Language Update - a closer look at Dr. Frommer's letter

Started by Payoang, January 20, 2010, 02:11:20 PM

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Prrton

Quote from: roger on January 20, 2010, 06:47:00 PM
I'll try to answer the questions I can that haven't been covered yet.

Quote
Shouldn't yawn be a verb?
Per Frommer, the noun tìyawn derives from yawne "beloved". The e drops, as it often does, though we don't know why, or where. I imagine that oe ngaru tìyawn si (or worse, oel ngati tìyawn si) would mean something like, "hey baby, come over here and I'll love you." If it's idiomatic to say it at all, which is dubious. Prrton and I both suspect that "I love you" might be worded nga oeru yawne leiu "you are beloved to/of me".

Quote
Derived *kangkem, the verb.
Kangkem would appear to be correct. Or at least I think so. Frommer says it's derived from kan [sic] "to aim" and kem.


I think it would be really nice if nga oeru yawne leiu ("you are belovèd to/of me") turns out to be one's basic "I love you" in Na'vi, but we still don't know for sure.

*Kangkem is probably the infinitive/imperative form of of "to work" but based on rumors/hints I suspect that it does NOT conjugate/infix on kan/kang. Perhaps this will become our first example of a class of "irregular verbs" or perhaps we already have that in omum. Just try infixing it starting on o and watch what happens. There is probably already a rule about this somewhere that I don't know. If so, someone please inform me.

suomichris

#121
Hi folks,

I went through and parsed/glossed Prof. Frommer's letter in linguistic style, if people want to take a look at it.  Please do let me know if you find typos/errors/etc., or any questions about the formatting.

Here be spoilers (and etc.)!

https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B5x_kVXReq_iNjU2YzllNWMtOTQ0Mi00ZWE0LTgxZDAtYzM4Njc4MGQ5OTQ5&hl=en

EDITed to update link.

Alìm Tsamsiyu

Quote from: suomichris on January 20, 2010, 06:44:58 PM
Okay, whoa there...

Ah.. It appears my source was incorrect, I concede defeat, oeru ngeyä txoa livu.

+1 Karma to you for calling me out on my zealous ignorance :(

(I swear this is the biggest ninjafest in the history of this forum)
Oeyä ayswizawri tswayon alìm ulte takuk nìngay.
My arrows fly far and strike true.

suomichris

Quote from: Alìm Tsamsiyu on January 20, 2010, 09:52:20 PM
Quote from: suomichris on January 20, 2010, 06:44:58 PM
Okay, whoa there...

Ah.. It appears my source was incorrect, I concede defeat, oeru ngeyä txoa livu.

+1 Karma to you for calling me out on my zealous ignorance :(

(I swear this is the biggest ninjafest in the history of this forum)
No problem :)

Do we have a way to say something along these lines??  ke'u ke lu?

Ftiafpi

Quote from: suomichris on January 20, 2010, 09:50:03 PM
Hi folks,

I went through and parsed/glossed Prof. Frommer's letter in linguistic style, if people want to take a look at it.  Please do let me know if you find typos/errors/etc., or any questions about the formatting.

Here be spoilers (and etc.)!

https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B5x_kVXReq_iNWEwMTFjZGMtYzJjNS00NzEwLTlkYmMtYzk4Mzc5OGMxMWMw&hl=en

I was just about to do that myself so I'll run through it without looking at yours and compare as a double check.

Prrton

Quote from: suomichris on January 20, 2010, 09:54:42 PM
Quote from: Alìm Tsamsiyu on January 20, 2010, 09:52:20 PM
Quote from: suomichris on January 20, 2010, 06:44:58 PM
Okay, whoa there...

Ah.. It appears my source was incorrect, I concede defeat, oeru ngeyä txoa livu.

+1 Karma to you for calling me out on my zealous ignorance :(

(I swear this is the biggest ninjafest in the history of this forum)
No problem :)

Do we have a way to say something along these lines??  ke'u ke lu?

 Fìlìfyari "Oer ke zoplo" fu "Oer ke zoplo nìwotx!" oeru prrte' leiu nìtxan.
 I like this phrase "no offense to me" or "no offense to me at all!" a lot.

Ke'u ke lu is also great and grammatically correct to the best of my knowledge. Double negatives are attested in the film dialog.

I think Ke'u nang! (Oh, (it's) nothing!) could also work in this scenario or even for a very casual "You're welcome.", but these are NOT attested. I don't see what's wrong with their being used in this context of this community, though. Very little slang in any human language is ever governed by RULES per se.

suomichris

Quote from: Ftiafpi on January 20, 2010, 10:11:08 PM
Quote from: suomichris on January 20, 2010, 09:50:03 PM
Hi folks,

I went through and parsed/glossed Prof. Frommer's letter in linguistic style, if people want to take a look at it.  Please do let me know if you find typos/errors/etc., or any questions about the formatting.

Here be spoilers (and etc.)!

https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B5x_kVXReq_iNWEwMTFjZGMtYzJjNS00NzEwLTlkYmMtYzk4Mzc5OGMxMWMw&hl=en

I was just about to do that myself so I'll run through it without looking at yours and compare as a double check.
Cool!  I proposed that to Keyl, too, but haven't heard back yet.  I did use some potentially non-standard analyses, and I'm sure there are lots of typos in mine, but any collaborative learning on this would be awesome!

Also, since this is the only real, official text we have, it's probably worth coming to a consensus at some point about what is in there, and putting it somewhere--on the wiki, maybe, as a reference...

TorukMakto!

He may not publish anything yet due to FOX , but this letter was indeed handy for understanding the language more.

Irayo to all of you!

Prrton

#128
Quote from: Erimeyz on January 20, 2010, 09:45:46 PM
Quote from: wm.annis on January 20, 2010, 08:55:31 PM
Another typo, in the sentence Sìlpey oe, layu oeru ye'rìn sìltsan a fmawn a tsun oe ayngaru tivìng.  In the text with the flash of the sound+text, the attributive particle is attached to sìltsan, as expected for an attributive adjective.  Here it's written separately for some reason.

How do we know which is correctly copied from Frommer's original authoritative email/telegram/palimpsest, and which is the typo?  I assume that some as-yet-unclearly-specified combination of Seabass, Prrton, roger, and James Cameron worked together on this multi-media extravaganza; perhaps one of them can attest to the provenance and relative accuracy of the Flash and the Forum Post.

 - Eri


Please consider the FLASH video/audio and the audio in this post to be the CANON from Karyu Pawl.

If you notice anything that is otherwise typo:ed or "wonky" in any way when compared to those references as MASTERS, please point them out and I'll try to get them as correct as possible as soon as possible. Irayo nìtxan!



Will Txankamuse

Quote from: suomichris on January 20, 2010, 09:50:03 PM
Hi folks,

I went through and parsed/glossed Prof. Frommer's letter in linguistic style, if people want to take a look at it.  Please do let me know if you find typos/errors/etc., or any questions about the formatting.

Here be spoilers (and etc.)!

https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B5x_kVXReq_iNWEwMTFjZGMtYzJjNS00NzEwLTlkYmMtYzk4Mzc5OGMxMWMw&hl=en

This is amazing. Irayo for this!

Can you explain how Foru (in Foru 'upxaret oel fpole' - 'I have sent them a message') comes about?  Why isn't this ayforu?  does the dative override the plural prefix?  Why the trial form here? :confused:

Will
Txo ayngal tse'a keyeyit, oeyä txoa livu.  I am learning Na'vi too!
If you see a mistake in my post please correct me!

Please help on the Movie Lines in Na'vi wiki page

omängum fra'uti

#130
The plural prefix ay- can be omitted when the word undergoes lenition.  Therefore po plural is ayfo, dropping ay it just becomes fo.

Not sure where you're seeing the trial form in that sentence though?

(ay-)Foru 'upxaret oel fpole'
3-PL-DAT message-ACC 1-ERG send-PFV
Ftxey lu nga tokx ftxey lu nga tirea? Lu oe tìkeftxo.
Listen to my Na'vi Lessons podcast!

Will Txankamuse

Quote from: omängum fra'uti on January 20, 2010, 10:37:54 PM
The plural prefix ay- can be omitted when the word undergoes lenition.  Therefore po plural is ayfo, dropping ay it just becomes fo.

Not sure where you're seeing the trial form in that sentence though?

(ay-)Foru 'upxaret oel fpole'
3-PL-DAT message-ACC 1-ERG send-PFV

Irayu for this.  I forgot the ay- could be omitted after lenition.  Looking at the Pocket Guide v3.4.1 - should the 3rd person plural be updated to always be 'fo' (rather than 'ayfo') or are there times were the ay- might appear?

And yes I was misreading the linguistic notation - 3 is 3rd person PL not trial plural :)

Will
Txo ayngal tse'a keyeyit, oeyä txoa livu.  I am learning Na'vi too!
If you see a mistake in my post please correct me!

Please help on the Movie Lines in Na'vi wiki page

suomichris


NeotrekkerZ

Quote from: roger on January 20, 2010, 06:59:40 PM
Quote from: wm.annis on January 20, 2010, 06:54:28 PM
Quote from: roger on January 20, 2010, 06:47:00 PMPer Frommer, the noun tìyawn derives from yawne "beloved".

Per Frommer where?  Because that adds a, what — adjective? noun? — to our list.

In an email exchange this morning making sure that there were no typos in the message before it was posted:

Quote
yawn is not actually the verb 'love.' Rather, yawne means 'beloved.' (For the noun, the e has dropped. Happens a lot.)

I would assume then that yawne is an adjective, ayawne, yawnea.

He also confirmed that like vowels contract, so that the dual/trial of 'eveng 'child', where the glottal stop is lenited, would be meveng, pxeveng. I suppose we can therefore say that the genitive in all pronouns is -eyä, and that after oe the two e's coalesce.

This may perhaps answer one of my nagging questions regarding the attributive adposition(See the bold section above).  If I wanted to say "large home" it would be "apxa kelku" and not apxaa kelku.  Agree?
Rìk oe lu hufwemì, nìn fya'ot a oe tswayon!

roger

Quote from: Prrton on January 20, 2010, 09:48:13 PM
*Kangkem is probably the infinitive/imperative form of of "to work" but based on rumors/hints I suspect that it does NOT conjugate/infix on kan/kang. Perhaps this will become our first example of a class of "irregular verbs" or perhaps we already have that in omum. Just try infixing it starting on o and watch what happens. There is probably already a rule about this somewhere that I don't know. If so, someone please inform me.
I think we have s.t. similar in iveyk (<iv>eyk), sjv of 'to lead'. Sjv of omum should just be ivomum, srak?

roger

Quote from: neotrekkerz on January 20, 2010, 10:59:35 PM
This may perhaps answer one of my nagging questions regarding the attributive adposition(See the bold section above).  If I wanted to say "large home" it would be "apxa kelku" and not apxaa kelku.  Agree?
Unless apxa already has an attrib within it. Perhaps the root is pxa or apx. (I'm just guessing here.)
Also, it may be that stress shifts or s.t., the way it does w fem. tuté.

Ftiafpi

#136
Just noticed that nìaynga is cited in red in the OP but is not discussed in the list of new words. Is this just because it's assumed to be obvious what it is? Same thing with p<ay>eng, also the same deal?

omängum fra'uti

Quote from: willphase on January 20, 2010, 10:50:57 PM
Irayu for this.  I forgot the ay- could be omitted after lenition.  Looking at the Pocket Guide v3.4.1 - should the 3rd person plural be updated to always be 'fo' (rather than 'ayfo') or are there times were the ay- might appear?

And yes I was misreading the linguistic notation - 3 is 3rd person PL not trial plural :)

Will

It can be either on it's own.  If there is another source of lenition (For example mì fo) I would personally never drop the ay to avoid confusion.  (mì fo vs mì ayfo)  However I'm not sure if that's officially how the language handles the short plural ambiguity issue.

Quote from: Ftiafpi on January 20, 2010, 11:10:35 PM
Just noticed that Nìaynga is cited in red in the OP but is not discussed in the list of new words.
I don't think I'd consider that a new word...  We already have nìayoeng - like us.  So nìaynga would be the same thing, but like you.  Similarly, nìoe - like me.  Nìfo - like them.  Etc.

Oe ke nìfo lu.  I'm not like them.
Ftxey lu nga tokx ftxey lu nga tirea? Lu oe tìkeftxo.
Listen to my Na'vi Lessons podcast!

suomichris

Quote from: omängum fra'uti on January 20, 2010, 11:14:31 PMIt can be either on it's own.  If there is another source of lenition (For example mì fo) I would personally never drop the ay to avoid confusion.  (mì fo vs mì ayfo)  However I'm not sure if that's officially how the language handles the short plural ambiguity issue.
I was under the impression from the Wikipedia article that only the plural ay- can be dropped, and not the others.  Is this not the case?

omängum fra'uti

Not sure what you think I was saying to drop besides ay-?  That is correct, only the plural prefix ay- can be dropped.
Ftxey lu nga tokx ftxey lu nga tirea? Lu oe tìkeftxo.
Listen to my Na'vi Lessons podcast!