[YG Conlang Archives] > [ceqli group] > messages [Date Index] [Thread Index] >


[Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]

Re: [ceqli] A few lexicographical and semantic comments



On 7/7/05, Rex May - Baloo <rmay@hidden.email> wrote:
> on 7/7/05 4:30 PM, Jim Henry at jimhenry1973@hidden.email wrote:
> 
> > On 7/7/05, Rex May - Baloo <rmay@hidden.email> wrote:

> >> I believe you're right.  I more or less call things verbs when they can be
> >> regarded as verbs in the Chinese sense.   .....

> > Oh -- I just noticed that "sta" is glossed as "at"
> > as well as "to be located".  So is the general
> > rule that all such words can be used
> > as prepositions or spatial-location verbs as the
> > speaker pleases?

> Pretty much.  I'm following what I know of Mandarin in such usage.  They
> have the habit of using verbs where we'd use prepositions.
> 
> Go zu spun kom.   I use spoon eat.   I eat using a spoon.

I suppose this order,

go kom zu spun.

...would be just as grammatical in ceqli?  (And would
mean the same thing, not something odd like "I
eat the use-of-a-spoon"; I expect you would need some
special nominalizer to express something like that.
No sense in this case, but you might want it for 

go dum <nominalizer> zu spun.

because thinking about the use of spoons makes
more sense than thinking using a spoon (though not 
by much).

> Now, "ci" also means at, and that bothers me a little, but "ci" is
> definitely not a verb, but what I guess I'll call a true preposition.  It's
> analogous to pa, fu, do, and is what Loglan calls a "free modifier."

In the way you've described it in the glossary and the grammar, 
it doesn't seem to be a preposition at all.  It's a deictic particle,
that acts as a demonstrative adjective or as a demonstrative pronoun
or adverb.

> Ci go dorm, Go dorm ci, go ci dorm, all mean the same thing.

If they all mean "I sleep here" then it's a demonstrative adverb
in this use, I think.

> And I also let these forms act as a sort of preposition when they go before
> something that makes sense.
> 
> Go dorm ci.   I sleep here.   Go dorm ci janzo sa dom.   I sleep at John's
> house.

In the latter sentence it does seem to be used as a preposition,
though.  I don't remember seeing any use like this in the grammar,
and it's not hinted at in the glossary.


> Go dorm pa.   I sleep before (I slept).   Go dorm pa zi.   I slept before
> you (did).
> 
> "Sta" differs from "ci" in that it means "located at in the customary
> manner," so "ci cer" means at the chair, but "sta cer" means seated in a
> chair.  "sta slon" means mounted on an elephant, etc.

From all the previous examples I would have thought that 
"ci cer" meant "this chair", "ca cer" = "that chair", "cu cer"
= "yon chair".  But maybe in certain contexts we can understand
these noun phrases as acting adverbially, so they mean
"at this chair", "at that chair" "at yon chair".
This would make sense in any context where 
such a noun phrase beginning with "ci" could not
be the object or subject, either for pragmatic reasons
or because another object or subject is present.

go kom ci stol.   
Probably "I eat at this table", *not* "I eat this table".

go kom baluqi ci stol.

Must mean "I eat grapefruit at this table".

go kom ci baluqi.   

Probably I eat this grapefruit, *not* I eat at this grapefruit.

go kom stol ci baluqi.

Must be "I eat a table near this grapefruit", weird
though that may seem.

I wouldn't want gjax-zym-byn to act like that, but
it seems to fit the ethos of ceqli tolerably well.

-- 
Jim Henry
http://www.pobox.com/~jimhenry/review/log.htm