Re: [lojban] The place structure of {selma'o}

[Michael Turniansky <mturniansky@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Jun 18, 2010 at 3:21 PM, Daniel Brockman <dbrockman@gmail.com> wrote:
> The term "selma'o" (in both English and Lojban) actually has very little to do
> with cmavo.  It's used for any word, and we have selma'o like CMENE and BRIVLA.
>
> Remarkably, {selma'o} doesn't even have a proper definition in jbovlaste.
> I propose the following place structure:
>
>    selma'o: x1=c2 is the grammatical class of the word x2=c1
>    with role x3=c3 in language x4=c4.
>
> Note that I have dropped the reference to cmavo, and adapted the meaning
> of the x3 to be the role of the selma'o rather than the meaning of the word.
>
> I like this for several reasons, the biggest one of course being that it
> causes the word {selma'o} to make sense and be useful and intuitive.
>
> I also like the fact that this definition makes {selma'o} != {se cmavo} (though
> they would still share their x1s).  This sets a precedent that should
> discourage people from creating nonce lujvo with -sel- that are completely
> superflous to the {se} compound, which is just a bad habit anyway in a
> language that is supposed to be inflectionless.
>
> (Are there any precedents for {selbroda} != {se broda} already?)
>
> An interesting expression is {lo se selma'o be zo ui}, by the way, which with
> this definition would be a precise way to say "the words of selma'o UI".
> (Right now, this is usually expressed using {la'e}: {lo cmavo be la'e zo ui}.)
>
> Thoughts?
>

  Sorry, knee jerk reaction -- I dislike it.  I think that lujvo of
construction SE zei broda should be sacrosanct, and mean nothing more
or less that "SE broda" doe.  Using "selma'o" to describe "CMENE" and
"BRIVLA" is just plain wrong and sloppy, in my opinion.

                    --gejyspa

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