From lojbab@lojban.org Mon Oct 22 13:31:26 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojbab@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_0_1); 22 Oct 2001 20:31:26 -0000 Received: (qmail 73105 invoked from network); 22 Oct 2001 20:31:25 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by l10.egroups.com with QMQP; 22 Oct 2001 20:31:25 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO stmpy-2.cais.net) (205.252.14.72) by mta1 with SMTP; 22 Oct 2001 20:31:25 -0000 Received: from bob.lojban.org (209-8-89-146.dial-up.cais.com [209.8.89.146] (may be forged)) by stmpy-2.cais.net (8.11.1/8.11.1) with ESMTP id f9MKVNo15381 for ; Mon, 22 Oct 2001 16:31:23 -0400 (EDT) Message-Id: <4.3.2.7.2.20011022155414.00e704f0@pop.cais.com> X-Sender: vir1036@pop.cais.com X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 4.3.2 Date: Mon, 22 Oct 2001 16:31:34 -0400 To: Subject: Re: [lojban] Types of fu'ivla in natural languages In-Reply-To: <01102210384115.07854@neofelis> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed From: "Bob LeChevalier (lojbab)" At 10:38 AM 10/22/01 -0400, Pierre Abbat wrote: >How common are types 2, 3, and 4 fu'ivla in natural languages? (I don't think >it makes sense to speak of a type-1 fu'ivla in a language that doesn't have a >foreign-word marker.) We have such type-1 markers in English - we often mark foreign words with italics or some other font change (and that is considered proper style). The ones I see most often used and so marked is "deja vu" and "savoir faire" (unfortunately I cannot figure out how to italicize text in this mailer). We also identify them by the use of nonstandard diacritics (e.g. fiancee'). Obviously there is no marker for such words in the spoken language unless we alter our accent for foreign words (often necessary). Type 1 in-line borrowing is the norm for English until a word is grabbed informally (often as slang) and bastardized into a Type 2 or Type 4 (which bastardization is usually considered uncouth usage until the word has been in the language for a generation or more). I recently read that the origin of the derogatory word "wop" for Italians is as a borrowing of "guapo", as an example of such slangy Type 4-ing. We often use Type 2 borrowing in English for names or at least for things that are proper nouns in English (Pennsylvania Dutch, who were really Deutsch), though I have more rarely seen capitalization of a German polysyllabic abstraction ("Weltschung" (sp?), but that can be seen as Type 1 as well since the capitalization is distinctive to German nouns.) I think that Type 3 borrowing is more or less unique to Loglan/Lojban, though there is some similarity to the manner of Chinese borrowing, which attempts in borrowing a word to choose native syllables that are relevant in meaning to compose the word, even though this results in mangling worse than some other borrowing choice. lojbab -- lojbab lojbab@lojban.org Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc. 2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273 Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org