From nobody@digitalkingdom.org Mon Mar 02 15:37:47 2009 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-beginners); Mon, 02 Mar 2009 15:37:47 -0800 (PST) Received: from nobody by chain.digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1LeHhj-00061K-0X for lojban-beginners-real@lojban.org; Mon, 02 Mar 2009 15:37:47 -0800 Received: from mx.freeshell.org ([192.94.73.19] helo=sdf.lonestar.org ident=root) by chain.digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1LeHhg-000610-Nd for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Mon, 02 Mar 2009 15:37:46 -0800 Received: from sdf.lonestar.org (IDENT:jwodder@iceland.freeshell.org [192.94.73.5]) by sdf.lonestar.org (8.14.3/8.13.8) with ESMTP id n22NbefX007005 for ; Mon, 2 Mar 2009 23:37:40 GMT Received: (from jwodder@localhost) by sdf.lonestar.org (8.14.3/8.12.8/Submit) id n22NbeG8008368 for lojban-beginners@lojban.org; Mon, 2 Mar 2009 23:37:40 GMT Date: Mon, 2 Mar 2009 23:37:40 +0000 From: Minimiscience To: lojban-beginners@lojban.org Subject: [lojban-beginners] Re: grammar check for my first few sentences Message-ID: <20090302233739.GA4545@sdf.lonestar.org> References: <20090302231357.GF25033@sunflowerriver.org> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20090302231357.GF25033@sunflowerriver.org> Organization: SDF Public Access UNIX System User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.19 (2009-01-05) X-Spam-Score: 0.0 X-Spam-Score-Int: 0 X-Spam-Bar: / X-archive-position: 1379 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-beginners-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: minimiscience@gmail.com Precedence: bulk Reply-to: lojban-beginners@lojban.org X-list: lojban-beginners de'i li 02 pi'e 03 pi'e 2009 la'o fy. Alan Post .fy. cusku zoi skamyxatra. > .i mi cusku le mlatu do la lojban > (I talk about the cat to you in lojban.) > > I'm not sure that saying "le mlatu" in the x2 is proper. I'm not > sure if the x2 place of cusku permits saying "the cat" or whether I > need a different or additional word. .skamyxatra Technically, it's grammatically correct, but it's improper usage of "{cusku}." The x2 place is supposed to be the text that is spoken, either quoted with "{lu} ... {li'u}" or indirectly described with "{lo se du'u}." If you simply want to describe the subject of your discourse rather than what you were saying about it, it would be better to use "{tavla}" in place of "{cusku}" and switch the x2 and x3 places. (Also, the x4 of "{tavla}" is explicitly the language used, rather than the "expressive medium," and so is even more fitting.) > .i se lu pa re ci li'u cusku do > ("123" you said.) > > Are the lu/li'u required here? Is this the same sentence as "se pa > re ci cusku do" or is that saying "the concept of 123 you speak > about?" I assume the status of lu/li'u is the same if you replace > "pa re ci" with "coi." The "{lu}" and "{li'u}" are required; however, the "{se}" needs to be placed immediately before the "{cusku}," without any intervening {sumti}. Also, saying "{pa re ci se cusku do}" would mean "123 utterances [are somehow related to] you," as a bare number string acts as a quantifier for a {sumti} rather than as a separate {sumti}. > In "Direct quotations" in Lojban for Beginners[2], the sample sentence > for lu/li'h has a "cu" in it: > > lu le munje li'u cu cmalu > > I would guess that the "cu" is optional, because the terminator li'u > is used. Is this correct? The "{cu}" is optional because "{cmalu}" is not preceded by a {selbri}. If the "{li'u}" were removed, the sentence would become "``The world is small''," a {bridi} within an unterminated quotation, and if the "{cu}" were also omitted, it would be "``The world-small''," a single {sumti} inside an unterminated quotation. mu'omi'e .kamymecraijun. -- ko kutygau le do skami jbipru bo vreji