Definition disambiguation

[Txonpay]

Kxì Na'viya!

I have been looking at Fwew's dictionary for things that look like synonyms but aren't actually.  That way, you know whether to use snaytx or han, or which of the four words for powerful.  You can also be confident that pate and pähem actually mean the same thing instead of having to guess or research or ask.

The words have to have a definition word in common and the same part of speech.  I only considered Fwew's dictionary when making this list, but it may just help other dictionary maintainers.  Here's a list of words to disambiguate and sources:

2010 vocab update:

• Several: 'a'aw: For countable nouns only
• Found it: rolun is for answers and objects, tolel is for answers only
• Many: pxay can be used on singular or plural nouns

Directly stated on Na'viteri:

• Once: 'awlie is once in the past and 'awlo is only one time
• Smooth/rough: faoi and ekxtxu are for texture only
• Rough: kakan is for behavior or treatment
• Lose: han is the opposite of keep, tìhan is here too
• Lose: snaytx is for not winning, tìsnaytx is here too
• Excuse me: hìtxoa is a small forgiveness
• Hi: kxì means "hi, hiya"
• Constant: letut is weaker, lukftang is stronger
• Steadily (and others): nìler is smoothly/steadily moving, nìk'ärìp is "without letting it move", nìklonu is "without releasing it", nìktungzup is "without letting it fall", nìsyep is "like a trap"
• Just: nìyey needs "just" in its definition
• Meaning: ral is logical meaning, wawe is emotional significance/meaning
• Prayer: saho is a prayer as opposed to the practice of prayer
• Competition: säwäsul is an instance of competition, tìwäsul is the idea of competition
• Last: syen is last in a sequence
• Exploration: tìlang is the general sense of exploration
• Conclusion: tìpe'ngay is of truth, not tì'i'a, which is an ending
• Beginning: tìtsyul can be a place or a time
• Strength: tìtxur is physical strength
• Attempt: According to the given examples, säfmi is an attempt, tìfmi is the act of attempting.
• Mild: flrr for anything, tsyafe for temperature of weather.

For people or not?:

• Thin: flì is NFP
• Strong: tstew is OFP (not tìtstewnga')
• Powerful: letswal is OFP (not tswalnga') (both can be any kind of power.  Physical, emotional, political or psychological)
• Powerful (again): txantxur is OFP (not tìtxurnga') (Physically powerful)
• Smart: kanu is OFP (not sìlronsem)
• Healthy (mentally): lefpomron is ofp, fpomronga' is nfp
• Unhealthy (mentally): kelfpomron is ofp, kefpomronga' is nfp
• Healthy (physically): lefpomtokx is ofp, fpomtokxnga' is nfp
• Unhealthy (physically): kelfpomtokx is ofp, kefpomtokxnga' is nfp

From context:

• Simple: fyin: contrasted with complex
• Excuse me: matu is not an apology, but a conversation starter
• After: mawfwa and mawkrra are both a temporal "after"
• Thick: nutx contrasted with flì.  Can also say "in diameter" in the definition (also NFP from context)
• Expression: tìyewn is an expression of a thought or feeling

From construction:

• Hunting: tìtaron is the art/skill of hunting (more abstract) while tìtusaron is more of the situation or something more concrete.
• Shelf: fyanyì: a fyan keeps things off the ground while a yì is a shelf.  So a fyanyì is to keep things off the ground

From Learn Na'vi forums:

• Before: both srefwa and srekrr are temporal "before"s (unlike "eo")

Grammar I found:

• Ask: pawm can use san quotes, just like plltxe
• Question particle: srake is prepositional, srak is postpositional (otherwise the same)
• Ma: Optional with animals

Definitions in need of better searchability:

• Badsmelling: Bad smelling, smelly, stinky
• Healthful: Healthy
• Remembrance: A memory, remembering (precise definition needed)
• Ray: Light ray, light beam
• Ordinary: Normal
• Allergen: Kind/type of poision (both are under fnetxum)

Other:

• Tsahìk: Current definition is gendered.  Can be "head shaman, high priest, interpreter"

Uncomfirmed differences (sent to Pawl):
Also kept track of in this spreadsheet, including items removed from this list.

Suspected multipurpose (like blanket terms):

• Queue: kuru is any kind of queue, tswin is just on Na'vi (judging by Tsu'tey's Path saying "Tsu'tey's kuru bonds with the direhorse's kuru")

Unclear definitions without examples:

• Hard: Txa' is an ASG word.  Is it for material hardness only?  It was never disambiguated.  There is only one example sentence on Na'viteri.
• Pattern: What is a renu?  Is it any kind of English Pattern?
• Produce: In 2010, sleyku was said to mean "produce" (vtr.), but we never got a precise meaning.
• Treachery: We don't know if kavuk is countable or not, either.
• We never got a precise definition for tsam si, either

ASG nouns: Countable or not?

• Remembrance: 'Ok (There is only one example on Na'viteri as "do you have my rememberence?")
• War: Tsam (all Na'viteri examples are countable or tsam si)
• Fear: Txopu is only on Na'viteri as part of "txopu si" and "txopu sleyku"
• Dinner: Wutso (it's on Na'viteri, but I still have doubts as to whether or not it's countable)
• Vision (spiritual): Äie is ambiguously countable and isn't on Na'viteri.
• Ceremonial challenge: Fpeio (not on Na'viteri)
• Service: Kìte'e (not on Na'viteri)
• Cord: Telem (Not really on Na'viteri.  Txurtel is derived from it, blurring the countability)
• Art: Tseo (the LEP already has tseovi as a submission for a countable "art")
• Excercise: Tskxekeng (all examples seem countable)
• Poison: Txum (the u/ù list has fnextum as a separate word, suggesting txum is not countable)

Other:

• Apparently: nìlam/tatlam seem to have the same meaning, but tatlam never appeared on Na'viteri in any official context (neither did 'awstengyem).
• Thick: Nutx was never confirmed as NFP even though its antonym flì was confirmed as NFP in the same post.
• Requirement: Is a säfngo' like a requirement while a tson is like an assignment?  Do they overlap?

[Txonpay]

Update:
In private channels, others have suggested improvements for Fwew:

• onvä' should get "smelly" and "stinky" in its definition for better searchability
• The French definition of ilu has weird brackets: ([grande créature marine ressemblant à un pléiosaure)]
• nì'aw should also have "just" in its definition
• leym can also take san predicates

Also nfp:

• srunga'
• tìtstunwinga'
• fpomtokxnga'/kefpomtokxnga'/fpomronga'/kefpomronga'
• hafyonga'
• kxapnga'
• tìkeftxonga'
• parulnga'
• tìflänga'
• tìfnunga'

[Vawmataw]

Regarding the brackets in the French translations, it's quite likely you'll find some because a lot of stuff was imported from dict-navi where the italic format is applied using brackets. Of course they can and should be removed if you find some.

[Tirea Aean]

Regarding the brackets in the French translations, it's quite likely you'll find some because a lot of stuff was imported from dict-navi where the italic format is applied using brackets. Of course they can and should be removed if you find some.

Oh wow, I always wondered why there were [ ] in so many definitions, I thought it was a style thing you and/or other fr speakers prefer over ( ) maybe.

Good to know

I'm not sure why I never thought to ask. I guess because none of them seemed particularly weird to me until the ilu one

[Wllìm]

Thanks for making this list!

One thing that stood out to me:

Found it: rolun is for objects, tolel is for ideas

This seems to contradict the original source:

Rolun and tolel are conversational exclamations used for "Eureka!" moments. The difference is that Rolun! means you've found something, e.g. a lost object, the answer to a question, the solution to a problem, whereas Tolel! means you've had a flash of insight and now you "get it"—you've received knowledge or understanding.

So you can actually run the answer to a question, not just objects.

[Toliman]

Thanks for making this list!

Fì'u

[Txonpay]

Thanks for making this list!

One thing that stood out to me:

Found it: rolun is for objects, tolel is for ideas

This seems to contradict the original source:

[Na'viteri stuff]

So you can actually run the answer to a question, not just objects.

Oh, thanks for pointing that out!  I'll edit it right now

[Txonpay]

Hmm, I had another idea.  Seems that kuru and tswin were said to be similar in 2021 with the precise definitions saved for later.  But we haven't gotten a precise definitions yet.

[Tìtstewan]

tswin and kuru should be on the list because it is still not clear what exactly the difference between them is.

[Tìtstewan]

Posting this here for recording:
---
When checking the old source for tatep, where that word appeared first, the definition of it is: lose track or awareness of something, such as a target ("lose track, lose awareness of something" are in Dict-Na'vi and in the LN dictionary). What it makes confusing is the line on Na'viteri from 2011:

Note: Don't confuse tatep and snaytx. They both mean 'lose,' but tatep is lose in the sense of 'have no longer.'

That "have no longer" falls to the word han - lose (not having s.t. you once had) which was introduced in 2018.

[Txonpay]

Leiu mipa hapxì sästarsìmä oey

[Txonpay]

Did we ever get a precise definition of txur?  We know that tswal can basically refer to any kind of power.  But that source seems to insinuate that txur is about physical strength, yet an idea can be tìtxurnga'.  What does txur apply to?

[Txonpay]

Update: Txur was, in fact confirmed to mean physical strength only.

[Txonpay]

Fwew already fixed nìyey and kxì, we're off to a good start!

I also updated the clickable URLs to put them in more consistent and logical places

[Txonpay]

I have noticed that lefpomron, lefpomtokx, kelfpomron and kelfpomtokx were not confirmed to be OFP in their original source, even though it introduces NFP versions of those words. 
EDIT: These are only for people in the original source.  All clarified

Likewise, flì was confirmed to be NFP in its original source, but its antonym nutx was not confirmed to be NFP in that post.  Should this be added to the list of things to ask Pawl?

[Txonpay]

Also, I remembered that the definition of "atanvi" was "ray", which I found ambiguous when I first saw it.  I suggest its definition change to "light ray, light beam".  Also, here is the source of atanvi.

[Txonpay]

I just finished the first draft of a spreadsheet with the 60 words we want Pawl to canonize (or not canonize), as well as the 26 definitions we want Pawl to clarify from this thread.  I used LibreOffice to make it, but I can save it in .xlsx format (or .xls if you're into Clippy.  The formatting is basic and there is no math anyway)

[Toliman]

Sìltsan, good list

[Txonpay]

I just put a bunch of possible clarifications in a spreadsheet in the cloud for anyone to view. That includes the roughly 60 words still to be canonized and the words with unclear definitions here.

EDIT: I put the spreadsheet online because I want peer review.  Mostly to see if it makes sense to others, but also possibly to see if anyone has answers to them before we send the sheet to Pawl

[Toliman]

Sìltsan