Combining Our Efforts II

[roger]

I don't know about the answer; that would be evident from context. However, case is not optional the way TAM is. Also, providing case in the answer would verify that you heard the question correctly. But certainly in the question, as a practical matter, case would be essential in many contexts: there's a big difference between pesul tamakuk and pesuti tamakuk, and *pesu tamakuk would be unintelligible. (I take that back: it would most likely be heard as pesut tamakuk, especially if double consonants are reduced the way double vowels are, so if you meant pesul tamakuk you'd be completely misunderstood.)

But y'know how oeng reverts to oenga- when declined? I wonder if pesu would revert to ?pesute when declined?

[Ftiafpi]

While trying to make the quoted phrase from Lord of the Rings "You shall not pass" and make use of the determinate futures (ìsy, asy) I came across the problem, does the determination apply to the speaker (as with <ei> & <äng>) or the subject/object?

"Ngal ke ftìsyem!"

Does it mean "(I) shall not allow you to pass" or does it mean "(you are determined) you will not pass"?

[roger]

While trying to make the quoted phrase from Lord of the Rings "You shall not pass" and make use of the determinate futures (ìsy, asy) I came across the problem, does the determination apply to the speaker (as with <ei> & <äng>) or the subject/object?

"Ngal ke ftìsyem!"

Does it mean "(I) shall not allow you to pass" or does it mean "(you are determined) you will not pass"?

Good question. I've passed it on to Paul. If we're lucky ...

(You might want to as well. His box is overflowing w my emails.)

I could see using the evidential for the intention of another person, with the lack of the evidential meaning the intention is that of the speaker. But I don't think that level of detail has been worked out.

[omängum fra'uti]

(You might want to as well. His box is overflowing w my emails.)

And because of that he doesn't ever see any of the rest of our emails through the flood either!   I have heard nothing back yet, but of course it has only been a day or two.

[Ftiafpi]

(You might want to as well. His box is overflowing w my emails.)

And because of that he doesn't ever see any of the rest of our emails through the flood either!   I have heard nothing back yet, but of course it has only been a day or two.

Yeah, we should avoid duplicating emails if at all possible. At the very least it means Pawl has to write the same email twice. At most it means he has to respond in Na'vi to two separate emails. Given that Frommer is the "choke point" in our expansion of the language we want to make things as easy on him as possible. Doubly so since he's working so hard on all this for free.

[omängum fra'uti]

Right, hence the point of this thread...

['eylan na'viyä]

Verb usage / forms

• can nouns that are used with "si" take the plural, adjectives or adpositions?
  Word meanings
  
• Usage/Meaning of "tsopì"="lung":
  In English some other languages you have <two lungs>. In German and some other languages you have <eine Lunge> but <zwei Lungenflügel>. The way frommer gave us the word it should be assumed to be used in plural but do we really know if this organ looks the same like ours?
  Generally: how has this term envolved in our languages?. had it something to do with the spread of anatomie or why don't you use "the thing you breath with" in singular?

[omängum fra'uti]

Just a small update on the status of asked questions.  Karyu Pawl is a busy man and has not had a chance to sit down and respond, but he hopes to get to them this week.

[Ftiafpi]

Just a small update on the status of asked questions.  Karyu Pawl is a busy man and has not had a chance to sit down and respond, but he hopes to get to them this week.

Woohoo! Oh and this question got answered: http://forum.learnnavi.org/language-updates/ltasygt-with-ke-and-nga/

[Kemaweyan]

but he hopes to get to them this week.

Tsun oe tsere'a faylì'ut a fì'u oeru txana prrte' leiu

[wm.annis]

Syntax

You have used "tsaw" as a resumptive pronoun with inanimate head-nouns (po *tsane* karmä a tsengit ke tsìme'a oel).  Do we use forms of "po" for animates, as in "srake ngal tse'a sutet a oe *fohu* parmängkxo?".

Feh.

[wm.annis]

Syntax

In Chinese, Topics are usually definite (given or inferable discourse topics), but not all topic-heavy languages do this.  Where does Na'vi's topical case stand?

[Lance R. Casey]

You have used "tsaw" as a resumptive pronoun with inanimate head-nouns (po *tsane* karmä a tsengit ke tsìme'a oel).  Do we use forms of "po" for animates, as in "srake ngal tse'a sutet a oe *fohu* parmängkxo?".

Apparently yes: Ke lu kawtu a nulnivew oe pohu tireapivängkxo äo Utral Aymokriyä.

Did we ever get clarification whether tsa is the same as tsaw? In the post containing the tsane line, Frommer writes tsa on its own first, contrasting it with po.

[wm.annis]

You have used "tsaw" as a resumptive pronoun with inanimate head-nouns (po *tsane* karmä a tsengit ke tsìme'a oel).  Do we use forms of "po" for animates, as in "srake ngal tse'a sutet a oe *fohu* parmängkxo?".

Apparently yes: Ke lu kawtu a nulnivew oe pohu tireapivängkxo äo Utral Aymokriyä.

Gah!  I no longer have the entire Corpus memorized!  What use am I now?

[Nìwotxkrr Tìyawn]

You'd make a mighty fine paper weight. 

[omängum fra'uti]

You have used "tsaw" as a resumptive pronoun with inanimate head-nouns (po *tsane* karmä a tsengit ke tsìme'a oel).  Do we use forms of "po" for animates, as in "srake ngal tse'a sutet a oe *fohu* parmängkxo?".

Apparently yes: Ke lu kawtu a nulnivew oe pohu tireapivängkxo äo Utral Aymokriyä.

Gah!  I no longer have the entire Corpus memorized!  What use am I now?

That's a good thing!  It's a sign the language is broadening.

[Kì'eyawn]

I learned a new word from NPR today, hapax legomenon -- a word that occurs only once in a given corpus.  Although in the NPR story it was being used to refer to phrases that occur in only one use in a language, so i don't know if that fits the "official" definition--they gave the example of the phrase "under God" being an archaic way of saying "God-willing" that is now extant (at least in American English) only in our Pledge of Allegiance.

So, i would like to know if Karyu Pawl has any examples of 1) a word that is used in Na'vi for only one phrase and/or 2) a phrase in Na'vi that only exists to be used in one very specific context (e.g., a phrase one would only use while communing with the Tree of Souls, used for no other purpose).

Don't ask me why i would want these things; i just...do.

If you feel this doesn't belong in this thread, ma smuk, please let me know, and i'll relocate it.

[omängum fra'uti]

That is the sort of thing I refer to as "Linguistic lense flare" - making an analogy to the quintessential 3-d animation effect of a lense flare...  Something that in real optics is undesirable and every attempt is made to minimize, yet when there is a chance to not have it at all, it is added in artistically (Hopefully artistically, anyway) to make it feel more organic and real because we are used to seeing it.  With constructed languages you could avoid all these irregularities, archaic forms, and other such things that make the language difficult to learn or use, but putting them in makes the language feel more natural and more real.

So, it's a fair question.  Don't expect an answer right away, but asking it may be enough to put the thought in his mind, and perhaps down the road something like that will appear.

[wm.annis]

So, i would like to know if Karyu Pawl has any examples of 1) a word that is used in Na'vi for only one phrase and/or 2) a phrase in Na'vi that only exists to be used in one very specific context (e.g., a phrase one would only use while communing with the Tree of Souls, used for no other purpose).

What you're talking about here is less hapax than specialized or archaic vocabulary.  Homer is full of hapax legomena, and they can be quite annoying.  It's hard sometimes to know what a word means when you only get to see it used once... once anywhere, in the entire body of Greek texts.  To speak of hapax in a living language would be a bit odd, since in theory you could walk up to someone and use a rare word, moving it out of hapax territory.  In a fixed corpus that doesn't really grow much, like ancient Greek, hapax are much more common.

The "under God" business is an archaism, an easier and less annoying situation to cope with.

[Kì'eyawn]

So, i would like to know if Karyu Pawl has any examples of 1) a word that is used in Na'vi for only one phrase and/or 2) a phrase in Na'vi that only exists to be used in one very specific context (e.g., a phrase one would only use while communing with the Tree of Souls, used for no other purpose).

What you're talking about here is less hapax than specialized or archaic vocabulary.  Homer is full of hapax legomena, and they can be quite annoying.  It's hard sometimes to know what a word means when you only get to see it used once... once anywhere, in the entire body of Greek texts.  To speak of hapax in a living language would be a bit odd, since in theory you could walk up to someone and use a rare word, moving it out of hapax territory.  In a fixed corpus that doesn't really grow much, like ancient Greek, hapax are much more common.

The "under God" business is an archaism, an easier and less annoying situation to cope with.

Yeah, as soon as i read the Wikipedia article it became clear the NPR story hadn't been using the term correctly.  So what i'm going for is the thing they were calling "hapax" in the NPR story.