From cowan@ccil.org Mon Aug 23 21:03:42 1999
X-Digest-Num: 219
Message-ID: <44114.219.1186.959273825@eGroups.com>
Date: Tue, 24 Aug 1999 00:03:42 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Cowan <cowan@ccil.org>
Subject: Re: Mark's proposed "ja'ai" already exists
X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 1186

Blunderingly I wrote:

> >There is already a positive analogue to "nai", and that is "jo'a".
> >It can be attached to attitudes to make them explicitly positive,
> >or used as a general metalinguistic affirmer: this is so, despite
> >appearances otherwise.
> >
> >Grammatically "jo'a" belongs to UI rather than NAI, but that simply
> >means it cannot be used in place of the non-attitudinal uses of "nai",
> >such as with connectives, tenses, etc.  (In practice if you want
> >to say ".ejo'a" it is grammatical 99% of the time.)

Mark Shoulson hrmphed:

> Hrmph.  I'm not sure I'm satisfied.  If ja'o means the same as my proposed
> ja'ai, then na'i must be the same as nai.

Oops.  jo'a is the counterpart of na'i indeed.  There is no counterpart
of nai; jo'a = na'inai.

-- 
John Cowan                                   cowan@ccil.org
       I am a member of a civilization. --David Brin