Just to shake things up a bit here's some samples of the mountain people's language. I'm calling them the Be'oi, from their word for mankind or people. Technically they call themselves Be'oi kau Qqoi "The people on the cliffside" but no one calls that because it's long. I've been going through a swadesh list to fill out their vocabulary, which already makes me remember how much I hate creating a lexicon. That's why TbKt gets so much attention. The vocabulary practically writes itself thanks to its derivational system. I'm just providing sentences and translations, you, my dear readers, get to try to figure the structure of the language (though some of the translations are way loose).
Cirre'i e happia ijji u'e ngõnã- The bird could be eating a flower.
Hã sa uxxale fu fũxã ikkanã?- Have I ever been squeezed by a snake?
Hã sa uxxale ri fũxã ikkanã- Once a snake squeezed me.
Hã e ssevĩ litto rusu- I was going to go fishing.
Hã e ibollo u'e hufe rrixa- I was digging for worms.
Hã ãnã iyea õrẽĩ mĩ'ãũ mẽmẽ posai- I was tired and unfortunately fell asleep.
Uxxale rajji- A snake arrived.
Hã i hhi uwẽ gebba- Maybe it smelled me.
Hã i hhi voa ngõnã- It tried to eat me.
U''ai go hã pũ ngãvõ ã ẽrõĩ- The chieftain heard us fighting.
Ba go hhi icõ ẽmẽtõ- After some time, he killed it.
Uxxale ku mẽwĩẽ; hã e hhi mẽmẽ obie- The snake died but I started to fear snakes.
yeah, I haven't made any conjunctions. Or figured out story telling. And a bunch of other things. I don't know if I used the right aspects and moods. But I got something out. Enjoy!
(I think I'm gonna post this story without translation on facebook for the lulz).
Saturday, March 18, 2017
Monday, March 13, 2017
Harvey Danger
So I've rediscovered Harvey Danger. Even though I've enjoyed "Flagpole Sitta" for years, I've never actually bothered to listen to their other stuff, assuming they were just another generic post-grunge, late 90s alternative band. Ends up they are, but I really like their stuff. I haven't listened to their third album yet, but Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone? and King James Version are both really good, fun, enjoyable, witty and emotional. All my favorite things!
Moral of the story? Don't write off someone just because they are a one hit wonder. They might have more songs that should be hits.
Some random lyrics from them:
"I swear, I wish I could be less aware... now it’s absolutely clear to me that solitude is not the same as singularity, but that’s not why I’m lonely."- This reminds me about the fun of dividing the semantic space of "loneliness". What is loneliness? What's the difference between solitude and loneliness? How else can it be divided? Or combined? I forget how I've divided up the space in various conlangs, if I have at all, but I know I made loneliness taboo for the Úīkmo Kīkxot. Well not loneliness perse, but bachelorhood and loneliness outside of set times. In fact one of their core religious tales is about how loneliness can drive someone to do evil things. It has two roots so far relating to loneliness, both with negative connotations (well sort of at least). One root is for humans, one is for other stuff. I dunno if this technically counts as suppletion, but TbKt has a pretty strong system of roots used only for humans and a separate root meaning the same thing for everything else. An essential part of insults is using the wrong verb form to imply that someone is less than human.
I think that the mountain tribes (one day I'll give them a name!) might distinguish loneliness from solitude by using the adversative particle. But I dunno yet. Osogkum may use the volitional form to distinguish the two. Again, I dunno, haven't hit that hill yet.
Speaking of alone, I just looked up it's etymology and it apparently came from "all one". Who would've guessed :p
"Friends will turn against you
"You can bash your head against a wall forever,
The wall will never change.
But if you start to like the bloody bruises,
The wall cannot be blamed."
And of course the classic:
Among other lyrics and songs.
I like late 90s punk/post-punk/post-hardcore/emo/alternative/etc. Pinkerton is probably my favorite Weezer album, after all. In fact I was very happy to hear that At the Drive In is realizing a new album in a couple months. One of my favorite modern bands is Two Inch Astronaut. If you are somehow reading this blog and yet haven't had me try to get you to listen to them, you should go listen to them. And check out Exploding in Sound Records. I've been following this label since 2013 and they're starting to get bigger. Some of their bands even have wikipedia pages now! Though it makes me feel sort of band that I didn't grad early Speedy Oritz stuff before they got (relatively) big.
I like to ramble. It makes me feel like there's thoughts in my brain.
Moral of the story? Don't write off someone just because they are a one hit wonder. They might have more songs that should be hits.
Some random lyrics from them:
"I swear, I wish I could be less aware... now it’s absolutely clear to me that solitude is not the same as singularity, but that’s not why I’m lonely."- This reminds me about the fun of dividing the semantic space of "loneliness". What is loneliness? What's the difference between solitude and loneliness? How else can it be divided? Or combined? I forget how I've divided up the space in various conlangs, if I have at all, but I know I made loneliness taboo for the Úīkmo Kīkxot. Well not loneliness perse, but bachelorhood and loneliness outside of set times. In fact one of their core religious tales is about how loneliness can drive someone to do evil things. It has two roots so far relating to loneliness, both with negative connotations (well sort of at least). One root is for humans, one is for other stuff. I dunno if this technically counts as suppletion, but TbKt has a pretty strong system of roots used only for humans and a separate root meaning the same thing for everything else. An essential part of insults is using the wrong verb form to imply that someone is less than human.
I think that the mountain tribes (one day I'll give them a name!) might distinguish loneliness from solitude by using the adversative particle. But I dunno yet. Osogkum may use the volitional form to distinguish the two. Again, I dunno, haven't hit that hill yet.
Speaking of alone, I just looked up it's etymology and it apparently came from "all one". Who would've guessed :p
"Friends will turn against you
People disappoint you every time
So if you've got greatness in you would you do us all a favor
And keep it to yourself?"
So if you've got greatness in you would you do us all a favor
And keep it to yourself?"
"
Cast off the ego scars and let's go hit the bars
I reserve the right to hold my grudges
Friends like you, you know the rest
But all told, I hold on to my anger far too long"
I reserve the right to hold my grudges
Friends like you, you know the rest
But all told, I hold on to my anger far too long"
"Some people will surprise you with a real depth of feeling
Others still may shock you with all that they're revealing
But one thing's sure: there's always more information than you ask
For."
Others still may shock you with all that they're revealing
But one thing's sure: there's always more information than you ask
For."
"You can bash your head against a wall forever,
The wall will never change.
But if you start to like the bloody bruises,
The wall cannot be blamed."
And of course the classic:
"I'm not sick but I'm not well
And I'm so hot cause I'm in hell"
And I'm so hot cause I'm in hell"
Among other lyrics and songs.
I like late 90s punk/post-punk/post-hardcore/emo/alternative/etc. Pinkerton is probably my favorite Weezer album, after all. In fact I was very happy to hear that At the Drive In is realizing a new album in a couple months. One of my favorite modern bands is Two Inch Astronaut. If you are somehow reading this blog and yet haven't had me try to get you to listen to them, you should go listen to them. And check out Exploding in Sound Records. I've been following this label since 2013 and they're starting to get bigger. Some of their bands even have wikipedia pages now! Though it makes me feel sort of band that I didn't grad early Speedy Oritz stuff before they got (relatively) big.
I like to ramble. It makes me feel like there's thoughts in my brain.
Wednesday, March 1, 2017
Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Toúījāb Kīkxot
Here's a translation for the first article of the Universal Declaration of Human rights. The first set of translators notes have to do with the translation itself, the second set more with the theory behind why I did things. Btw, check out this site
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 1:
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Toúījāb Kīkxot:
Khōhim úīkmo1 vit akhxōm qal cōroj2 dumlūzō ūmpa lipha tāsah ī cāyap3 vit fnoxi4. Cānu mamaxīrosasā5 mocīph6 ī ahrōsh 7 ūmpa ziūsiwk8 olúīg-alúag zāraz dūchhawāx.
IPA:
[ˈk'oːʔɪm wiːkŋɔ ʕɪt ək'ʃoːm q'əl tsoːrɔdz dʊmluːtʃoː uːmpə lɪp'ə tɑːsəʔ iː tsɑːjəp ʕɪt ħnɔʃɪ. Tsɑːnʊ məməʃiːrɔsəsɑː mɔtsiːp' iː əʔroːs' uːmpə tʃjuːsɪɹk ɔlwiːg-əlwəg tʃɑːrətʃ duːts'əɹɑːʃ]
Translators notes
1 The word literally means "human, person, mankind", but has a connotation of "civilized people" (that is, only their civilization). Using "úīkmo" instead of "vīggo" (human, tribe, people, mankind, barbarian etc) reflects their values that they are superior and have greater rights compared to everyone else.
2 Úīkmo Kīkxot find the idea of people being born "free" strange. Instead the phrase "enter the world" is used. Means the same thing, but fits their sensibility better, since the verb born usually has reference to a mother, but there is none here.
3 Literally means "entitlement". Úīkmo Kīkxot don't have the same views as us regarding rights. People can feel that they deserve something, but those are based on merit, wealth and caste, not ideals.
4 Means the same, equal or even balanced. While this construction is perfectly acceptable, xenophobic Úīkmo Kīkxot would probably interpret this to mean that each person's rights (entitlements) are equal or in accordance with their individual dignity (honor, standing) and not that all people have the same rights and dignity.
5 The habitual/frequentive/gnomic aspect is used to emphasize that people are always given the following things. Takes a locative applicative suffix to show that the subject is the recipient, not the patient. While no agent is specified, the ditransitive is still used and people can understand from context that the following nouns are patients, not agents.
6 Literally means "mind, place of thoughts" but can mean reason too
7 Literally means "doing righteous acts" but like many verbal nouns, has a more abstract meaning of "knowing what is right" or conscience
8 Means "must" but uses the imperative prefix to soften it to "should". This shows that pragmatically the imperative prefix makes orders more polite and in the case of an imperative verb, still makes it more polite
A) The IPA represents the standard dialect as I have it so far. But I may add more assimilations/sadhi effects/liaison and the like so don't take it as the final say.
B) So I was looking at different translations of the UDHR while I was doing this (having already decided that I didn't want to use the word for birth (see the note above)) and it ends up that Sundanese seems to use a similar phrasing: "Sakumna jalma gubrag ka alam dunya...". My Sundanese is pretty shabby and my dictionary is still in Ethiopia, but gubrag ka alam dunya means "[something] to the natural world" and I'm pretty sure gubrag means "enter". So I'm not the only person to come up with this sort of way for translating it.
C) You may get the feeling that this culture is a culture of lawyers. Well, it really is. Their religion's big schism is over the interpretation of a religious holiday. Lawyering and loopholes is built into their national being. Just look at their views on slavery. And a translation of a document like this would definitely be written by lawyers. So that's why there's lots of weasel words and ambiguous phrasings that they can take advantage of. "Oh yes, we treat all civilized people in balance with their deserved honor. In fact, we are the most humane civilization around."
D) Caste is a big deal for the Úīkmo Kīkxot. Of course they would write the translation to fit that, rather than trying to change their culture.
E) In retrospect, I think that the verb mamaxīrosasā should probably be mamaxīrosaī (which in turn would be probably pronounced something like [məmʃiːrɔsiː] but I haven't figured out all the assimilation stuff yet) since I've really shifted to having the benefactive also be a recipient marker and the locative being more only for physical locations. Especially since it benefits the person getting reason. So I may eventually change this up.
F) Verbal nouns probably make up one of the most ambigious, least consistent, hardest to translate and most fun form for TbKt. I really haven't done enough with them, showing all the different paths that things can take for it.
G) I thought for a long time on how to express "should". I already had an imperative, and in normal speech probably only the imperative would be used, I think, but in something more formal like this there had to be something seperate. So it made some interesting effects on the pragmatics of commands, which is cool.
H) I always love when one of my reduplications gets used. I had so much fun thinking them up and figuring out how they'd be use. It was actually one of the big things, in my opinion, that help TbKt move away from its Indonesian and Arabic roots.
I) In retrospect, it might be best that olúig takes the instrumental suffix, which would empahsize that the manner is a (compound noun) and the subject is using that noun to do the verb. Also, I'm not sure if the adjective agreement is necessary here since it could be a compound noun.
J) Conjunctions in TbKt (the one concession I give to logic!) would make for an interesting article. But I think I want to get some profiles and work on other languages up first. But maybe not, because the patient is marked already...it's all confusing. Maybe a preposition should be added.
As for the literal translation, it would be something like "All civilized beings which enter the world are independent and they have honor and entitlements which are equal. They are given a mind and sense of good doing and should treat each other in a brotherly manner."
I should do a gloss but I'm real lazy so this is good for now.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 1:
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Toúījāb Kīkxot:
Khōhim úīkmo1 vit akhxōm qal cōroj2 dumlūzō ūmpa lipha tāsah ī cāyap3 vit fnoxi4. Cānu mamaxīrosasā5 mocīph6 ī ahrōsh 7 ūmpa ziūsiwk8 olúīg-alúag zāraz dūchhawāx.
IPA:
[ˈk'oːʔɪm wiːkŋɔ ʕɪt ək'ʃoːm q'əl tsoːrɔdz dʊmluːtʃoː uːmpə lɪp'ə tɑːsəʔ iː tsɑːjəp ʕɪt ħnɔʃɪ. Tsɑːnʊ məməʃiːrɔsəsɑː mɔtsiːp' iː əʔroːs' uːmpə tʃjuːsɪɹk ɔlwiːg-əlwəg tʃɑːrətʃ duːts'əɹɑːʃ]
Translators notes
1 The word literally means "human, person, mankind", but has a connotation of "civilized people" (that is, only their civilization). Using "úīkmo" instead of "vīggo" (human, tribe, people, mankind, barbarian etc) reflects their values that they are superior and have greater rights compared to everyone else.
2 Úīkmo Kīkxot find the idea of people being born "free" strange. Instead the phrase "enter the world" is used. Means the same thing, but fits their sensibility better, since the verb born usually has reference to a mother, but there is none here.
3 Literally means "entitlement". Úīkmo Kīkxot don't have the same views as us regarding rights. People can feel that they deserve something, but those are based on merit, wealth and caste, not ideals.
4 Means the same, equal or even balanced. While this construction is perfectly acceptable, xenophobic Úīkmo Kīkxot would probably interpret this to mean that each person's rights (entitlements) are equal or in accordance with their individual dignity (honor, standing) and not that all people have the same rights and dignity.
5 The habitual/frequentive/gnomic aspect is used to emphasize that people are always given the following things. Takes a locative applicative suffix to show that the subject is the recipient, not the patient. While no agent is specified, the ditransitive is still used and people can understand from context that the following nouns are patients, not agents.
6 Literally means "mind, place of thoughts" but can mean reason too
7 Literally means "doing righteous acts" but like many verbal nouns, has a more abstract meaning of "knowing what is right" or conscience
8 Means "must" but uses the imperative prefix to soften it to "should". This shows that pragmatically the imperative prefix makes orders more polite and in the case of an imperative verb, still makes it more polite
A) The IPA represents the standard dialect as I have it so far. But I may add more assimilations/sadhi effects/liaison and the like so don't take it as the final say.
B) So I was looking at different translations of the UDHR while I was doing this (having already decided that I didn't want to use the word for birth (see the note above)) and it ends up that Sundanese seems to use a similar phrasing: "Sakumna jalma gubrag ka alam dunya...". My Sundanese is pretty shabby and my dictionary is still in Ethiopia, but gubrag ka alam dunya means "[something] to the natural world" and I'm pretty sure gubrag means "enter". So I'm not the only person to come up with this sort of way for translating it.
C) You may get the feeling that this culture is a culture of lawyers. Well, it really is. Their religion's big schism is over the interpretation of a religious holiday. Lawyering and loopholes is built into their national being. Just look at their views on slavery. And a translation of a document like this would definitely be written by lawyers. So that's why there's lots of weasel words and ambiguous phrasings that they can take advantage of. "Oh yes, we treat all civilized people in balance with their deserved honor. In fact, we are the most humane civilization around."
D) Caste is a big deal for the Úīkmo Kīkxot. Of course they would write the translation to fit that, rather than trying to change their culture.
E) In retrospect, I think that the verb mamaxīrosasā should probably be mamaxīrosaī (which in turn would be probably pronounced something like [məmʃiːrɔsiː] but I haven't figured out all the assimilation stuff yet) since I've really shifted to having the benefactive also be a recipient marker and the locative being more only for physical locations. Especially since it benefits the person getting reason. So I may eventually change this up.
F) Verbal nouns probably make up one of the most ambigious, least consistent, hardest to translate and most fun form for TbKt. I really haven't done enough with them, showing all the different paths that things can take for it.
G) I thought for a long time on how to express "should". I already had an imperative, and in normal speech probably only the imperative would be used, I think, but in something more formal like this there had to be something seperate. So it made some interesting effects on the pragmatics of commands, which is cool.
H) I always love when one of my reduplications gets used. I had so much fun thinking them up and figuring out how they'd be use. It was actually one of the big things, in my opinion, that help TbKt move away from its Indonesian and Arabic roots.
I) In retrospect, it might be best that olúig takes the instrumental suffix, which would empahsize that the manner is a (compound noun) and the subject is using that noun to do the verb. Also, I'm not sure if the adjective agreement is necessary here since it could be a compound noun.
J) Conjunctions in TbKt (the one concession I give to logic!) would make for an interesting article. But I think I want to get some profiles and work on other languages up first. But maybe not, because the patient is marked already...it's all confusing. Maybe a preposition should be added.
As for the literal translation, it would be something like "All civilized beings which enter the world are independent and they have honor and entitlements which are equal. They are given a mind and sense of good doing and should treat each other in a brotherly manner."
I should do a gloss but I'm real lazy so this is good for now.
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