>
and
Amazon<http://www.amazon.com/Second-Person-Patrick-Dunn/dp/1599249065/ref=sr
_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1324342341&sr=8-2>.
Messages in this topic (24)
________________________________________________________________________
2c. Re: Creating a Proto-language
Posted by: "Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 6:29 pm ((PDT))
I just found a whole bunch of questionnaires from The Department of
Linguistics. I figure us conlangers are ikind of field linguistics.
-----Original Message-----
From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of Patrick Dunn
Sent: Friday, March 22, 2013 6:15 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Creating a Proto-language
The Power of Babel is a good, accessible, and entertaining book. I don't
know the other one.
You might also like Guy Deutsch's The Unfolding of Language.
On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 5:02 PM, Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews <
[email protected]> wrote:
> I'm going to use it to explain the present language's etimology. But
> because
> it's a dead language, does it still count as a proto-language, or is it a
> dead language period. Also, how do I account for it dieing out, since no
> Yemorans came into contact with Yardish, the present form of the language.
>
> Also, here's a slightly off-topic question, how far back in time should I
> go
> to get linguistic material, is 2003 to out-of-date, I'm thinking so, but
am
> curious to know what you think. I had a book called The Power of Babel,
but
> it was written in 2001, and I have a book called Language Endanger, I
think
> it was written in 2003.
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:[email protected]] On
> Behalf Of Jyri Lehtinen
> Sent: Friday, March 22, 2013 10:14 AM
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: Creating a Proto-language
>
> 2013/3/22 Roger Mills <[email protected]>
>
> > --- On Thu, 3/21/13, Patrick Dunn <[email protected]> wrote:
> > You don't *need* to have a protolanguage. A lot of us like to do that
> > because we find figuring out the sound changes to be fun, but if you
> think
> > it's a chore, skip it.
> > ======================================
> >
> > Ah sad but true. And if you've created a living, modern language from
> thin
> > air, it's VERY HARD to devise it's proto-language, though it can be
> > done..... Imagine, trying to get back to Proto-IE just on the basis of
> > modern English.
> >
>
> Well, you don't have to go many millennia back in time with your
> proto-language. It all depends on what you want to do with it. Is it going
> to function as a way to explain where the grammar of the "present"
language
> comes from or are you going to use it to derive some sister languages, or
> maybe its an older form of the language that you see in old literature.
>
> I think the hardness goes the other way around. When you have created the
> grammar out of thin air it can be very hard to come u pwith a logical and
> plausible history for it. But on the other hand, you can have a lot of
> freedom explaining your word forms if you go by the way of extensive
> simplification of the sound system (complicated words becoming simpler and
> tidier ones).
>
> -Jyri
>
--
Second Person, a chapbook of poetry by Patrick Dunn, is now available for
order from Finishing Line
Press<http://www.finishinglinepress.com/NewReleasesandForthcomingTitles.htm>
and
Amazon<http://www.amazon.com/Second-Person-Patrick-Dunn/dp/1599249065/ref=sr
_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1324342341&sr=8-2>.
Messages in this topic (24)
________________________________________________________________________
2d. Re: Creating a Proto-language
Posted by: "Gary Shannon" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 6:44 pm ((PDT))
On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 6:14 PM, Patrick Dunn <[email protected]> wrote:
> The Power of Babel is a good, accessible, and entertaining book. I don't
> know the other one.
>
> You might also like Guy Deutsch's The Unfolding of Language.
>
I second that motion. I'm reading Deutsch's book right now. My
daughter gave it to me last weekend.
--gary
Messages in this topic (24)
________________________________________________________________________
2e. Re: Creating a Proto-language
Posted by: "DM" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 7:35 pm ((PDT))
Deutscher not only wrote The Unfolding of Language (which is excellent),
but Through the Language Glass, another excellent book that deals mostly
with how language affects our view of the world, if it does this at all (a
rehashing of Sapir-Whorf with an alternative theory presented). The section
that sticks in my mind most is the analysis of languages that use an
absolute-direction system for describing spatial relationships, rather than
one based on current location of the speaker. I own both of his works and
recommend them to everyone on the list.
Messages in this topic (24)
________________________________________________________________________
2f. Re: Creating a Proto-language
Posted by: "Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 9:16 pm ((PDT))
I'll look for that as well. I'll try audio first, and Braille as a last
resort.
-----Original Message-----
From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of DM
Sent: Friday, March 22, 2013 7:36 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Creating a Proto-language
Deutscher not only wrote The Unfolding of Language (which is excellent),
but Through the Language Glass, another excellent book that deals mostly
with how language affects our view of the world, if it does this at all (a
rehashing of Sapir-Whorf with an alternative theory presented). The section
that sticks in my mind most is the analysis of languages that use an
absolute-direction system for describing spatial relationships, rather than
one based on current location of the speaker. I own both of his works and
recommend them to everyone on the list.
Messages in this topic (24)
________________________________________________________________________
2g. Re: Creating a Proto-language
Posted by: "Garth Wallace" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 10:48 pm ((PDT))
On Sat, Mar 23, 2013 at 12:15 AM, Nicole Valicia Thompson-Andrews
<[email protected]> wrote:
> I'll look for that as well. I'll try audio first, and Braille as a last
> resort.
Speaking of braille, you might find this link handy:
http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~reng/BrlIPA.html
It's about IPA Braille in particular, and IPA accessibility in
general. I can't personally vouch for it, but it seems promising.
Messages in this topic (24)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
3.1. Re: CHAT: Does etymology awareness affect your speech?
Posted by: "George Corley" [email protected]
Date: Fri Mar 22, 2013 8:35 pm ((PDT))
On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 4:19 PM, Matthew George <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 4:48 PM, George Corley <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > Alright, then historically it's a different process. I would still
> expect
> > that, given what we know about similar situations, that synchronically
> > these have become a single lexeme. That jives with the other similar
> > situations we've been citing where give/recieve meanings are bound to the
> > same word.
> >
>
> Which would be fine and dandy - except absent a nuance to distinguish the
> different meanings, making the two words synonymously one deprives the
> language of a way to express a meaning without gaining any expressiveness.
> A net loss of utility.
>
What exactly are you talking about? I'm just trying to figure out
descriptively what's going on -- my claim is that it _is_ a single lexeme,
not that it _should_ be. I really don't care about your value judgements
on the matter -- it's an established usage that is consistently used by
native speakers, therefore I want to try to explain it.
> I see no reason why any language (even English) *must* do things the way
> English does at the moment... but the referenced usage doesn't represent an
> alternate method, merely a breaking of the existing one.
>
I didn't claim that English _must_ do anything. In fact, this part of your
message is completely baffling to me. I am not proposing that anyone use
"learn" any differently -- I am merely hypothesizing why people use it in
the way that they do. Linguistics is a science, after all.
Messages in this topic (44)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
4.1. Re: Pesky morphemes
Posted by: "R A Brown" [email protected]
Date: Sat Mar 23, 2013 1:28 am ((PDT))
On 22/03/2013 22:40, Jyri Lehtinen wrote:
[snip - I wrote]
>> It is much simpler IMO to take the invariable bit as
>> the the lexical base, and the rest as the suffix. OK,
>> it does mean that we have allomorphs for the suffixes,
>> but we would have that whatever we did, we avoid doing
>> the same for the stem and we produce 'rules' which
>> have far fewer exceptions (always a good thing IMO).
>>
>
> Well, what was on my mind is that you can't use the same
> kind of splitting mechanically for every language.
No, I was not intending to imply that. The thing about a
fusional language is that it "is a type of synthetic
language, distinguished from agglutinative languages by its
tendency to overlay many morphemes in a way that can be
difficult to segment."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusional_language
Morphemes are overlaid and difficult to segment. That's
why they're pesky in such languages ;)
With a purely agglutinative language or isolating language,
morpheme segmentation is straightforward and, indeed, there
is some sort of correspondence between morphemes and
"units of meaning" (which is what began this thread). Which
is probably why conlangs tend be either isolating or
agglutinative ;)
But with fusional languages that clearly ain't so.
> A sane way to do morphemic breakdown for Finnish will
> lead you to have stem alternation as well as allomorphy
> of the affixes even when you disregard the uncertain
> cases.
Your knowledge of Finnish is a good deal better than mine,
so I accept your word on this.
> One argument for this is that most of the affixes work
> in a very agglutinating manner and have constant forms
> appearing everywhere.
Yes, Finnish is often quoted as an example of an
agglutinative language; but clearly from what both you and,
indeed, BPJ have written, it has fusional elements as well.
[interesting examples snipped]
>> I suppose these could be regarded as three allophones
>> of the morpheme "to see" whose form is conditioned by
>> the extra meaning added to it. Or they could be
>> regarded as three separate but related morphemes.
>>
>
> I have to say I'm a bit uncomfortable in making such
> terminological distinction especially when it comes to
> lexical units. These questions might be relevant in the
> light of various theories but when describing individual
> languages I'd say use what ever fits your data best.
Yes, as those who have been long on this list will know, I'm
not addicted to any one theoretical linguistic viewpoint,
and take an empirical approach. I most certainly agree that
"describing individual languages I'd say use what ever fits
your data best."
> As you state, you can sometimes find correlations between
> allomorphic alternations and different grammatical
> categories. But this is often not the case at all and the
> forms are just parts of an inflectional paradigm.
I agree. But the three verb allomorphs I quoted for "to
see" - vidē ~ vīd ~ vīs - do clearly have grammatical
constraints.
I think, on reflexion, I was being misled by the "units of
meaning" business with which this thread began. It is
better, I now think, not to try to attach an extra unit of
meaning to each of these allomorphs; you may recall that
when I tried to define _vīs_ as "see" + 'another meaning', I
couldn't define that 'other meaning.' Obviously a saner
approach is to define the _grammatical_ constraint under
which the particular allomorph is used.
> A case in point is Estonian noun declension (seems I
> seriously need to broaden my example pool).
Please do.
Now, how do segment the morphemes of Latin personal pronouns
- or even English personal pronouns? :)
--
Ray
==================================
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
"language … began with half-musical unanalysed expressions
for individual beings and events."
[Otto Jespersen, Progress in Language, 1895]
Messages in this topic (32)
________________________________________________________________________
4.2. Re: Pesky morphemes
Posted by: "R A Brown" [email protected]
Date: Sat Mar 23, 2013 4:50 am ((PDT))
On 23/03/2013 08:28, R A Brown wrote:
[snip]
>
> I agree. But the three verb allomorphs I quoted for "to
> see" - vidē ~ vīd ~ vīs - do clearly have grammatical
> constraints.
>
> I think, on reflexion, I was being misled by the "units
> of meaning" business with which this thread began.
I was :)
> It is better, I now think, not to try to attach an extra
> unit of meaning to each of these allomorphs; you may
> recall that when I tried to define _vīs_ as "see" +
> 'another meaning', I couldn't define that 'other
> meaning.' Obviously a saner approach is to define the
> _grammatical_ constraint under which the particular
> allomorph is used.
But are they allomorphs at all? Compare, e.g. the
corresponding three stems of the verb "to love": amā ~ amāv
~ amāt.
We'd surely say that _amāv_ and _amāt_ are bimorphemic
(though what meaning those who equate morpheme with a unit
of meaning would give -t-, I don't know). So are _vīd_ and
_vīs_ really bimorphemic with the 2nd morpheme somehow fused
to _vidē_?
But it is not as simple as that. Cf the same stems of the
verb "to break": frang ~ frēg ~ frāct. One might propose
*frag as the underlying root morpheme. So _frang_ is
bimorphemic with _n_ infixed? And _amā_ bimorphemic, with the
second morpheme being zero?
Maybe. But it occurs to me that we have similar problems
with verbs in English, e.g. _love ~ loved_ can be analyzed
OK. But what about _saw_ in: see ~ saw ~ seen?
How does one analyze _sing ~ sang ~ sung_ morphemically?
:)
--
Ray
==================================
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
"language … began with half-musical unanalysed expressions
for individual beings and events."
[Otto Jespersen, Progress in Language, 1895]
Messages in this topic (32)
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