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

[Keylstxatsmen]

Well, and being fluent in a language that does the exact same thing -- Japanese -- where many verbs are formed with NOUN+する(suru).  Again the verb for love in Japanese is 愛(ai:noun)する(suru:do), I would call this a verb.  Just because the ending inflects or in Latin characters you write them as two words, doesn't really matter to me, personally.

Actually, you're fluent in two languages that do (more or less) the same thing. English does it alot with verb + preposition.

I put the Neytiri poster up on my bedroom wall..

I put up with my friends taking the piss out of me for that.

They put me down, but their insults don't matter.

= phrasal verbs

Phrasal verbs!  I hope that's a good word for it.   Actually I was just talking about how Japanese also uses the verb "to do" to make phrasal verbs from nouns.  I hadn't really though of verb + preposition being more or less the same thing.  Now that I have a more specific word for it, maybe I can get out of trouble with the grammer police.   

-Keyl

[Txaslan]

This is fantastic! New words and new grammar! What could we want more?

[Eight]

I hadn't really though of verb + preposition being more or less the same thing.  Now that I have a more specific word for it, maybe I can get out of trouble with the grammer police.   

In all my years of speaking English, I'd never even thought about them until a course I was on mentioned the subject. They're something you use and never really consider in depth.

[omängum fra'uti]

The English construct of verb+preposition would be a phrasal verb for sure, but wouldn't the Na'vi (And Japanese) construct be considered a "compound verb" instead?  (Phrasal verb = verb + preposition or verb + adverb, compound verb = verb + noun or verb + verb)

Both "si" and "tìng" get many uses in forming compound verbs in Na'vi.  Most are noun on verb, but we get some hot verb on verb action as well with yomtìng.

[roger]

Most are noun on verb, but we get some hot verb on verb action as well with yomtìng.

Okay, that deserves some karma!

[suomichris]

The English construct of verb+preposition would be a phrasal verb for sure, but wouldn't the Na'vi (And Japanese) construct be considered a "compound verb" instead?  (Phrasal verb = verb + preposition or verb + adverb, compound verb = verb + noun or verb + verb)

Both "si" and "tìng" get many uses in forming compound verbs in Na'vi.  Most are noun on verb, but we get some hot verb on verb action as well with yomtìng.

Heheh...  The verb give often ends up grammaticalizing to do this type of thing (benefactive), so we might find this happening in other places, which would be cool!  I'm not sure how we want to class the noun + si things, tho...  Hopefully things will become clearer when we have more verbs

[Keylstxatsmen]

...but we get some hot verb on verb action as well with yomtìng.

  Second best thing I heard all day (after Dr. Frommer's message)

[Eight]

The English construct of verb+preposition would be a phrasal verb for sure, but wouldn't the Na'vi (And Japanese) construct be considered a "compound verb" instead?

Maybe yeah.

I mentioned the phrasal verbs as one way in English that a verb is joined to another part of speech to form one new construct. i.e. they're not two words interacting, they're essentially one verb with a space in the middle.

[Txaslan]

I think a in sentences like tì'eyngit oel tolel a krr, is used in much the same way as de in chinese.

The same sentence in chinese (in pinyin without tones):

Wo shoudao huida de shihou...

Where
wo = I = oel
shoudao = receive = tolel
huida = answer = tì'eyngit
de = relative particle connecting two sentences, indicating there's a relation between them = a
shihou = time = krr

Except word order and cases, the two sentences are equivalent.

Literally = The time (that) I receive the answer.

[omängum fra'uti]

Has anyone noticed that the grammatic role "tsakrr" fills isn't that of a noun, like tsa+othernoun typically (Presumably) would?

We see this in Avatar too, "Oel pot spìmìyang, tsakrr za'a aungia ta Eywa" - I was about to kill him, then(that-time) come sign from Eywa

Tì'eyngit oel tolel a krr, ayngaru payeng, tsakrr paye'un sweya fya'ot a zamivunge oel ayngar aylì'ut horentisì lì'fyayä leNa'vi.
I get answer which time, will tell to you, then(that-time) decide best way that I give to you words and rules of Na'vi language

[roger]

Yes, I asked Frommer about it, and he said that he didn't have time to go into it right now, but that it wasn't an error.

[omängum fra'uti]

I didn't think it was an error...  As I pointed out the same form is used in Avatar.  However IANAL so I don't know the correct linguistic term for what the word is doing there.

[roger]

I was just trying to reassure that he's aware of this and it's intentional. It would seem that it's being used as an adverb. Consider English "today", which can be both a noun (today is a beautiful day) and an adverb (I think I'll go today). Maybe he had s.t. like this in mind. Or maybe it's ellipsis of some sort -- won't really know until he has more time.

[Alìm Tsamsiyu]

fì-txan — not "adj-great", but "this-great"

I dunno about that...  What is "this"?  And where is it in the translation?  It looks to me like fìtxan is modifying the adverb, and is thus adjective-y.  (If this is true, it is interesting to note that we don't have an attributive when an adjective modifies an adverb.)

I'm not sure if fì- would work as "this" in this case, but I think he's just pointing that out as we have "txan" (great) and typically any time we see fì- stuck onto a word it means "this (word)."
(i.e.: fì-tseng::this.place | fì-ay-vrrtep[fayvrrtep]::this.PL.demon[these.demons] | fì'u::this.thing)

Also, adverbs can only be modified by other adverbs, adjectives only modify nouns or pronouns. (This is one English grammar rule I'm certain of. )

tì-yawne-it — if you're gonna break it up, the root is yawne

Well, I'm not sure it is...  Based on the discussion above, we have "yawne" for "beloved" and "tìyawn" for the noun "love," and thus a mystery /e/ that disappears.  I'm betting that the /e/ is actually forming an adjective somehow, so that "yawn" will turn out to be the verb "to love."  It is speculative, yes, but no more so than saying that that /e/ goes away but doesn't come back before the accusative -t.

Yeah I don't really know what the deal is with this word either, but I'm afraid that "yawn" being "to love" has been strictly debunked by Frommer himself (according to roger and Prrton).

What I think is the case here is that yawne means beloved and adding tì- onto it simply turns it into the abstract noun associated with "beloved," which would be "love."

fì-'u-t-a — you can break it down further

I'm not sure what you're referring to here.

He's talking about the word "futa" which I THINK breaks down into this.thing.which or something to that effect. (Not sure what the -t- does in it.)

[Tawtute]

I was thinking about kìyevame and have some suggestions (sorry if someone already has it from other, more official resourse)
This kìyevame breaks up into kame, ìy, and ev. We know that the whole meaning is "see again soon".
We know that ìy is recent future infix, so kìyame is "see soon", but what is ev? If think that is the infix for repeating, so kevame would mean "re-see".
What everyone thinks about that?

P.S. sorry for bad eenglish.

[Ftiafpi]

He's talking about the word "futa" which I THINK breaks down into this.thing.which or something to that effect. (Not sure what the -t- does in it.)

Yeah, fì'u-t-a seems like what it breaks down too but why do you drop the ì' and I also don't see why it needs an accusative infix on it.

[Alìm Tsamsiyu]

He's talking about the word "futa" which I THINK breaks down into this.thing.which or something to that effect. (Not sure what the -t- does in it.)

Yeah, fì'u-t-a seems like what it breaks down too but why do you drop the ì' and I also don't see why it needs an accusative infix on it.

Yeah that -t- really bothers me, I don't have a clue what it does there.

It looks like the accusative, but I don't think it would work like that...

Maybe someone else has a better idea?

[Ftiafpi]

He's talking about the word "futa" which I THINK breaks down into this.thing.which or something to that effect. (Not sure what the -t- does in it.)

Yeah, fì'u-t-a seems like what it breaks down too but why do you drop the ì' and I also don't see why it needs an accusative infix on it.

Yeah that -t- really bothers me, I don't have a clue what it does there.

It looks like the accusative, but I don't think it would work like that...

Maybe someone else has a better idea?

Perhaps it's a new word that's derived from 'fì'u' but cannot be directly broken down to 'fì'u'

[Na'rìghawnu]

Has anyone noticed that the grammatic role "tsakrr" fills isn't that of a noun, like tsa+othernoun typically (Presumably) would?

Well ... doesn't seem to be something new, since it's the same in the "Hunt Song":

   Pxan  livu  txo  nì'aw  oe  ngari                Only if I am worthy of you
   Tsakrr  nga  Na'viru  yomtìyìng.                then will you feed the People.

[suomichris]

Yeah that -t- really bothers me, I don't have a clue what it does there.

It looks like the accusative, but I don't think it would work like that...

Maybe someone else has a better idea?

The /t/ is there because it is the object of the verb:

I know that (...).
Subj V Obj

You're getting the subordinate clause marker taking the case for the whole clause..