zompist bboard

We actually wrote a couple of conference presentations and a chapter for a forthcoming colume on "Contexts of Language Revitalization in Latin America" to be published by MOuton de Gruyter. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.431.2562 http://www.cunyphonologyforum.net/ENDANABSTRA...

I use it for coöperate and similar words.

Hmm, if you pm me your email I can send you the springer article by baker. The other article is really better but it is probably not possible to get that as something your screen reader can handle, maybe through your local library you can get it if you have some way to read physical books. If at som...

A "true quantifier" in the sense used by Baker is a quantifier that acts as the head of a noun phrase and "governs" the noun (e.g. forcing it to agree with the quantifier). Using generative jargon Baker defines it as quantifiers that C command a pronoun that it coindexes, shows weak crossover effect...

Not really, the only one I know who has worked on that is Mark Baker who uses it as one of his traits that they dont have true quantifiers. I dont think anyone else has paid any attention to quantifiers (partly because if ones definition of polysynthesis is purely morphological as opposed to syntact...

I think Porphyrogenitos is right in considering the process to involve some kind of semantic change that could be called portmanteau reanalysis. For them to work the original compound is analysed as a whole and then a semirandom subset of syllables within the word is extracted as and used to refer t...

The first question about the possible text corpora I dont know how to answer well. Since I mostly work with languages that are underdocumented I dont know which languages in the world really have good corpora. What I would do would be to use reference grammars of individual languages which tend to h...

I forgot this thread where I had some unaddressed questions. Regarding Dyirbal and australian dependentmarking polysynthesis this view is advanced by Nicholas Evans and Hans-Jürgen Sasse in a 2002 edited volume called "Problems of Polysynthesis". Thety are argueing for a definition of polysynthesis ...

In Danish "færrest" also seems to be competing with "mindst". Though I dont think anyone considers the former archaic.

No I was getting confused over the grammatical relations between the genetive and the predicate, but apparently I figured it out. Thanks.

How does Latin handle cases like the phrase "I am my fathers daughter" or "I am my mother's son" where the predicate is a genitive phrase? I couldnt get it to work in my mind when I tried translating them. Is it something like "filius matris meae sum" with "son" in the nominative and "my mother" gen...

But what is the origin of the -ku suffix?

A friend of mine has a theory that I am inclined to accept that the Nahuatl reflexive prefix mo- is derived from a PUA root *mo'o meaning "head", and originated as an incorporated noun. The same apparently happened in Basque.

No, they are claiming the Olmecs were Nahuatl speakers.

I think it is found to different degrees in all kinds of nationalism - nationalism after all is based on the Herderian/Humbolditan ideology of one people, one language one nation. In the US there are people who believe Jesus spoke English and that it is the original language of the Bible. Its easier...

Nigerian?

I mean that is has a lot of redundancy in that it double marks all grammatical relations (both syntactically and morphologically), which in a natural language would very likely be unstable if spoken over time - particularly with the exotic choice of OVS order which also extends to clause subordinati...

Which source would you recommend then for a better view of Okrands vision of Klingon? Even if it's incomplete we'll have to judge the language by what he has published - just like we review the published version of a book and not the authors notes. May main problems this far is the too logical gramm...

As I read the grammar in Okrand's "Klingon Dictionary" I am becoming increasingly underwhelmed. It is certainly not among the more complex conlangs, and the degree of detail in the description is really flat. I guess it stands out mainly because of being the first televised conlang and the created b...

loQ tlhIngan Hol vI-jatlh vI-neH! tlhIngan Hol Da-ghoj-meH Da-lo'-bogh cha' paq-mey vI-ghaj. slightly Klingon language I.it-speak I.it-want! Klingon Language you.it-learn-in.order.to you.it-use-which two book-pl I.it-have "I want to speak a little klingon! I have two books that you use in order to ...

Lets try to analyze our sentences then? (I am going to be amazed if not a single Klingonist is on the board though). da-jathl-aH-'a' 2sSubj/3Sobj-speak-can-Q "do you speak it?" Da-HaD-rup-'a' 2sSubj/3Sobj-study-ready-Q "are you ready to study it?" nuq-neH what-want "What do you want?" (A greeting, w...

nuqneH Bristel. tlhIngan Hol DaHaDrup'a'?

I did make a mistake in the title, I used an intransitive verb form for "speak", but the language is the object!

Who speaks klingon? Who wants to learn? Who have resources? I would like to learn it myself and am a complete novice (I probably made a mistake in the title). Can we have a practice thread?

Natchez has polypersonal agreement and complex verbal morphology and uses obligatory auxiliary verbs - I think this is also common in Muskogean languages. Basque of course does it too (though its claim to polysynthesis is probably less convincing).

Well that is the problem, it is hard to find a useful baseline for odd.