What do we call roots in other languages? Posted by PierreAbbat on Sun 05 of Oct, 2008 23:01 GMT posts: 324 Use this thread to discuss the What do we call roots in other languages? page.
Posted by PierreAbbat on Sun 05 of Oct, 2008 23:01 GMT posts: 324 Take, for example, the word "activations". It consists of a root, "act", three derivational suffixes "ive", "ate", and "tion", and an inflectional suffix "s". The root and derivational suffixes together are called the stem. By this terminology the word "nuntolcadgau" has a root "cadgau", two derivational prefixes, and no inflectional affixes (such morphemes don't exist in Lojban). The only natlang roots I know of that seem like gismu to me are the Semitic roots, which generally, like Lojban gismu, have three consonants, and their Afro-Asiatic kin. I call them smegi'u. Unlike Lojban gismu, they do not make lots of compound words. Pierre To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.
Posted by dbrock on Mon 06 of Oct, 2008 20:13 GMT posts: 47 > Take, for example, the word "activations". It consists of a root, "act", > three > derivational suffixes "ive", "ate", and "tion", and an inflectional > suffix "s". The root and derivational suffixes together are called the > stem. > > By this terminology the word "nuntolcadgau" has a root "cadgau", two > derivational prefixes, and no inflectional affixes (such morphemes don't > exist in Lojban). I agree it makes sense to consider -nun- and -tol- derivational affixes, but wouldn't {cadgau} be a compound of two roots, rather than a root? -- Daniel Brockman daniel@brockman.se
Posted by PierreAbbat on Fri 02 of Jan, 2009 06:09 GMT posts: 324 On Monday 06 October 2008 16:01:21 Daniel Brockman wrote: > I agree it makes sense to consider -nun- and -tol- derivational affixes, > but wouldn't {cadgau} be a compound of two roots, rather than a root? Yes it is two roots. I've been thinking about roots and {gismu}, and there does seem to be some sense in calling natlang roots {gismu}. Take the Indo-European root for instance. It consists generally of some consonants, none of which are the same, and a vowel "e" somewhere among the consonants. The e-grade, o-grade, and zero-grade forms could be said to be its rafsi. Its relation and argument roles are those of the simplest verb formed from the root, if any; if it's a noun or adjective, there is one argument role. Lojban has a sharp distinction between the native roots, which can form compounds by running together their rafsi as long as the phonotactics allow, and borrowed roots, which have to be separated at least by "y" from adjacent morphemes (or "'" for those that begin with a vowel) (if the general rafsi fu'ivla proposals are accepted) and otherwise by {zei}. But they are both roots, as far as linguistic terminology goes. So what can we call something that's either a gismu or a fu'ivla, but is not a lujvo, and may be in a language other than Lojban? Pierre To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.
