Re: [lojban-beginners] What actually are the rules of word formation?

[Jorge Llambías <jjllambias@gmail.com>]

On Sun, Apr 19, 2015 at 5:19 PM, mezohe <wow.jvs@gmail.com> wrote:

------ MEZOHE'S CONDENSED CLL 2.0 MORPHOLOGY CHAPTER COUNTERFEIT ------

Very impressive. And more succinct than I expected it would have to be, given all the complexity.  

A few minor comments:

i and u are vowels, unless a vowel or diphthong follows, in which case they are glides. Glide-diphthong pairs win over glide-vowel pairs, which win over diphthongs.

Not sure about "Glide-diphthong pairs win over glide-vowel pairs". "iaua" is "ia,ua" not "iau,a" so the glide-vowel wins in this case. Except that "au" can't really be a diphthong here because a diphthong can't be directly followed by a vowel, but I'm not sure if that's supposed to be understood at this stage, since that rule hasn't been mentioned yet.

 

i as a glide can't follow a diphthong ending in i, and u as a glide can't follow the diphthong au.

This rule hasn't been implemented yet. Currently it's just that a glide can't follow a diphthong.

 

h can't be next to a consonant, glide, or glottal stop.

Nor can it start or end a word. Alternatively: "h must be between one vowel/diphthong and another". 

* y-syllable
  - a word break, a glide, or up to three consonants
  - then the letter y
  - e.g. by, .y, gry, zbly

* hy-syllable
  - the string "'y"

 

y-syllables and hy-syllables could in principle end in a consonant too, although this is never actually realized in brivla. But there is a proposal to make the r-hyphen of type-3 fu'ivla "-yr-", which would introduce y-syllables with codas in fu'ivla. (And eliminate the need for -l- as a variation of the type-3 r-hyphen.)

A final rafsi is:

- a zihevla:
  - a vowel syllable
  - followed by any number of vowel, h-, or consonantal syllables
  - followed by a vowel- or h-syllable with no final consonant
  - is not a gismu or sequence of more than one rafsi
  - e.g. cpi,kù,ku  àl,ga  fì,pr,koi  glàu,ka  sprà,'e
- or a gismu:

... 

I think the definition of zihevla also needs to say that it may not start with a sequence of cmavo that yields a valid word when removed, otherwise "fa'i" would count as a zi'evla, even if it would never make it as a brivla.

A slinkuhi {valslinku'i} is a [consonant followed by a brivla that up to its first y-syllable, or if no y-syllables, in its entirety, is composed of non-zihevla rafsi] that itself can't be broken up into a string of rafsi.
  e.g. _p_rà,'i  _s_pòr,te  _z_bla,zdà,vro  _c_nar,jy,fra,gà,ri

The part following the consonant doesn't have to be brivla, just a string of one or more rafsi, as your first example shows. "pra'i" or "pra'ira'i" are slinku'i even though the consonant is not followed by a brivla.

- Each pair of cmavo of the form CV Cy followed by either a brivla or a
  cmavo of the form CVV or CV'V needs a glottal stop between the last
  and second-last word.
    e.g. "ca" "vy" "càr,vi" -> {ca vy. carvi} /Sa.vy?.'Sar.vi/
         (/Sa.vy.'Sar.vi/ would be {cavycarvi}, a lujvo)

or alternatively between the first and second word: "ca.vycarvi" should also work.

Very good description of the morphology!

mu'o mi'e xorxes

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