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on 2/28/02 10:47 PM, Mike Wright at darwin@hidden.email wrote: > Rex May - Baloo wrote: >> >> on 2/28/02 4:58 PM, Mike Wright at darwin@hidden.email wrote: >> >>> Just noticed that there are terms like <pezo>, person-male, which is >>> head-modifier. >>> >>> Don't like it. Hate it. Despise it. >> >> More on this. You'll note that I've gone with complete neuter words for >> everything, including kinship terms. Somehow, xipam and zopam, like xipe, >> zope, just rub me the wrong way. > [...] > > Wait'll you finish your Mandarin course. They'll whip you into line. > > So you like "parent male", but not, presumably, "house big"? Do you, > by any chance, feel that "male" is a noun, rather than an adjective? For me, this particular problem is more esthetic than logical. Pamxi, pamzo, frozo, pampamzo, filxi, zinzo, just sound and look better to me. And with the stress on the first syllable, the most important element seems to belong there... and my kneejerk is that in this case, the sex isn't as significant as the relationship. Sure, 'male' can be a noun. At least, in the tradition of most western languages, where adjectives can frequently serve as nouns. One thing Ceqli does like Mandarin and English is use attribuitve nouns, where most other IE languages, at least, don't permit it. So Pamzo can be regarded as parent male, or even parental male. I'd be glad to make pamzo and zopam equally acceptable, but that wreaks havoc in compounds like pamzofra and frazbanxi. -- >PLEASE NOTE MY NEW E-MAIL ADDRESS: rmay@hidden.email > Rex F. May (Baloo) > Daily cartoon at: http://www.cnsnews.com/cartoon/baloo.asp > Buy my book at: http://www.kiva.net/~jonabook/gdummy.htm > Language site at: http://www.geocities.com/ceqli/Uploadexp.htm >Discuss my auxiliary language at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/txeqli/