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on 1/24/04 1:17 PM, HandyDad at lsulky@hidden.email wrote: > 1) Is there a general rule or sense about which order the morphemes > go in a compound: > > Pamxi = parent-female = mother > Xipam = female-parent = mother? Ah. Long controversy about that. I was advocating pamxi, etc., because of my European-oriented mindset. Mike Wright, a Mandarin guy, insisted on xipam, because pam was the basic thing and xi the modifier. I came to agree. So. We'll have the option of using xi and jo as prefixes, but for most familiar kinship terms, we have the pseudo compounds pami, pamo, zini, zino, etc. They are -not- compounds. They are simply morphemes selected for their mnemonic power:) And they are elegant-sounding. I was torn between that, and the neatness of Esperanto-style endings for the sex. And I sure didn't want to go the dippy Loglan route. So, I said, we'll do both! We need separate morphemes for parent-mother-father, but not for elephant, female elephant-male elephant. > > ? > > 2) Some very common words may arise as alternatives to more > rigourously constructed compounds. Apparently all the world over > babies come up with "ma" to mean 'mommy'. Within the morphology > constraints, Ceqli is well-equipped to accommodate this kind of > evolution. Should we establish some of these right off the > bat: "hama" = 'mommy', for example? Or just let it evolve? Hm. I actually thought of 'pami' as fairly pronouncable as such things go, but who knows what would delvelop? -- Rex F. May (Baloo) Daily cartoon at: http://www.cnsnews.com/cartoon/baloo.asp Buy my book at: http://www.kiva.net/~jonabook/book-GesundheitDummy.htm