Sunday 24 December 2017

Detu language

1: Orthography

-          A a = /a/
-          B b = /b/
-          C c = /t͡ɕ/
-          D d = /θ/
-          E e = /e/
-          F f = /ɸ/
-          G g = /g/
-          I i = /i/
-          Ī ī = /ɪ/
-          J j = /ɮ/
-          K k = /k/
-          L l = /l/
-          M m = /m/
-          N n = /n/ (comes after “a/i/o/u/ū” to make them nasal)
-          O o = /ɔ/
-          P p = /p/
-          R r = /ɾ/
-          S s = /s/
-          T t = /t/
-          U u = /ʊ/
-          Ū ū = /y/
-          W w = /w/
-          Y y = /j/
-          Z z = /z/

2: Understanding of grammatical syntax

2a: Relative pronouns and sentence order

All sentences are described in only two persons for their first subject nouns - 1st (“me”) and 2nd (“you”) - even those which do not directly involve these. In the latter instances, the two persons refer to whoever the action is physically closer to, or more in relation to; for example, if the person who is being spoken to can observe, in a way, the action being described, the verb takes the 2nd person, whereas if not, the 1st person is used.

The common sentence order is OSV - for instance, “you make X” becomes “X make-2nd”. If a prepositional noun relates to the subject or object, it follows the relevant noun. Thus, “I, with him, make X” becomes “with-near X make-1st”.

2b: Non-person sentences and recursives

For sentences not directly involving either object, such as “X does Y”, these are treated as subordinate/recursive clauses, with the relevant person (the use of which is discussed in 2a) used with a linking verb, such as “to see” or “to describe”.

As an example of how these are arranged:
-          I see X do Y/I see X which is doing Y = See-Y X do-1st
-          You see X do Y/You see X which is doing Y = See-Y do-2nd X (in 2nd-person subordinates, the order becomes OVS)

We can see that the marker of a recursive clause is attaching the recursive object as a suffix (discussed in 3b) to the primary verb, while applying the appropriate person to the final verb.

For subordinate clauses marked with “which” in English, such as:
-          I see X, which knows Z, do Y = See-Y know-Z-X do-1st
-          I see X, which knows that A helped Z, do Y = See-Y know-Z A help-X do-1st
-          You see, which knows that A helped Z, do Y = See-Y know-Z do-1st help-X

2c: Predicates

Predicates (“to be”) are not shown with a verb, but in the following way:
-         X is Y = Y-X X

An auxiliary verb, “kaun”, is inflected in a single neutral person to demonstrate other tenses with X and Y. A similar verb, “lan”, is inflected to show predicates with the pronouns.

For adjectives in the predicate, like “the cat is tall”, the adjective is simply put before the subject noun and the suffix “-t” is added. For pronoun-adjective predicates, “lan” is again used.

2d: Indirect/intransitive expression

For intransitive verbs, structures such as these are used (fortunately, there are very few of these, as most verbs of motion simply incorporate prepositions):
-          I see X run to Y = see-inf X-impresent run-1st-Y

Noun presence will be explained in 3a.

For verbs with a direct and indirect object, structures like this are used:
-          I see X give Y to Z = See-Y (*) Z X give-1st

*When not “to”, the preposition is indicated with an adjective.

3: Nouns

3a: Plurality and presence

All nouns have a general plural, and are inflected for a third verb person, roughly equivalent to pronoun “one” in English - although it still occurs in relation to 1st and 2nd person with verbs, it is used (with the subject) to indicate an action as a question of the presence/possibility of something. This “one” form is known as the “impresent”.

Nouns ending in vowels (including nasal vowels) and “y”/”w” all take the same pattern of endings (for example, “bi” (“ox”)):


Std.
Imp.
Sg.
Bi
Bis
Pl.
Bik
Bizi

Nouns ending in consonants are split into soft (s, z, f, d, l, j, shown left) and hard (p, b, t, k, g, c, r, m, n, shown right), with the examples “aj” (“mind”, “spirit”) and “nīt” (“wind”):

Std.
Imp.
Std.
Imp.
Sg.
Aj
Aje
Nīt
Nīta
Pl.
Ajag
Aji
Nītīg
Nīti

3b: Suffixed (recursive) form

Every noun also has a suffix form, used in constructions indicated with “see-Y” in 2b. This suffix is formed by adding “-wa” to the end of the original noun, and “d-” at the beginning if it starts with a vowel - if it starts with a unvoiced consonant, it is voiced, but if not remains the same.

3c: Pronouns

In order to form plural pronouns, articles meaning “with you”, “ey”, and “with me”, “so”, exist, to be added to the subject. These can also be used as object forms, when prefixed with “ta-”.

4: Verbs

4a: Verb patterns

There are four verb “forms”:
-          General: used for questioning, instructing, or simply describing actual events
-          Subjunctive: used for wishes and hopeful possibilities (equivalent to “should”)
-          Necessitative: equivalent to “must”
-          Hypothetical: describing fictional events, or equivalent to “would”

All verbs have an infinitive ending in “-n”, with any vowel preceding it. A common example of a verb is “gun”, “to accept”, or “one accepts”. These can be used to refer to neutral events in the general tense, especially coupled with the impresent form discussed in 3a, but rarely.


1st
2nd
Gen.
Gud
Gur
Sub.
Guc
Gut
Nec.
Guya
Guyu
Hyp.
Gus
Guki

An uncommon second class of verbs ending in “-an”, such as “ajan”, “to be cunning”, take a somewhat different conjugation - the verb “kaun” takes the 2nd person form as its only form, being the only verb to do so.


1st
2nd
Gen.
Ajat
Ajut
Sub.
Ajac
Ajuc
Nec.
Ajay
Ajuy
Hyp.
Ajak
Ajuk

5: Adjectives and adverbs

Adjectives and adverbs do not heavily differ from nouns, although when they are in such a function, they come before the noun/verb to which they are attached. Most adverbs referring to motion or quality, such as “quickly”, “well”, “poorly”, are incorporated into the verb. The only suffix most adjectives take is the predicative suffix, described in 2c. A handful of colours and numbers take “-u” as a suffix.

6: Numerals 1-10

-         Yac
-         Ar
-         Aw
-         Telu
-         Kosu
-         Oyu
-         Asdu
-         Nidu
-         Keru

-         Jey