[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

[lojban-beginners] Re: three-letter gismu?



On 9/6/05, HeliodoR <exitconsole@gmail.com> wrote:
> la maikyl. pu ciska di'e
>  
> > coi rodo.
> > 
> > This is an idea I had. I'm not proposing anything nor am I going to run
> > off and design my own language quite yet :-). 
> > 
> > Was there ever a proposal to have a plain, regular 3-letter system for
> > everything - gismu, rafsi and cmavo?
>  
>   
> Not a bad idea. Though it some problematic points... 
> Having different forms for words - according to length and letter order - is
> a useful tool 
> to give the listener/reader a hint what kind of word that might be. 

Not only this, but there's the problems involving lujvo. An
experienced listener/reader will be able to pick out an unfamiliar
lujvo only from the sounds/letters, based on the number and position
of consonant clusters and such. And you can also pick out gismu in
speech through their cadence--the emphasis is always on the second
syllable, so if you hear a stressed syllable, it's likely (though
practically, not always) in a brivla.

> BTW, could someone tell me what
> "English" means?

The Angles, and some other group (the Brutes?) were an early
inhabitant of the British Isles, thus Anglo-Saxon. So English is Angle
+ ish, if my folk etymology guessing has any merit.

Chris Capel
-- 
"What is it like to be a bat? What is it like to bat a bee? What is it
like to be a bee being batted? What is it like to be a batted bee?"
-- The Mind's I (Hofstadter, Dennet)