There are 21 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1a. Re: A vignette ...
From: Jörg Rhiemeier
1b. Re: A vignette ...
From: Eugene Oh
1c. Re: A vignette ...
From: MorphemeAddict
1d. Re: A vignette ...
From: Daniel Bowman
1e. Re: A vignette ...
From: R A Brown
1f. Re: A vignette ...
From: Jörg Rhiemeier
2a. marking for affectedness
From: Roman Rausch
2b. Re: marking for affectedness
From: Daniel Bowman
3a. Re: Conlanging talk @ Edinburgh
From: Richard Littauer
4a. Loglan questions
From: maikxlx
4b. Re: Loglan questions
From: Brett Williams
5.1. Re: Worldwide conlanger locations map, v2
From: Garth Wallace
5.2. Re: Worldwide conlanger locations map, v2
From: Philip Newton
6a. Re: Conlangs in Harry Potter?
From: Peter Bleackley
7a. Re: language created from names.
From: Peter Bleackley
8a. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
From: Peter Bleackley
8b. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
From: R A Brown
8c. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
From: Charlie
8d. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
From: Peter Bleackley
8e. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
From: Jim Henry
9. Higher-density data graphics for corpus and lexicon analysis data?
From: Jim Henry
Messages
________________________________________________________________________
1a. Re: A vignette ...
Posted by: "Jörg Rhiemeier" joerg_rhieme...@web.de
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 9:47 am ((PDT))
Hallo!
On Sun, 10 Oct 2010 17:40:39 +0100, Eugene Oh wrote:
> It is a most fascinating vignette! I like reading such vignettes very much,
> especially when they are as realistic as this.
Thank you!
> Although correct me if I'm
> wrong the Italian journal article titles at the bottom should read
> "L'inscrizione" for each occurrence of "La inscrizione"?
You may be right; I don't know which one is correct. My knowledge
of Italian is very limited.
--
... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
Messages in this topic (7)
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1b. Re: A vignette ...
Posted by: "Eugene Oh" un.do...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 10:05 am ((PDT))
It is a most fascinating vignette! I like reading such vignettes very much,
especially when they are as realistic as this. Although â correct me if I'm
wrong â the Italian journal article titles at the bottom should read
"L'inscrizione" for each occurrence of "La inscrizione"?
2010/10/10 Jörg Rhiemeier <joerg_rhieme...@web.de>
> Hallo!
>
> I have just finished a little vignette of a lostlang. The language
> is named "Attidian" and is a cousin of Old Albic. The corpus consists
> of a single inscription of seven words.
>
> Here's the link:
>
> http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/attidian.html
>
> Also, I have made some further additions to my conlang page (see
> signature for its address).
>
> --
> ... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
> http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
>
Messages in this topic (7)
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1c. Re: A vignette ...
Posted by: "MorphemeAddict" lytl...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 5:29 pm ((PDT))
On Sun, Oct 10, 2010 at 12:45 PM, Jörg Rhiemeier <joerg_rhieme...@web.de>wrote:
> Hallo!
>
>
> On Sun, 10 Oct 2010 17:40:39 +0100, Eugene Oh wrote:
>
> It is a most fascinating vignette! I like reading such vignettes very
>> much,
>> especially when they are as realistic as this.
>>
>
> Thank you!
>
>
> Although â correct me if I'm
>> wrong â the Italian journal article titles at the bottom should read
>> "L'inscrizione" for each occurrence of "La inscrizione"?
>>
>
> You may be right; I don't know which one is correct. My knowledge
> of Italian is very limited.
>
>
Eugene is right. The "la" loses it's 'a' before another vowel or 'h' (which
is silent).
stevo
>
> --
> ... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
> http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
>
Messages in this topic (7)
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1d. Re: A vignette ...
Posted by: "Daniel Bowman" danny.c.bow...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 6:48 pm ((PDT))
That website would have fooled me completely if I'd just run across it on
Google. Had I not known better, I would have thought: "Neat! A lost
language!" and never known it was a conlang.
On Sun, Oct 10, 2010 at 10:00 AM, Jörg Rhiemeier <joerg_rhieme...@web.de>wrote:
> Hallo!
>
> I have just finished a little vignette of a lostlang. The language
> is named "Attidian" and is a cousin of Old Albic. The corpus consists
> of a single inscription of seven words.
>
> Here's the link:
>
> http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/attidian.html
>
> Also, I have made some further additions to my conlang page (see
> signature for its address).
>
> --
> ... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
> http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
>
--
Ayryea zakayro al Gayaltha
Messages in this topic (7)
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1e. Re: A vignette ...
Posted by: "R A Brown" r...@carolandray.plus.com
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 12:14 am ((PDT))
On 10/10/2010 17:40, Eugene Oh wrote:
> It is a most fascinating vignette! I like reading such
> vignettes very much, especially when they are as
> realistic as this.
Yes, realistic - so much so that it reminded me very much of
many similar vignettes I've read before. :)
The trouble with short, one-off inscriptions is that, if you
really try, you can "read" them in your own favored
language. Cf. the five word 'Epioi' inscription (now shown
to be a fake):
http://www.carolandray.plus.com/Eteocretan/Epioi.html
http://www.carolandray.plus.com/Eteocretan/PseudoTranslation.html
This one, it is true, is a bilingual, which cuts down the
possibilities - but it would not, methinks, put off, for
example, a determined supporter of the "Albanian is
Etruscan" hypothesis - nor others with bizarre hypotheses.
It will need the discovery of other inscriptions that can be
realistically read as Hesperic related before doubters are
convinced (tho some, as we know, will never be convinced)
;)
--
Ray
==================================
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
"Ein Kopf, der auf seine eigene Kosten denkt,
wird immer Eingriffe in die Sprache thun."
[J.G. Hamann, 1760]
"A mind that thinks at its own expense
will always interfere with language".
Messages in this topic (7)
________________________________________________________________________
1f. Re: A vignette ...
Posted by: "Jörg Rhiemeier" joerg_rhieme...@web.de
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 7:51 am ((PDT))
Hallo!
On Sun, 10 Oct 2010 20:27:32 -0400, MorphemeAddict wrote:
> Eugene is right. The "la" loses it's 'a' before another vowel or 'h' (which
> is silent).
I'll correct it soon.
OnSun, 10 Oct 2010 21:27:07 -0400, Daniel Bowman wrote:
> That website would have fooled me completely if I'd just run across it on
> Google. Had I not known better, I would have thought: "Neat! A lost
> language!" and never known it was a conlang.
Then I was successful ;) Actually, I am worried that someone
mistakes it for real - not the first time the problem occured
in the League of Lost Languages! A scrupulous scholar would
at least notice that the references are spurious - a Google
research will show that Old Albic is a conlang, the Accademia
Farnese is an orchestra, and the other academic bodies and
journals cited are at least so obscure that Google doesn't
know them. Perhaps I should add more hints of fictionality
without breaking the atmosphere (I think the word "Elf",
which would not be much of a problem working in as the language
is related to an "Elvish" language, would be enough of a
stumbling block for those who think the thing was real).
OnMon, 11 Oct 2010 08:16:45 +0100, R A Brown wrote:
> Yes, realistic - so much so that it reminded me very much of
> many similar vignettes I've read before. :)
>
> The trouble with short, one-off inscriptions is that, if you
> really try, you can "read" them in your own favored
> language. Cf. the five word 'Epioi' inscription (now shown
> to be a fake):
> http://www.carolandray.plus.com/Eteocretan/Epioi.html
> http://www.carolandray.plus.com/Eteocretan/PseudoTranslation.html
Ah, the "Epioi" inscription! Some member of this list once
interpreted it as being in his own conlang - I once found
such a post in the CONLANG archive, I think it was Ed Heil,
but I am not sure. Perhaps I should try reading it as in
a Hesperic language one day ;)
> This one, it is true, is a bilingual, which cuts down the
> possibilities - but it would not, methinks, put off, for
> example, a determined supporter of the "Albanian is
> Etruscan" hypothesis - nor others with bizarre hypotheses.
Yes. One would start with the assumption that the unknown
language line means the same as the Latin line, especially
as it begins with two words very similar to the name with
which the Latin version begins. One would furthermore
conclude that the three short words in the middle correspond
to the verb and the pronouns in the Latin version, and that
the last two words are the name of the goddess. Then, it
becomes obviously similar to what a translation of the Latin
version into Old Albic would look like.
> It will need the discovery of other inscriptions that can be
> realistically read as Hesperic related before doubters are
> convinced (tho some, as we know, will never be convinced)
> ;)
Sure ;)
--
... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
Messages in this topic (7)
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2a. marking for affectedness
Posted by: "Roman Rausch" ara...@mail.ru
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 3:19 pm ((PDT))
Thinking about how to distinguish verbal arguments which are just formal
slots from what actually happens I came up with the simple idea of
additional marking for affectedness. It won't be determined by the type of
verb or noun involved, but will be rather akin to topic marking.
For example,
"The boy [NOM AFF] ate the apple [ACC]"
would imply that he needed sustenance or was maybe poisoned, and thus was
affected by the eating.
"The boy [NOM] ate the apple [ACC AFF]"
would imply that the apple is now gone and thus it could be an answer to
'Where did the apple go?'.
The Wikipedia article on the partitive case has an example from Finnish
_ammuin karhun [ACC]_ 'I shot the bear' (implication: shot it dead) vs.
_ammuin karhua [PART]_ 'I shot (at) the bear' (implication: not necessarily
hit it). This is approximately what I have in mind, but with every argument
of a verb, hence "I [NOM AFF] shot the bear" would imply that I'm now proud
to be a hunter or maybe have successfully defended my life.
Hence, a simple sentence like 'I love you' will have four possibilities:
"I [NOM] love you [ACC]" as a state of fact without emotional involvement,
"I [NOM AFF] love you [ACC AFF]" for mutual love
"I [NOM AFF] love you" for unrequited love or without knowledge about the other.
And I guess that "I [NOM] love you [ACC AFF]" can make sense in a context as
well. When the object is affected and the subject is not (or left out), it
will be probably equivalent to the passive: 'You are loved by me'. 'I wanna
be loved by you' could be expressed by "I [NOM AFF] want you [NOM] love me
[ACC AFF]". Instead of defocusing the agent by swapping the verbal slots and
decreasing the valence of the verb, one simply focuses on the object.
Also looking at the Japanese adversative passive, I'm thinking that
intransitive verbs could have arguments, but only in the affected form,
which allows for a further positive/negative distinction:
"Me [ACC AFF] rained"
would mean that I was adversely affected by the rain, equivalent to
_(Watashi wa) ame ni furareta_.
"Me [DAT AFF] rained"
would mean that I was positively affected by the rain.
Finally, verbs of creation receive a special treatment. There will be a
resultative case which for historical reasons has only the affected form.
For example, one has to say
"I [NOM] wrote a letter [RES AFF]"
The direct object of 'write' can be 'ink' or whatever one writes with.
In Schleicher's fable the horse would say:
"A man, the master [NOM], makes the wool of the sheep [ACC AFF] into a warm
garment [RES AFF] for himself [DAT]"
as it is more important in the context that the sheep will be affected by
the stripping, rather than the master by the clothing.
Since animate beings will be probably marked as affected more frequently,
this system could then evolve into an animate/inanimate distinction. And
with the animate splitting into masculine and feminine it could finally
develop into a well-known gender distinction.
So, does it make sense? Is it boring and has been done many times before?
Messages in this topic (2)
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2b. Re: marking for affectedness
Posted by: "Daniel Bowman" danny.c.bow...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 6:27 pm ((PDT))
> So, does it make sense? Is it boring and has been done many times before?
>
Yes to the first. I think it makes lots of sense and I'm interested to see
how your system develops. No to the first part of the second question: it
is quite novel to me at least. I'm not sure if it's been done before.
May I use this construction in my conlang Angosey? I am not positive how
well it would integrate, as the language is pretty well developed at this
point, but your idea lends a semantic element that Angosey completely
lacks. It would be a harmonious addition to my grammar.
Regards,
Danny
--
Ayryea zakayro al Gayaltha
Messages in this topic (2)
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3a. Re: Conlanging talk @ Edinburgh
Posted by: "Richard Littauer" richard.litta...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 4:55 pm ((PDT))
Well, I managed to actually transcribe the first two sections, which were
horrible bad for some reason. So, here is a link to the playlist on Youtube.
Enjoy guys. Don't judge me too harshly, I'm almost certainly wrong in a few
areas. :P
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=C63D005AEEA69981
On Sat, Oct 9, 2010 at 5:59 PM, Richard Littauer <richard.litta...@gmail.com
> wrote:
> Thanks Sai. I wasn't planning on posting this here, given the lack of
> response to my last talk, and the fact that no one seems to be conlanging in
> Edinburgh besides me and another person I know personally.
>
> Yes, I will be holding a conlang workshop next wednesday. You all are
> invited, if you would like to come. I'm going to see if a basic conlang can
> be established in a night session. It should be rather fun. This comes from
> a talk I gave last Wednesday to 75 people a the university. I'll upload the
> videos of it when I finish subtitling them.
>
>
> On Sat, Oct 9, 2010 at 11:07 AM, Mechthild Czapp <0zu...@gmx.de> wrote:
>
>> > Von: Maxime Papillon <salut_vous_au...@hotmail.com>
>> > An: conl...@listserv.brown.edu
>> > Betreff: Re: Conlanging talk @ Edinburgh
>>
>> > > Date: Fri, 8 Oct 2010 23:03:42 -0500
>> > > From: s...@saizai.com
>> > > Subject: Conlanging talk @ Edinburgh
>> > > To: conl...@listserv.brown.edu
>> > >
>> > > http://langsoc.eusa.ed.ac.uk/blog/?p=169
>> >
>> >
>> > I hope this won't sound offensive or paranoid, but I find that posting a
>> > link in an otherwise empty message without any explanation, description,
>> or
>> > attention-catcher really makes it look like spoofing toward a phishing
>> or
>> > otherwise undesirable website. I don't know if others feel the same.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > Would you be as kind as to introduce us to what we should find at the
>> > other end of this link?
>> >
>> It is related to taronyu's (I forgot his real name) presentation on
>> conlanging and says that these will be a conlanging workshop.
>>
>> or a rickroll...
>>
>> (SCNR)
>>
>> ~Mechthild
>> --
>> Sanja'xen mi'lanja'kynha ,mi'la'ohix'ta jilih, nka.
>>
>> My life would be easy if it was not so hard!
>>
>>
>>
>> GRATIS! Movie-FLAT mit über 300 Videos.
>> Jetzt freischalten unter http://portal.gmx.net/de/go/maxdome
>>
>
>
Messages in this topic (5)
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4a. Loglan questions
Posted by: "maikxlx" maik...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 5:03 pm ((PDT))
I'm not sure if anyone on this list can answer these questions, but I'll
give it a shot.
Is anyone familiar with the "Notebook 3" document? If so, is this document
worth the effort and money to obtain? It used to be offered at
loglan.orgfor $20.
Was the "Loglan 6" document, referred to in Loglan
1<http://www.loglan.org/Loglan1/chap3.html>,
ever published?
Thanks in advance!
Messages in this topic (2)
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4b. Re: Loglan questions
Posted by: "Brett Williams" mungoje...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 6:02 pm ((PDT))
On Sun, Oct 10, 2010 at 8:02 PM, maikxlx <maik...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm not sure if anyone on this list can answer these questions, but I'll
> give it a shot.
I think the Loglan materials are available now for free on the
website, but I'm not sure. I do know there's some activity on this
mailing list:
http://mailman.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/loglanists
They should be able to answer your questions!
<3,
la stela selckiku
aka
mungojelly
aka
bret-ram
aka
veret'he
aka
brett
Messages in this topic (2)
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5.1. Re: Worldwide conlanger locations map, v2
Posted by: "Garth Wallace" gwa...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Oct 10, 2010 10:28 pm ((PDT))
On Sat, Oct 9, 2010 at 3:01 PM, Carsten Becker <carb...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> Am 29.09.2010 03:01 schrieb Sai:
>>
>> http://tinyurl.com/conlangmap
>>
>
> So far this seems to be almost only readers of Conlang-L. What about other
> known venues of conlanging?
I think Sai also posted it to the Conlang livejournal community.
Messages in this topic (59)
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5.2. Re: Worldwide conlanger locations map, v2
Posted by: "Philip Newton" philip.new...@gmail.com
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 2:28 am ((PDT))
On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 7:26 AM, Garth Wallace <gwa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I think Sai also posted it to the Conlang livejournal community.
That's certainly where I saw it first.
Cheers,
Philip
--
Philip Newton <philip.new...@gmail.com>
Messages in this topic (59)
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6a. Re: Conlangs in Harry Potter?
Posted by: "Peter Bleackley" peter.bleack...@rd.bbc.co.uk
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 1:21 am ((PDT))
staving Carsten Becker:
> Am 08.10.2010 17:04 schrieb Jörg Rhiemeier:
>> (_Avada Kedavra_).
>
> I've always thought that would be a mangling of _abracadabra_, which
> is itself mangled Latin IIRC.
>
> Carsten
>
I'd heard that it was mangled Hebrew - from ab (father) ben (son) and
ruach (spirit).
Pete
Messages in this topic (9)
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7a. Re: language created from names.
Posted by: "Peter Bleackley" peter.bleack...@rd.bbc.co.uk
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 1:31 am ((PDT))
staving Garth Wallace:
> On Fri, Oct 8, 2010 at 4:29 PM, Mario Bonassin<tar_sa...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Garth,
>> The ' is there I believe to add that alien flavor to the word. So i have
>> some
>> room to make those decisions to the answer of your questions. What it
>> actually
>> is I'm not sure yet.
>>
> I figured as much. I was just trying to prompt you into thinking about
> what it could be doing there.
>
I treated it as a glottal stop in my triconsonantal analysis, mainly
because it seemed to fit in the the Semitic feel of the thing.
Pete
Messages in this topic (12)
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8a. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
Posted by: "Peter Bleackley" peter.bleack...@rd.bbc.co.uk
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 1:55 am ((PDT))
staving Gary Shannon:
> On Sat, Oct 9, 2010 at 12:23 PM, John Vertical<johnverti...@hotmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>
>> For an example, Finnish _maailma_ "world", literally "earth+air". I'm told
>> this is the original Uralic pattern, with the . I've seen some further
>> examples from Mordvinic, something like "dairy" as "milk+cream".
>>
> I'm reminded of the Sanskrit word for "Universe", especially in the
> Upanishads, which translates literally "all this".
>
>
The English "world" comes from the Old English "werald", literally
meaning "The Age of Men". This is why older translations of prayers
often use "world" to mean "age" -"world without end" = "forever"
(translating the Latin "in saecula saeculorum" = "into an age of ages")
In Tolkiens mythos, the term "world" would presumably apply from the
Fourth Age onwards. The First to Third Ages would presumably be Alfaldar.
Pete
Messages in this topic (12)
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8b. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
Posted by: "R A Brown" r...@carolandray.plus.com
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 4:04 am ((PDT))
On 11/10/2010 09:52, Peter Bleackley wrote:
> staving Gary Shannon:
[snip]
> -"world without end" = "forever" (translating the Latin "in
> saecula saeculorum" = "into an age of ages")
>
"into _ages_ of ages", please - both nouns are plural. Maybe
even "into aeons of aeons" :)
I remember long years ago when I was kid, one of the old'uns
in the church choir always pronounced "world" with _two_
syllables: /wVrl=d/ or maybe even /wVr&ld/. Apparently that
was an old Sussex pronunciation.
Darn it! Will this spawn YAEPT thread? ;)
--
Ray
==================================
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
"Ein Kopf, der auf seine eigene Kosten denkt,
wird immer Eingriffe in die Sprache thun."
[J.G. Hamann, 1760]
"A mind that thinks at its own expense
will always interfere with language".
Messages in this topic (12)
________________________________________________________________________
8c. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
Posted by: "Charlie" caeruleancent...@yahoo.com
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 7:27 am ((PDT))
--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Peter Bleackley <peter.bleack...@...> wrote:
>
> The English "world" comes from the Old English "werald", literally
> meaning "The Age of Men". This is why older translations of prayers
> often use "world" to mean "age" -"world without end" = "forever"
> (translating the Latin "in saecula saeculorum" = "into an age of
> ages")
I don't know where the phrase "in saecula saeculorum" occurs, but in the Latin
of the Roman Catholic Mass, the phrase is "per omnia saecula saeculorum,"
through all ages of ages.
Charlie
Messages in this topic (12)
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8d. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
Posted by: "Peter Bleackley" peter.bleack...@rd.bbc.co.uk
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 8:01 am ((PDT))
On 11/10/2010 15:15, Charlie wrote:
> --- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Peter Bleackley<peter.bleack...@...> wrote:
>
>> The English "world" comes from the Old English "werald", literally
>> meaning "The Age of Men". This is why older translations of prayers
>> often use "world" to mean "age" -"world without end" = "forever"
>> (translating the Latin "in saecula saeculorum" = "into an age of
>> ages")
>>
> I don't know where the phrase "in saecula saeculorum" occurs, but in the
> Latin of the Roman Catholic Mass, the phrase is "per omnia saecula
> saeculorum," through all ages of ages.
>
> Charlie
>
I was born after the Council, and grew up with the Mass in English. My
knowledge of the Latin form is sketchy.
Pete
Messages in this topic (12)
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8e. Re: An engelang to minimize or contain abstractness
Posted by: "Jim Henry" jimhenry1...@gmail.com
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 8:15 am ((PDT))
On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 10:15 AM, Charlie <caeruleancent...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> --- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Peter Bleackley <peter.bleack...@...> wrote:
>> (translating the Latin "in saecula saeculorum" = "into an age of
>> ages")
> I don't know where the phrase "in saecula saeculorum" occurs, but in the
> Latin of the Roman Catholic Mass, the phrase is "per omnia saecula
> saeculorum," through all ages of ages.
In the Gloria Patri, it's:
"Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto. Sicut erat in principio,
et nunc, et semper, et in sæcula sæculorum. Amen."
--
Jim Henry
http://www.pobox.com/~jimhenry/
Messages in this topic (12)
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9. Higher-density data graphics for corpus and lexicon analysis data?
Posted by: "Jim Henry" jimhenry1...@gmail.com
Date: Mon Oct 11, 2010 8:04 am ((PDT))
I've been reading Edward Tufte's _The Visual Display of Quantitative
Information_, and it started me thinking about how some of his ideas
might be applied to graphics for displaying linguistic data. I
remember a few years ago seeing a rotatable, zoomable cube in which
the color of each cell represented whether the three-letter string
represented by that cell's coordinates (it was a 26x26x26 matrix) was
an actual English word. It seems that one could use similar methods
to visually represent analysis of a language's corpus, but that a
different kind of grid would make more sense than one based on the
arbitrary ordering of the Latin alphabet. For instance, take an IPA
consonant chart, with point of articulation on the horizontal axis and
manner of articuculation on the vertical axis; fill in each cell white
if the corresponding phoneme has a high frequency in the language's
corpus, and with darkening shades of gray for phonemes of lower
frequencies, and black for phonemes that don't occur in the language
at all. One could do a similar chart for the vowels, and two parallel
charts representing the frequencies of those phonemes in the lexicon,
or more specifically for the frequencies of specific phonemes as
syllable onsets or codas.
If one's language has a large proportion of its words with a fixed
length of two or three phonemes, one might could represent the
frequency of words in its corpus with something like the 3-letter
English words matrix I mentioned above. In the more general case,
with words or morphemes of arbitrarily variable length, I haven't yet
thought of a higher-density way of showing the frequencies of words in
a corpus than a simple histogram or bar chart. However, if one has a
corpus that's separable into multiple time-periods, each with a
statistically significant amount of text, one could show the changing
frequencies of some lexemes over time witih multiple lines.
Or, again extending the possibilities of the lexicon matrix, one could
color each cell differently depending on whether it's an actual word,
a potential word, or an impossible string forbidden by the
phonotactics. Or have a two-dimensional or three-dimensional matrix
where the color-density of each cell represents the number of words in
the lexicon (or corpus) that *begin* with that substring, or end with
it, or contain it.
--
Jim Henry
http://www.pobox.com/~jimhenry/
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