The BG Language Creation Guide
#8: Creating Descriptors
- Copula
- Adjectival agreement
- Derivation
- Negation
Adjectives exist in many, but not all languages. What does a language do without adjectives? It uses verbs or nouns: 'be good' instead of 'good', goodness instead of good, If you don't want adjectives, you don't have to have them, but you do have to explain how you will translate the forms listed here.
Here are the questions for you to answer as you decide how to set upyour adjectival (or pseudo-adjectival_ system.:
Note that as you work through these questions, you may find yourself wanting to translate whole phrases rather than isolated words. That is perfectly alright. Please think a little bit about what order you'd like those words to appear in. You will be able to change your mind on that point later on though. If you do find that you've changed your mind when you are finally asked to establish rules about ordering words within phrases, remember to come back to this point and make corrections.
- Do you have a copula? If so what is/are the form(s)? Think about how you will mark tense if you have no copula. How will you negate the copula? Translate:
- the sun is beautiful.
- The moon was round
(From line 26 of final translation).
NB: don't forget to use the past tense of the copula here.
- Do your adjectives agree with the nouns they modify in any way? Explain and demonstrate.
Translate
- long river
(From line 4 of final translation).
- big trees
(From line 3 of final translation).
- Anything else needed to fully exemplify the system.
- Create a set of derivational processes (affixes or other grammatical constructions) that changes part of speech.
There should be:
- A form that changes nouns and verbs into adjectives (this can be one form or two separate forms)
- A form that changes nouns and adjectives into verbs (this can be one form or two separate forms)
- A form that changes adjectives and verbs into nouns (this can be one form or two separate forms)
- Give a glossed example of each
- NB: these don't have to be the only way of deriving one part of speech from another; these are just to make sure you do have a way to fall back on.
- How do you negate an adjective? Give a glossed example.
Translate:
- not good
(From line 11 of final translation).
- not long
20 descriptors
alive
all
beautiful
big
cold
dark or black
dry
full
good
long
many
new
round
small
strange
warm
white or light
--- four more of your choice
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Someplace Else Interesting such as:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tfPUXHvOIM: a woman with 21 Accents.
Updated 4/1/2010