(Conlangs) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here [2010-2020]

[Dormouse559]

Is a language more likely to have a parent root meaning something like "related to the heavens" and a derivative root, specifically, for stars or unrelated roots for the heavens and stars?

I have no idea, but this feels like the kind of thing you can safely decide for yourself. No one will bat an eyelash.

[yangfiretiger121]

Thanks guys.

[DesEsseintes]

I have no idea, but this feels like the kind of thing you can safely decide for yourself. No one will bat an eyelash.

Huh. I’ve never heard that variant of the expression “bat an eyelid”. A quick Google suggests it’s common.

[LinguistCat]

I have no idea, but this feels like the kind of thing you can safely decide for yourself. No one will bat an eyelash.

Huh. I’ve never heard that variant of the expression “bat an eyelid”. A quick Google suggests it’s common.

And I've mostly heard "bat an eye".

[Pabappa]

I think batting your eyelashes is a bit different .... thats a sign of flirting, ... at work I once heard a woman say to another woman "you know the customer cant see you batting your eyelashes over the phone, right?"

[spanick]

Yeah, I’ve only ever heard “bat and eyelash” as a reference to flirting. The expression I’m familiar with is “bay an eye.”

[Dormouse559]

Apparently, everyone is batting an eyelid at my eyelash. For me, there's a clear difference between "bat one's eyelashes" and "not bat an eyelash". The former is a pretty straightforward phrase and can be affirmative or negative; the latter is a full-on idiom and only negative (the affirmative doesn't make much anatomical sense). "Not bat an eye(lid)" is perfectly acceptable for me, too.

[yangfiretiger121]

The language one root for soldier, which I'm planning to have become the word with a single transfix. While I'm confident that the classifications (enlisted, etc.) are derived from the root, is it plausible or speakers to derive the ranks, such as Yeoman, from the root as well?

Additionally, I'm reconstructing Proto-Common with the help of several Wikipedia articles. Are the changes below plausible?

1. [*h → l]
2. {*pʰ, *tʰ, *kʰ → ħ}
3. [*J → ʝ], but {*pJ, *tJ, *kJ, *ɾJ → pʰ, tʰ, kʰ, r}, which become interchangeable with [p, t, k, ɾ] due to rarity (no complete agreement on [*J], with it as [j] or [ʝ]; [ʝ] being more likely)
4. [*C → t͡ʃ~d͡ʒ] ([*C] was [ç] or [j̊], no complete agreement)

[Khemehekis]

A number system question: Can someone please go to my Kankonian grammar at http://khemehekis.angelfire.com/basic.htm and read over my number system list (search for "quintillion" on the page to find it) to make sure I didn't goof?

[Omzinesý]

The language one root for soldier, which I'm planning to have become the word with a single transfix. While I'm confident that the classifications (enlisted, etc.) are derived from the root, is it plausible or speakers to derive the ranks, such as Yeoman, from the root as well?

Additionally, I'm reconstructing Proto-Common with the help of several Wikipedia articles. Are the changes below plausible?

1. [*h → l]
2. {*pʰ, *tʰ, *kʰ → ħ}
3. [*J → ʝ], but {*pJ, *tJ, *kJ, *ɾJ → pʰ, tʰ, kʰ, r}, which become interchangeable with [p, t, k, ɾ] due to rarity (no complete agreement on [*J], with it as [j] or [ʝ]; [ʝ] being more likely)
4. [*C → t͡ʃ~d͡ʒ] ([*C] was [ç] or [j̊], no complete agreement)

Phonemes are written /phoneme/, pronunciations [pronunciation].
It's impossible to say if an unanalysable phoneme *C can change to something. You probably see why.
[h] rarely fortifies to anything. It's kind of the last stage of the phoneme before disappearing. In some voiceless environment that could happen but I don't see it probable in all environments.
pj -> pç -> pʰ actually does feel theoretically ok, though I don't know where it would have happened.

[yangfiretiger121]

The language one root for soldier, which I'm planning to have become the word with a single transfix. While I'm confident that the classifications (enlisted, etc.) are derived from the root, is it plausible or speakers to derive the ranks, such as Yeoman, from the root as well?

Additionally, I'm reconstructing Proto-Common with the help of several Wikipedia articles. Are the changes below plausible?

1. [*h → l]
2. {*pʰ, *tʰ, *kʰ → ħ}
3. [*J → ʝ], but {*pJ, *tJ, *kJ, *ɾJ → pʰ, tʰ, kʰ, r}, which become interchangeable with [p, t, k, ɾ] due to rarity (no complete agreement on [*J], with it as [j] or [ʝ]; [ʝ] being more likely)
4. [*C → t͡ʃ~d͡ʒ] ([*C] was [ç] or [j̊], no complete agreement)

Phonemes are written /phoneme/, pronunciations [pronunciation].
It's impossible to say if an unanalysable phoneme *C can change to something. You probably see why.
[h] rarely fortifies to anything. It's kind of the last stage of the phoneme before disappearing. In some voiceless environment that could happen but I don't see it probable in all environments.
pj -> pç -> pʰ actually does feel theoretically ok, though I don't know where it would have happened.

I, actually, asked this on the new ZBB as well (final questioned changes below).

1. [*j̊ → l]
>[*j → l] happens from Proto-Oto-Manguean to Tlapanec as well as Proto-Malayo-Polynesian to Proto-Malayo-Javanic; a variant, [*j → lʲ], happens from Proto-Slavonic to Polish; and sporadic [*j → ɭ] is from Proto-Malayo-Polynesian to Proto-Chamic. I just kept [h] voicelessness.
2. {*pʰ, *tʰ, *kʰ → ħ}
3. [*J → ʝ], but {*pJ, *tJ, *kJ, *ɾJ → pʰ, tʰ, kʰ, r}, which become interchangeable with [p, t, k, ɾ] due to rarity (no complete agreement on [*J], with it as [j] or [ʝ]; [ʝ] being more likely)
4. [*ʍ → t͡ʃ~d͡ʒ]
>Truly, IPA [*xʷ → t͡ʃ(ʷ)~d͡ʒ(ʷ)], with the results having extremely weak or no labialization because the labialization's only occurrence fronted the velar but transcribed [*ʍ] as [*x] is never reconstructed.
>>Simplifying to IPA [*xʷ → t͡ʃ(ʷ)] or local [*ʍ → t͡ʃ(ʷ)], ultimately ending at [ɹ̠̊˔] through [t̠ɹ̠̊˔]
>>Somewhat related was [*py, *pJo, *pJɔ, *pJu, *pJʊ → fy~f͆y, fo~f͆o, fɔ~f͆ɔ, fu~f͆u, fʊ~f͆ʊ]

[Shemtov]

Would it be unautralistic to have a set of numbers for mass nouns? Let's say we had them in English, and the suffix was (i)l. So Fouril waters could mean "four cups of water" "four pits of water" etc. and what the number was referring to is based on context/discourse clues.
Also, what mood corresponds to "should"?

[sangi39]

Would it be unautralistic to have a set of numbers for mass nouns? Let's say we had them in English, and the suffix was (i)l. So Fouril waters could mean "four cups of water" "four pits of water" etc. and what the number was referring to is based on context/discourse clues.
Also, what mood corresponds to "should"?

I think Japanese does this, but its grouping of nouns as mass nouns is pretty pervasive. Apparently, however, there's two ways to describe how many of some nouns there are. On the one hand, there's the use of Sino-Japanese numbers and counter words, and on the other hand these can be switched out for a bare native Japanese word (although seemingly only up to ten).

I wouldn't find it odd to see a system where something like this appeared in a language where mass nouns were a lot less common than in Japanese.

The counter words could, presumably, gradually fall out in some situations, and you'd end up with a system where (some?) mass nouns ended up using a distinct set of numbers with an implied measure. So you might have "three.MASS water" meaning "three cups of water" vs. "three.MASS pail water" for "three pails of water".

[Salmoneus]

Would it be unautralistic to have a set of numbers for mass nouns? Let's say we had them in English, and the suffix was (i)l. So Fouril waters could mean "four cups of water" "four pits of water" etc. and what the number was referring to is based on context/discourse clues.

So you mean like English, if the space were taken out between the number and "lots of"? Sixlotsa water, fourlotsawater. [or 'loads']

Yes, it is common for counters to semantically bleach over time. It's also common, from the other direction, for modifiers to inflect to agree with the countability of the noun.
[quote
Also, what mood corresponds to "should"?
[/quote]

Moods don't work like that - they're not just translations of English. Rather, different English constructions are used to convey different moods at different times.

"Should" is a word with a huge range of meanings, so there is no single mood "corresponding" to "should" (not to mention, the naming of moods/cases/aspects etc is largely arbitrary and frequently ad hoc).

[KaiTheHomoSapien]

Has anyone ever re-done a conlang of theirs significantly? Revamped it into the "2.0" version? What kind of changes did you make? Were they significant enough that you had essentially created a new conlang or just an improved version of the same one?

[Micamo]

Has anyone ever re-done a conlang of theirs significantly? Revamped it into the "2.0" version? What kind of changes did you make? Were they significant enough that you had essentially created a new conlang or just an improved version of the same one?

Many times: Often, I throw out literally everything except the general aethetic and some basic lexicon words I like. Sometimes, if I haven't touched a lang in a while, I'll start over just because it's easier than trying to decipher my shit-ass notes.

[Zekoslav]

Has anyone ever re-done a conlang of theirs significantly? Revamped it into the "2.0" version? What kind of changes did you make? Were they significant enough that you had essentially created a new conlang or just an improved version of the same one?

This happened to my Indo-European conlang. While it had and Old, Middle and Modern stage from the very beginning, they still had more-or-less the same feel, the archaic Indo-European feel like Greek or Lithuanian with final /s/ being preserved. And it had voiced aspirates become voiceless aspirates like Greek. Then at some point I decided to merge voiced aspirates into voiced unaspirates instead, and made the Middle and Modern stages much more innovative and rather ressembling the Iranian languages I had just read about than Greek or Lithuanian (complete with abstract/collective nouns formed with suffixes containing /t/ replacing the original plural declension). But then I became nostalgic about the original language and decided to make it a more conservative sister of the new one. However, I kept revising it to become an intentional pastiche of Classical Latin and Greek, complete with there being ae instead of ai (and ao instead of au for a good measure). Then the conlang with the original aesthetics became a third sister language (actually a fourth, since a third sister language had arisen by that time through an idea to have a "fleeting o". It was originally supposed to be also quite IE-like but it became to Hebrew what the second language was to Latin and Greek...).

[Pabappa]

Has anyone ever re-done a conlang of theirs significantly? Revamped it into the "2.0" version? What kind of changes did you make? Were they significant enough that you had essentially created a new conlang or just an improved version of the same one?

For me, the name of a conlang indicates a place in the story, and sometimes a certain aesthetic. So yes, Ive done this many times, .... I've been trying to create a language I call "Moonshine" since 1994, and have scrapped and revived it several times, such that I could say it is really four different languages. It's likely that Moonshine will never approach completion or even the stage where I can write short texts, partly because of my indecisiveness and partly because my current plan for Moonshine is to make it so different from all of the other languages on the planet that it is very time-consuming to work on.

I created Pabappa in 2004, and have since then changed everything about it except the phonology, but I did this slowly, and never had a time in which I considered myself to be starting over. I could say the same about Late Andanese, which was originally called Xap and had a very different grammar. But the phonology has not changed at all, and the changes I've made have been slow and gradual.

[Jackk]

Has anyone ever re-done a conlang of theirs significantly? Revamped it into the "2.0" version? What kind of changes did you make? Were they significant enough that you had essentially created a new conlang or just an improved version of the same one?

I think Boral qualifies for this, although it was less of a revamp and more of a Ship of Theseus style rebuilding. Here's a comparison almost 4 years apart:

August 2015
Jo ped te pardon por ri scrir i orthograph d'i langua - jo s'a un somer camp a Cambridge avant joudi e j'aif mal creð c'j'avlas Internet aver. A su pugnt, veðeit un bel long phraz por mangear pouc e pouc!

May 2019
Jo vos peð pardon d'ayent rien scaut sull'ig façon a dreçar y parol – jo's apart cas mey an cours stival a Cambridge fin je Jouf, e j'au mal creit connexion aïr, pu non, par nafranç. All'oc pognt, veyað eç bel e lonc protas a pascr a pieç minuscr !

I apologise for not writing anything about the language's spelling system - I'm on a summer course in Cambridge until Thursday, and I thought I'd have Internet, but alas, no. Instead, here are a nice long couple of sentences to pick over!

[Creyeditor]

Would it be unautralistic to have a set of numbers for mass nouns? Let's say we had them in English, and the suffix was (i)l. So Fouril waters could mean "four cups of water" "four pits of water" etc. and what the number was referring to is based on context/discourse clues.

So you mean like English, if the space were taken out between the number and "lots of"? Sixlotsa water, fourlotsawater. [or 'loads']

Yes, it is common for counters to semantically bleach over time. It's also common, from the other direction, for modifiers to inflect to agree with the countability of the noun.

Also, what mood corresponds to "should"?

Moods don't work like that - they're not just translations of English. Rather, different English constructions are used to convey different moods at different times.

"Should" is a word with a huge range of meanings, so there is no single mood "corresponding" to "should" (not to mention, the naming of moods/cases/aspects etc is largely arbitrary and frequently ad hoc).

Modality is such an intersting topic and I always find it hard to wrap my head my head around it. The main conceptual distinction is between epistemic and non-epistemic modality. Epistemic modality expresses how likely the speaker judges an event to occur. Non-epistemic modality refers to wishes, obligations, abilities etc. Importantly, this distinction is crosscut by the neccesity vs. possibility distinction. This is actually a continuum. Let's say we talk about wishes (which is non-epistemic). This is often approached by talking about the speaker's ideal world. Possibility would mean he's okay with it, weak neccesity would mean that he would be really if it happened and strong necessity if you would be devastated if it did not happen. English does not encode the difference between epistemic and non-epistemic modality. Should generally describes weak necessity. It can be used in an epistemic way (Where is Joe? I think, he should be at the train station around this time generally.) or refer to obligations and similar stuff (You should do your homework!).