declension of nouns ending in diphthongs; fì- and tsa-

[wm.annis]

A few refinements...

I asked, First, I say that "For declension, the diphthongs count as consonants. I'm 95% certain this is true (kifkeyit, etc.)

No, not quite. I hadn't written up the rule, but this is what I've been doing with diphthong-final N's, which feels right in my mouth and ear:

A: -ìl
P: -it, -ti
D: -ru, -ur
G: -ä
T: -ri

(I think I've been consistent, but if you come across places I haven't, please let me know.)

Sorry to give you a headache with this. One generalization is that the single-C allomorphs are out. Other than that, I guess it's some from Column A, some from Column B. Maybe you can find a way to convey this without having to take up space with another chart.

For the record, I went through the lexicon and found 19 diphthong-final N's:

-AW: fpxafaw, swizaw, taw, tìsraw
-AY: holpxay, nguway, reypay, tìngay, tsray, txampay, way, yemfpay
-EW: fahew, flew, txantstew
-EY: kifkey, kxeyey, tìrey, vey

(20 if we count tìletìngay. <g>)

I asked, Second, I say that the near demonstrative is "fì-" (pl. "fay-", or just "fì-" with lenition); the distant demonstrative is "tsa-" (pl. tsay- or just "tsa-" with lenition).

I worry about the distal deixis prefix, because you have given ussa'u as a plural of tsa'u.

OK, except that for the plurals, there's no fì-/tsa- plus lenition option. That is,

fìketuwong 'this alien'
fayhetuwong 'these aliens'
tsaketuwong 'that alien'
tsayhetuwong 'those aliens'

But not *fìhetuwong, *tsahetuwong. (The nice thing about short plurals is that they save you a syllable; here that doesn't happen, so there's no raison d'être for the short forms with demonstratives.)

The plural of the stand-alone demonstrative pronoun tsa'u is (ay)sa'u, which follows the regular rules.

I don't see anything worrisome here, but if I'm missing something (which is entirely possible), let me know.

When I asked for clarification about the pronouns,

Right. With the pronouns, the order of elements is ay+tsa+'u rather than the expected tsa+ay+'u, etc.

[roger]

Great! That's half down. Now to figure out if the other PN's inflect like tsa'u or like the nouns.

And we do have a case of tsa+ lenition w/o the y.

[omängum fra'uti]

I was actually talking to William about that case last night.  Since it doesn't have shorten the word any like normal short plurals, it may be one of those cases of "Technically it may be correct, but why would you ever actually USE it, so don't...  But I'll use it here for poetic license."

[wm.annis]

And we do have a case of tsa+ lenition w/o the y.

Which he chalked up to differences in verse vs. prose.  I didn't pursue that further.  Discussions of poetic language can wait until we get some more prose grammar filled out, I think. 

[roger]

and what's this noun vey that he mentions?

[wm.annis]

and what's this noun vey that he mentions?

No idea.  Hope it's a LEP word.

[Swoka Swizaw]

and what's this noun vey that he mentions?

Or flew?

[Plumps]

A: -ìl
P: -it, -ti
D: -ru, -ur
G: -ä
T: -ri

(I think I've been consistent, but if you come across places I haven't, please let me know.)

Sorry to give you a headache with this. One generalization is that the single-C allomorphs are out.

Too late He's only talking about the diphthong cases here, right? Other than that the forms after vowel can remain -t and -r for patient and dative, kefyak?

and what's this noun vey that he mentions?

There are a lot more words in there I have never seen before ...
reypay, tsray, txampay, flew, txantstew

[wm.annis]

Too late He's only talking about the diphthong cases here, right?

Yes.  It's all laid out in a chart in my cheat sheet.

[Kì'eyawn]

and what's this noun vey that he mentions?

There are a lot more words in there I have never seen before ...
reypay, tsray, txampay, flew, txantstew

reypay, "live-water"... medicine? (or, alternatively, alcohol?)

[roger]

the rest of those will be released over the next couple weeks.

[Plumps]

I officially call for the word for "tease"

[Swoka Swizaw]

I officially call for the word for "tease"

"ronger?"

[Kì'eyawn]

Tìletìngay = truthfulness?

...does the <g> mean he's being sarcastic?  Or is that seriously a word?

[omängum fra'uti]

That would be the Na'vi translation of Stephen Colbert's "Truthiness".  It is, like the English word, a tongue in cheek word.

[Plumps]

I officially call for the word for "tease"

"ronger?"

txantsana tìpe'un - pesu mìsyunge tsat Karyu Pawlur?
Excellent decision - who suggests that to Frommer?

[wm.annis]

That would be the Na'vi translation of Stephen Colbert's "Truthiness".  It is, like the English word, a tongue in cheek word.

When Frommer told us we couldn't rely on freely using the derivational affixes, I emailed back "but I was so proud of tìletìngay!" and gave a hint at the intended sense.  Had I been paying better attention, I would have removed that from this post.