Oe-ri lu nume-er

Started by Quzac, December 31, 2009, 04:58:54 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Quzac

Oe-ri lu fmi-er lu(?) nume
I am trying to Learn

I could not find to, only too which wouldn't fit I don't think. Brand new to this, just started today waiting for the new years eve party. Anyone that can help me with the to issue, or give me a sound solution I'd appreciate it.

Irayo

omängum fra'uti

Truth is, we don't know how to form noun phrases properly, so combining two verbs like fmi and nume doesn't necessarily work like that.

However, lu is certainly wrong there.  English has a lot of extra words to express things it can't otherwise, where other languages don't need them.

I am hunting...
Oel taron

I will be hunting...
Oel tayaron

I will give it to you
Oel tayìng ngaru
Ftxey lu nga tokx ftxey lu nga tirea? Lu oe tìkeftxo.
Listen to my Na'vi Lessons podcast!

Quzac

So, in a nutshell, when you WANT to say am, or to, or otherwise words like that, you'd leave it out and hope someone can just assume what you're trying to say?

So far, the only language besides English I'm familiar with is Spanish, and even then I slept because the teach tried to teach us Spanish by speaking Spanish and we had no idea what the hell she was saying.

Irayo

Doolio

well...... not exactly:)

na'vi is different from english, tenses are not built with 'to be', they are constructed by inserting infixes. so, you don't have to assume anything, it is perfectly clear what is being said.
...taj rad...

omängum fra'uti

#4
Not always.  Those words do have their place, as they are conjugations of "to be"...  But Na'vi doesn't use "to be" as a helper verb the way English does.

Sky people are demons
Sawtute lu vrrtep

Your eyes are blue
Ngayä menari ean lu

It will be beautiful
Fra'u layu lor

The word "lu" does have other cases where it is used in Na'vi for something other than that, but that is a more advanced topic, I'd focus on the basics for now.

Edit: Oh yeah and like Doolio said, there is no assumption.  The meaning of everything I said here is perfectly crystal clear.  English is actually an odd language with all the extra words that get thrown in like that.  The only reason there are so many is that English lacks a better way to express the concepts.
Ftxey lu nga tokx ftxey lu nga tirea? Lu oe tìkeftxo.
Listen to my Na'vi Lessons podcast!

Quzac

Hm, okay, sounds good. Then would one mind writing what I had intended in the correct fashion so I can look at the differences and learn accordingly.

Irayo

omängum fra'uti

Well as I said, we don't have the full grammar rules.  Some people will tell you something like "Oe fmì nume" or butcher it even worse with "Oe fmì ne nume".  The second is certainly incorrect and the first is likely incorrect.

We don't know the proper way to express noun phrases in a grammatical correct manner at the moment, so any time you need two verbs and can't turn one of them into a noun, you can't say it.

Probably the best I could come up with what we know would be...

Tì-nume-ri oe fmì
About learning, I try.
(Learning in that sense refers to what is learned, not the act of learning)
Ftxey lu nga tokx ftxey lu nga tirea? Lu oe tìkeftxo.
Listen to my Na'vi Lessons podcast!

Quzac

Okay, that helps a lot. I'll keep that in mind.

Irayo

omängum fra'uti

Just don't expect too much.  Large parts of the Na'vi grammar are still unknown to us, until Fox/Cameron/whoever sees fit to let a wider audience know.  We're basically stuck at the point of "See spot run."  Ok, maybe a LITTLE past that, but not much.
Ftxey lu nga tokx ftxey lu nga tirea? Lu oe tìkeftxo.
Listen to my Na'vi Lessons podcast!

Maktoyu Palulukanyä

Way back in the early 90's, I was a very active member of the Klingon Language learning community.  Even after the publication of several books, audio tapes and such, there were still massive questions about how to say certain things which Marc Okrand (the designer of Klingon) had left vague (either on purpose or just had not gotten to it yet).  I suspect that if Dr. Frommer and all concerned parties decide that this is a really important thing and they want to widely distribute and teach Na'vi (a fact I doubt will happen, I'm sorry) then we will still be looking at several years to get sufficient materials to really converse well in Na'vi.  Languages are very complex and just like it takes time to learn one, it takes time to design one also (at least to design one well).