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On 1/14/06, Rex May <rmay@hidden.email> wrote: > > On Jan 14, 2006, at 6:16 PM, Jim Henry wrote: > > > On 1/14/06, Rex May <rmay@hidden.email> wrote: > >> > >> On Jan 3, 2006, at 10:52 AM, Jim Henry wrote: > it might be. If 'kam' means work as a verb, it seems that 'to kam' > ought to be clearly derivable from it. I know how you're thinking, Yes, there should be a way to derive nouns from verbs, specifically a noun meaning 'the act of doing X' and a noun meaning 'a person/entity who does X' among other things. Which of those is the primary unmarked nominalization of a verb isn't so important as for it to be consistent throughout the language. > So, if 'jin' doesn't mean 'be a person,' it ought to have some sort > of reasonable secondary verb meaning other than that, so as not to > waste anything, so to speak, or maybe not if it's awkward. "Be a person" seems like a reasonable verbal meaning, but I see what you mean about it's not being consistent with kam "to do" > to kam "deed". > OTOH, I think a noun like 'pamo' could be allowed to act as a verb. > go pamo da. I am father of him. And not "I beget him"? There's not much difference, to be sure. > But can I say: > > ciba hon kanin. This is a book about dogs. > > I don't think so. Really too ambiguous. You'd have to say 'ciba hon > hu tem kanin.' The latter is clearer, anyway. The first, "this [is] a dog book", sort of makes sense too. > OTOH, in Ceqli, 'go kala' would mean 'i'm a fish,' so 'kala' can't > really have the verbal meaning that it does in English. That would > have to be 'go kalafulu.' I fish-catch. Yes, "go kalafulu" makes much more sense. > Well, at this point I feel talked back around to the Mandarin/English > way of looking at things. go bi jin. go bi pamo hu da. go kala. > go bi kalapro. "go kalapro" makes sense as shorthand for "go kalafulupro", but "go kala" does not make so much sense as shorthand for "go kalafulu". -- Jim Henry http://www.pobox.com/~jimhenry/gzb/gzb.htm