qiihoskeh | Entries tagged with clpoly

These are also subject to change.

The aspect suffix, followed by the mood/tense suffix, appears right before the object number suffix and after any aspectual, modal, or other verb suffix.

The aspect suffixes are:
-Prf -e Perfective
-Ipf -a Imperfective
-Ret -oo Retrospective
-Pro -ii Prospective
-Tsl -yy Tenseless

I'm not sure about the long vowels.

The mood/tense suffixes are:
-Imp -l Imperative
-Sub -x Subjunctive
-Opt -p Optative
-PrsInd -m Indicative, Absolute Present
-PstInd -k Indicative, Past
-FutInd -s Indicative, Future
.Ind 0 Indicative, Relative Present

The tense suffixes and the imperative mood suffix aren't used with the tenseless aspect.
The absolute present suffix isn't used with the perfective aspect and the relative present perfective isn't used in main clauses.
I'm not sure if the absolute present suffix is used in main clauses.

Other Affixes

I haven't worked out anything for the aspectuals, modals, evidentials, attitudinals, etc. except that at least some of these will use suffixes.

Orthography

Consonant Letters: p, t, k, c, b, d, g, z, f, s, x, h, m, n, tl, l, j, w.
Vowel Letters: i, e, a, o, y.

c = [ts)]
z = [dz)]
x = [S]
n = [n] or [N] depending on what follows
tl = [tK)]
e = [E]
y = [I\] although this might actually be a strongly retracted [e]

B, d, g, and z contrast with p, t, k, and c after m, n, and l. Only the former occur between vowels* and only the latter occur elsewhere. Also, tl becomes l between vowels.

* except that Vh tends to be pronounced like V:.

I have some specific affixes now for PolyG, if I don't scrap them.

Numbers are S == Singular, P == Plural, and E == Extended. Extended referents include associated persons while simple plurals don't.

Subject Person and Number Prefixes

1S- xe-, 1XE- xo-; 1st person (exclusive)
1NP- ma-, 1NE- mo-; 1st person inclusive
2S- ke-, 2P- ka-, 2E- ko-; 2nd person
LS- tle-, LP- tla-, LE- tlo-; Local == 2nd person subject with 1st person primary object. These can't be used with monovalent verbs or with monovalent alignment. Also, the primary object number can't be plural.
3S. 0, 3P- a-, 3E- o-; 3rd person. Extended is used only with animate subjects. 3S: y- is inserted before l- and n- alignment prefixes.

Primary Object Number Suffixes

-OS 0, -OP -a, -OE -o; 3rd person except when subject marking is Local.

Except where the subject marking is local or the primary object is preempted, the primary object is third person (obviative if the subject is also 3rd person).

Alignment Prefixes

These determine the relationship between the subject and the object of divalent and trivalent verbs and aren't used on monovalent verbs. The first three preempt the primary object.

Ant- i-; "Antipassive". Direct with primary object unspecified.
Pas- l-; "Passive". Inverse with primary object unspecified.
Rfx- n-; Reflexive.
Dir. 0; Direct. Subject "acts on" primary object.
Inv- s-; Inverse. Primary object "acts on" subject.
Rcp- hto-; Reciprocal.

The combination e + i becomes yy.

Third Argument Affixes

These are for trivalent verbs. I'm not sure if these are going to be prefixes or suffixes. They're assumed to have inanimate referents.

IS- te-, IP- ta-;

Other Prefixes

CMI- replaces the 3rd argument affix. The next three replace the subject prefix except that they can precede a 1st or 2nd person subject prefix (assuming the primary object isn't preempted). Ina- precedes an otherwise divalent finite verb.

CMI- ti-; Coreference Main secondary object (trivalent only).
CMS- ty-; Coreference Main Subject.
CMO- hy-; Coreference Main primary Object.
Adj- ne-; marks form as being adjectival.
Ina- i-/j-; inanimate adjectival (trivalent only). J- occurs before a- or o-.

Example Word Forms

I'm going to have to make up some words for these on the fly, so they'll probably change. Note the k to g, t to d, and tl to l changes between vowels.

Melek. - He ran.
Tleskanek. - I saw you (singular).
Keganega. - You saw them.
Xyyganek. - I saw (something).
nenkanek - (the person) that saw herself
Tlehtodasobek. - We (you singular and I) gave them to each other.
ilehtosobek - (the things) that we gave each other

* The PolyF documentation is now online at

http://qiihoskeh.googlepages.com/PfNTOC.htm

I worked on comparisons (comparatives, superlatives, etc) some.

* I've mostly been working on PolyG (not the previously mentioned nameless project).

PolyG avoids marking person for one of the core arguments (the lower one in the hierarchy) by using a special 2nd person acting on 1st person morpheme along with the direct/inverse system. This leaves only number to be marked, except that adjectival and coreferential markers are used for those forms instead of number. The coreferential forms are used for subordinate verbs, adverbial forms, secondary predicates, and verbs following conjunctions. The direct/inverse markers are divided into divalent and monovalent. The divalent markers are direct (probably 0), inverse, and reciprocal. The monovalent markers are "antipassive" (direct with lower argument unspecified), "passive" (inverse with lower argument unspecified), and reflexive. Trivalent verbs add markers for 3rd person. Monovalent verbs, which includes adjectives, use a subset of the system. Nouns will probably use affixes similar to the verb's personal affixes for possessive markers. Possibly, number will be marked only on the verb.

The protolanguage will use a fairly small (10-11) number of consonants (labeled *p, *t, *k, *q, *f, *s, *h, *m, *n, *l, and maybe *r) with five vowels (labeled *i, *e, *a, *o, and *u). *q is probably [?]. Additional consonants that develop are /c/ [ts)], /b/, /d/, /g/, /z/ [dz)], /x/ [S], /j/, and /w/. The voiced stops and affricate come from intervocal consonants, with vowels subsequently deleted in some instances. Extralong syllables will be allowed. Some onset clusters with C + /l/, /j/, and /w/ are possible. The rest of the phonology is still to be worked out.

* I finished rereading White Gold Wielder. I see that the eighth Thomas Covenant book is finally coming out later this year.

* I went to the doctor Wednesday; my blood tests came out OK. I had an ultrasound of my heart done yesterday. It was in Hialeah, so I spent most of the day waiting for transportation.

* I'm still working on PolyF. I finished writing up the Satisfactive, Excessive, and Result Constructions section and Purpose Clauses.

Now I'm working on adverbial clauses and secondary predicates. There are forms specifically for the "object complement" type of secondary predicate ending in -ene (-ente if inverse). The adverbial forms ending in -e (-ou if inverse) are used for the "subject complement" type. PolyF uses secondary predicates in fewer situations than English does, preferring subordinate clauses when the "host" verb is attitudinal or evidential.

I may finally have some personal pronouns; these are used only when topical or when focused. I think the topical pronouns will have redundant agreement when corresponding to the 2nd or 3rd argument (the 1st argument always has redundant agreement), that is the personal prefix will be present (it's otherwise omitted when an argument phrase is present). I'm proposing that the focused pronouns have 3rd person agreement.

I haven't decided whether numbers will have gender agreement, like adjectives, or not, like nouns.

* I've finished rereading The One Tree and have started rereading White Gold Wielder, the third book of the trilogy.

* I'm still looking at Berkeley Hotels. The Beau Sky Hotel is a block away from where the conference is, but rooms start at $119 a night (plus tax). The Faculty Club is actually on campus, but on the other side. I could get a room there for $100. The Berkeley Inn is about a mile away by bus, but is only $67. There may be others I haven't found yet.

* One thing I've been working on is the PolyF auxiliary verbs. I've been trying to decide which are static, having only an imperfective aspect, and which are dynamic. It makes a difference because dynamic verbs end in -CVC and must be infixed if imperfective, while static verbs (which I've been calling adjectives) only have to end in -C and are unmarked when imperfective. Something I'll probably do is have suffixes corresponding to some of the auxiliaries which are used when the person making the judgement can be implicit and the aspect of the content verb is unimportant. The suffixes have the same roots as the independent auxiliaries and are added to the subjunctive stem. Example:

Nahâgles Tâmu. "Tom can write."
Lenahes Tâmu. "Tom wrote (something)."

One issue that comes up is whether the object can be omitted without the omission being marked with the le- prefix.

Last Edited: 2006.Dec.23 Sat

I'm probably scrapping the current affix system of the polysynthetic conlang. I'm working on a new system. The current system uses suffixes for all arguments and distinguishes extended plurals from limited plurals. The new system moves the first argument to prefix position (nounstems will use prefixes for possessors and determiners; the possessors will have the same origin as the first argument prefixes) and distinguishes only singular and plural number. It still uses a direct/inverse system (nounstems will use a different inverse marker, probably a suffix). It now uses a suffix to distinguish adverbial and adjectival forms from verbal forms. These preempt the second argument except that (a) for monovalent verbstems and reflexive divalent verbstems, the first argument is preempted and (b) there's a second adjectival suffix that preempts the third argument instead (I should note that the third argument represents the direct or secondary object). Oh, and the current umlaut system is also out too.

So far, so good; but I'm having trouble, as usual, with assigning sounds to the affixes that sound right.
( Read more... )
There are fewer combinations of affixes, which simplifies the documentation: only
1st argument * grammatical voice (32 prefix combinations),
3rd argument * 2nd argument (15 suffix combinations),
part of speech * 2nd argument (5 suffix combinations), and
part of speech * 3rd argument (6 suffix combinations).
This is really a lot simpler than the current system.

* I came up with a system of personal suffixes for the polysynthetic conlang. It's not exactly what I want esthetically, but it seems to work. It's so complicated, I don't know how to describe it, though. I think I'll have to use a large set of tables giving each combination of two consecutive suffixes.

I used a set of anticipatory assimilations for the vowels, blocked by two or more consonants. This changes a sequence of CV suffixes to something like C(VC(VC)) with changes to the stem as well. So that "You gave me them." comes out as something like <bolcilus>, assuming <bol> means "give".

Tense, mood, and aspect will be marked by prefixes. For the imperative mood, the 2nd person (and possibly the 1st person inclusive) suffixes become prefixes. I'm possibly using the project VOS system for tense (with definite distinguished from indefinite as well as perfective distinguished from imperfective).