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Re: [engelang] Xorban: parentheticals and interjections



Jorge Llamb�as, On 15/09/2012 20:07:
A parenthetical is any complete sentence inserted between any two
words of another sentence.

By "complete sentence" I mean one with an explicit illocutionary
operator, otherwise it would not be possible to tell that a new
sentence different from the current one is starting.

We haven't defined "word" other than by where we are writing spaces,
so the words we have so far are: simple-formula, unary-operator,
binary-operator, illocutionary-operator and is-called.

The precise semantic relationship between the inserted sentence and
the matrix sentence is left unspecified. Presumably the speaker has
some reason for injecting one sentence within another.

Now I would like to introduce a new type of word: an interjection. An
interjection is a word that is in itself a complete sentence (i.e.
complete with its own illocutionary force). I propose that
interjections take form wV (and yV?). For example:

wa:= I hereby express that I just realized something.

we:= I hereby express that I'm surprized.

wi:= I hereby express that I feel good, that I'm happy.

wu:= I hereby express that I feel bad.

ca'u xa sma, ce'eke tcde, jnve'eka
I wonder what, o reader, do you think?

Even if all phonological forms are interim, I'd rather not use w & y in this way, partly because I would be against making wa distinct from what we have currently been writing as u'a, but which I would rather start writing as ua, given that I can't envisage any unsilly phonological status for <'>, and also that I'm in favour of Mike's idea of <'> being an allograph of <q>, and partly because I'm in favour of y being an extra vowel.

So I'd go for either assigning an unassigned C to interjections, e.g. q, or else partioning cV so that c + certain Vs are or begin interjections while c + the other Vs are or begin illocutionaries that have a complement.

I agree with the definition of parenthetical, "any complete sentence inserted between any two words of another sentence", and I agree with the definition of "complete sentence". But I don't accept that illocutionaries would only be sentence-initial, so the presence of an illocutionary popping up mid-sentence is not itself indicative of a parenthetical beginning. I don't see this as a problem, mind you. It just means you can't tell that something is a parenthetical until the parenthetical is complete and you find it is not part of the containing sentence.

--And.