I think politically-motivated sound changes would be dependent on the sounds of the neighbouring (or otherwise culturally-significant) nations. Conquered or lower caste nations would use more of the language of the ruling class.
Is that what you had in mind?
Search found 23 matches
- 22 Sep 2020 20:50
- Forum: Everything Else
- Topic: (EE) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
- Replies: 751
- Views: 462034
- 14 Aug 2020 18:22
- Forum: Everything Else
- Topic: (EE) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
- Replies: 751
- Views: 462034
Re: (EE) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Good morning everyone, does anyone know if the Conlangio app/project is still up somewhere? The website seems to be down. There do not seem to be many mobile app options for conlanging.
- 31 Mar 2020 16:26
- Forum: Teach & Share
- Topic: Lesson/Guide Requests
- Replies: 322
- Views: 350532
Re: Lesson/Guide Requests
Does anyone have or want to give lessons for Tagalog? I would like to get to understand the grammar.
- 31 Mar 2020 00:25
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Re: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
Thank you all for your answers. I have begun to think that I simply over complicated things in my mind. I think it would be better to simply think of ergative-absolutive being different only in alignment (I know that has already been said, but maybe now I understand it better), and many of the ambig...
- 28 Mar 2020 16:01
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Re: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
Close, but not quite. If the verb is genuinely intransitive - rather than merely univalent - then it cannot have a patient. In true 'ergative-absolutive' languages, the subject of an intransitive is always treated the same way, regardless of its semantics. So, does that mean "I ate" is un...
- 28 Mar 2020 00:05
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Re: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
Here is another example. Perhaps it makes more sense: The tree was felled. The tree fell. Would they both be written like below: fell tree-DEF fell tree-DEF I have a hard time understanding ergative grammar. The answer is... they could be. And here's an important question to ask whenever a conlange...
- 28 Mar 2020 00:04
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Re: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
So, if I make use of split ergativity, a sentence like "I instructed" could be made Nom-Acc and "I was instructed." could be Erg-Abs? Would this work? So far, it appears that you're not interested in working out reliable ways to disambiguate the roles of nouns in one-argument se...
- 27 Mar 2020 02:10
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
- 27 Mar 2020 01:39
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Re: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
So, if I make use of split ergativity, a sentence like "I instructed" could be made Nom-Acc and "I was instructed." could be Erg-Abs?
Would this work?
Would this work?
- 27 Mar 2020 00:54
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Re: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
I suppose it's alright, as long as you remember that you only do that when you have one argument and the verb is transitive. You wouldn't do that for "the bears danced" if "dance" is supposed to be intransitive. I have an honest question. Why would I not use passivity for intran...
- 26 Mar 2020 22:24
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Re: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
Here is another example. Perhaps it makes more sense: The tree was felled. The tree fell. Would they both be written like below: fell tree-DEF fell tree-DEF I have a hard time understanding ergative grammar. As @salmoneus said, how do I know the difference between certain transitive and intransitive...
- 26 Mar 2020 16:41
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Unknown term for Ergative Languages
- Replies: 23
- Views: 5621
Unknown term for Ergative Languages
Good morning everybody. I have a couple questions about ergative languages. I would like to know how a person who speaks an ergative-absolutive language knows or marks the difference between "The bears danced." and "The bears were danced.", or "The walls painted." and &...
- 28 Jul 2019 10:07
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
- Replies: 24
- Views: 11683
- 28 Jul 2019 01:01
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
- Replies: 24
- Views: 11683
Re: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
Finnish (1) Menin talo-on sisään. I.went house-ILL in(to) (2) Menin talo-n sisään. I.went house.GEN in(to) Both mean 'I went into the house.' (1) has an adverb "sisään" that kind of codes the same info as the illative form of the noun. (2) has a postposition "sisään" that govern...
- 28 Jul 2019 00:14
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
- Replies: 24
- Views: 11683
Re: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
https://minerva-access.unimelb.edu.au/bitstream/handle/11343/217030/Wambaya-fest-rev.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y says Wambaya has free word-order and serial-verb constructions and allows discontinuous constituents. It might be an inspiration for ways to achieve what you desire. This looks great!...
- 22 Jul 2019 17:39
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
- Replies: 24
- Views: 11683
Re: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
For "inside- GEN-house -STV", how would one write in gloss that 'house' is genitive without implying a marker is there? I don't understand this question. That is okay, do not worry about it then. I have more studying to do, obviously. Thanks anyway [:)] . (By the way, I did not know that ...
- 21 Jul 2019 05:05
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Referring to a subject only once
- Replies: 6
- Views: 3639
Re: Referring to a subject only once
Die Wolfsmutter sichsammelte die Jungen. Die Wolf-s-mutter sich-sammel-t-e die Junge-n. DEF.F wolf-CMPND-mother REFL-rally-PST-1SG DEF.PL cub-ACC.PL Mother wolf rallied her cubs. @Creyeditor, that is cool, I do have a reflexive, so this might work really well. Sorry for all the German. I do not spe...
- 20 Jul 2019 20:20
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
- Replies: 24
- Views: 11683
Re: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
Good morning @Ser, thank you for your detailed and easy-to-understand explanation! I actually had been using Mandarin a lot for the features I wanted to incorporate (or at least I would refer to Mandarin to solve problems, haha). But, like you said, I would need to allow serial objects along with my...
- 20 Jul 2019 20:16
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Referring to a subject only once
- Replies: 6
- Views: 3639
Referring to a subject only once
Good afternoon! I am not sure if this is the place to ask, but I guess it counts as a stupid question, so here goes. I have a story with father and mother wolves and their cubs. I got to a point where the mother was rallying her cubs. "Mother wolf rallied her cubs." I am wondering if there...
- 19 Jul 2019 06:36
- Forum: Beginners' Corner
- Topic: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
- Replies: 24
- Views: 11683
Re: Different Way of Doing Adpositions - help request
@eldin raigmore, yes that does sound interesting. I had not considered having different kinds of objects, with the exception that I do have an indirect object showing the secondary recipient of some action or recipient of some object (although I would prefer that it not imply a literal recipient, as...