Re: TECH: Narrative connectives?

[Veijo Vilva <veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI>]

la xorxes cusku di'e

> Date:         Thu, 4 Aug 1994 17:22:00 EDT
> From:         Jorge Llambias <jorge@PHYAST.PITT.EDU>

> la veion cusku di'e

>> I was just thinking...

> Always a dangerous activity :)

>> Logically connected sentences
>>
>>   (1) mi nelci ti .ije mi nelci ta
>>       mi citka .ije mi pinxe
>>
>> can be conveniently shortened to
>>
>>   (2) mi nelci ti .e ta
>>       mi citka je pinxe
>
> Actually, the second one should be
>
>        mi citka gi'e pinxe
>
> because a tanru is not really automatically expandable to two sentences.
>
  Right.

> Also, you could have had {mi citka ti .ije mi pinxe ta} which is
> {mi citka ti gi'e pinxe ta}, and you probably, in (1), didn't mean to say
> that you were eating and drinking the same thing.

  Again an unfortunate choice of an example sentence :_)

> Your point is just as valid, though.

[...]
>> in a similar way. Sometimes it would be quite natural and
>> convenient to be able to say, e.g.
>>
>>   (4) *mi nelci ti gi ta
>>        I like this  ... and that
>>
>>       *mi citka gi pinxe
>>        I eat   ... and drink
>
> Unfortunately, I think it doesn't work. Consider:
>
>        ge mi citka ti gi do pinxe ta
>
> Will the parser understand it as:
>
>        ge (mi citka ti) gi (do pinxe ta)
>
> or as:
>
>        ge mi citka (ti gi do)
>
> and then find an error with the next word?

  Replace {gi} with, say, {xi'e} (I should have done it,
  just to be sure :_(

[...]
>> and tense relationships within tanru (not presently allowed)
>>
>>   (6) mi citka .ibabo mi pinxe
>>       -> *mi citka gibabo pinxe
>
> I think this was permitted under Mad Proposal. It has to be bridi-tail
> connection though, not tanru connection.

  Bridi-tails have been there... and checking from the selbri-
  level of the grammar it seems tanru with mixed tense connection
  ( mi citka jebabo pinxe ) are allowed - so it is just a question
  of connective type :_)

> Jorge

  So the question boils down to: Is there a different enough connection
  (from a logical AND and the various non-logical connections) involved
  to warrant one or more additional cmavo? In the case of comparisons
  there is a difference between

      (a) mi nelci ti .esemaubo ta

  and

      (b) *mi nelci ti xi'esemaubo ta

  in that (a) makes clearly all the 3 claims involved but (b) could
  omit {mi nelci ta} (or even {mi nelci ti} ?). Of course, the same
  argument could apply to

      (c) mi zukte jeba'obo pensi

  and

      (d) *mi zukte xi'eba'obo pensi

  i.e. in (c) I DO think afterwards but (d) could leave that open.
  But then, this would differ from the straight narrative

      (e) mi zukte .iba'obo mi pensi

  which seems to make all the 3 claims. Eh? But how does

      (f) mi zukte .ijeba'obo mi pensi

  differ from (e) ? And could there be a difference between

      (g) mi nelci ti .e ta
          le zukte jeba'obo pensi

  and (using {xi'i} for a narrative connective)

      (h) *mi nelci ti xi'i ta
          *le zukte xi'iba'obo pensi

  Might we actually need TWO sets of new connectives, afterthought
  mixed connectives to express just the tense/modal relationship and
  narrative connectives along the lines of my original posting
  (correcting the details :_) ?

  The afterthought case can be handled in a rather non-Zipfian way,
  of course:

      (j) mi nelci ti .emaugi ti gi ta

  (but that's even worse than (b) :__(

  co'o mi'e veion

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.i mi du la'o sy. Veijo Vilva sy.
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