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From: selpahi <seladwa@gmx.de>
Subject: [lojban] Young ex-presidents and abandoned houses
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Date: Tue, 15 Nov 2016 14:43:39 +0100
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Adjectival participles.

Lojban does not have them, but let's look at the known options for=20
translating phrases such as "to be a young ex-president" and "to be an=20
abandoned house". What these have in common is that they contain two=20
tanru units, at least one of which wants to be preceded by a=20
tense/aspect/modal. This is not grammatically possible, because=20
tense/aspect/modal tags apply to entire selbri and not to tanru units,=20
and they cannot appear in the middle of a tanru. The following=20
work-arounds are known to be available:

1) BE: {citno jatna be ba'o ku}, {se cliva be ba'o ku zdadi'u}
2) POI'I: {citno poi'i [ke'a] ba'o jatna kei}, {poi'i [ke'a] ba'o se=20
cliva kei zdadi'u}
3) ZEI: {citno ba'o-zei-jatna}, {ba'o-zei-selcliva zdadi'u}
4) lujvo, but this only works with a few tags
5) GU'E (and possibly {ke}): {gu'e citno gi ba'o jatna} (not allowed),=20
{gu'e ba'o se cliva gi zdadi'u} (allowed)
6) ME LO: {citno me lo ba'o jatna}, {me lo ba'o se cliva poi [ke'a]=20
zdadi'u} / {me lo ba'o se cliva me'u zdadi'u}

Option 1 is ugly to me because of the change in word order and the {ku}.
Option 2 is very flexible and very verbose and very complex (it=20
increases the nesting by one level)
Option 3 is not practical when the tanru unit consists of more than one=20
brivla (e.g. {se jai broda} or {na'e se broda}) as {zei} would then have=20
to be placed between all the words.
Option 4 is not at all general.
Option 5 has potential but requires forethought, and {gu'e} also can=20
claims too much, since it merges all the places, not just the x1 (just=20
like {je}).
Option 6 needlessly involves a sumti, which seems backwards to me,=20
because I believe that predicates should be the base case and sumti=20
should be derived from them, and not vice versa.

If tag + tanru_unit yielded a tanru_unit instead of a selbri, then=20
{(citno (ba'o jatna))} would be a valid tanru, as would {(ba'o se cliva=20
(zdadi'u))}. However, this would require a lot more {cu} everywhere,=20
specifically anywhere TAG was used in place of {cu} to close all the=20
preceding constructs.

I am looking for practical solutions to this rather commonly encountered=20
problem.

~~~mi'e la solpa'i

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