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Nov. 28th, 2015 11:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
darchildreSo yesterday, what with it not being my birthday or Thanksgiving, was a day of sitting around and having nothing to do. Which was great. I spent several hours noodling with seneshi translation stuff*.
Y'know what my favorite thing about conlanging is, other than inventing new writing systems? It's that moment when you're translating and you realize that the language has developed grammatical rules that you didn't consciously plan. I suppose it is the conlang equivalent of that thing where you write a story and the characters decide to do something that was not in your original outline. Sometimes the object goes before the verb and sometimes it goes after the verb and I've figured out why that happens but I did not mean for it to happen. It is a rule that senesh developed on its own.
I also keep finding out new things about my evidential markers. You guys, I am so pleased by my evidential markers, you have no idea. When I started building the language, I thought they were just going to do what it says on the tin: indicate how the speaker knows what they're saying is true. But now I'm learning that they can be used to add emphasis or indicate tone or change the politeness level of a sentence - it's so exciting. There are things we use whole long phrases for in English that I can indicate with a one-syllable particle in senesh.
- There's an evidential (tju-) that I essentially think of as the "story evidential": you use it to indicate that what you're saying is fictional or somewhat dramatized or metaphorical. But you can switch to a cwe- evidential in a metaphorical statement (cwe- is basically "I witnessed/experienced this"), which indicates that the statement is literal. So if you say something like "ei cwe-ra shimeihin" instead of "ei tju-ra shimeihin," you're doing that thing we do in English when we say "I am literally dying." When in fact you are clearly doing nothing of the kind. (I mean, you would still say that if you were actually dying and then it would be literally true. That's a different situation.)
- You can use tju- for nonfictional stories too, but there it indicates the level of casualness. Stories with tju- are the kind you tell on tumblr: "OMG, you guys, let me tell you a story about [insert historical person here]." If you're actually citing sources, you'd use shau-. Or fjo-, if you're presenting a source that you want to disprove. (shau- is "I was told this/I read this and I trust the source." fjo- is "I was told this/I read this and I don't trust the source".)
- The pa- evidential means roughly "this is self-evidently true/everyone agrees this is true." If you use it in a simple declarative sentence - "The sky is blue", for example - that's what it does. When used in an argument or when expressing something that could be subjective - "Climate change is real," "Blue is the best color" - it indicates the surety of the speaker in their position, and their belief that everyone should agree with them. When used in the future tense - "I'm going to win this game" - it indicates determination and the speaker's will to make what they're saying come true.
- la- and ðei- are both for when you're not sure of the veracity of what you're saying. la- is basically "This is my opinion" and ðei- is "I'm unsure about this/don't have evidence one way or another". So, using an example from the last section, "Blue is the best color" with a la- evidential would translate to something like "I think blue is the best color", but if you use a ðei- evidential it's something like "I guess blue is the best color, maybe?" People who use a lot of softening expression in English (I think, I feel, I guess, maybe) would use a lot of la- and ðei- in senesh. This is coded feminine in English but not necessarily in senesh. It is coded as being more polite to soften your speech this way in senesh - overusing cwe- and pa- in subjective statements sounds harsh and kinda rude.
- Along those lines, it's considered rude to directly contradict something someone else has said or to give an outright denial in answer to a question. So if someone tells you the sky is green and you want to politely contradict them, you might say "mase ðei-rel ferti shwe," which is something like "Maybe that's not true." Or you could say "eiyo, le ahje la-rel uwim," which is "Well, I think the sky is blue." And if someone says "Are you coming to my party?" and you want to politely refuse, you might say "ei eiŋen-auŋ-fati." "ei auŋ-fati" is "I'm going to come" but the eiŋe- evidential means "This is self-evidently not true/everyone agrees that this isn't true." That kind of reply is culturally understood as saying no without literally saying 'no'.
( - This kind of thing is a cause of translation problems and culture clash in the stories that go with the language. The Junchei - the other major culture in the story - tend to think of the seneshi as obsequious and dishonest because they don't grok how polite speech works in senesh. When speaking senesh, the Junchei tend to use a lot of cwe- and pa- evidentials (because they have the least apparent nuance and thus seem easiest to use) and so they come across as harsh and unnecessarily blunt to the seneshi. I don't know anything about the Junchei language - Chuktai - other than the fact that it has a lot more voiced consonants than senesh, doesn't have the bilabial fricative that senesh has, and doesn't use evidentials.)
- In the future tense, la- and ðei- get used a lot. la- in the future tense indicates that the speaker hopes that what they're saying is true. It can also carry connotations of longing or yearning. "ei lan-auŋ-nuneli aut nei tonjetam iya" is basically "It is my opinion that I will return home soon" but it could be translated equally well as "I hope I will return home soon" or "I long for it to be true that I will return home soon," depending on the context. ðei- in the future tense indicates that the speaker doubts what they're saying is true, and can carry connotations of dread. So "ei ðein-auŋ-nuneli aut nei tonjetam iya" is basically "I am unsure whether I will return home soon," but could also be "I doubt that I will return home soon" or "I am apprehensive that I will not return home soon."
This would be a lot easier to write about if I were writing by hand where most of the evidentials are only two characters.
*Translating Hamilton lyrics, because why not double up on the nerdery, right?
Y'know what my favorite thing about conlanging is, other than inventing new writing systems? It's that moment when you're translating and you realize that the language has developed grammatical rules that you didn't consciously plan. I suppose it is the conlang equivalent of that thing where you write a story and the characters decide to do something that was not in your original outline. Sometimes the object goes before the verb and sometimes it goes after the verb and I've figured out why that happens but I did not mean for it to happen. It is a rule that senesh developed on its own.
I also keep finding out new things about my evidential markers. You guys, I am so pleased by my evidential markers, you have no idea. When I started building the language, I thought they were just going to do what it says on the tin: indicate how the speaker knows what they're saying is true. But now I'm learning that they can be used to add emphasis or indicate tone or change the politeness level of a sentence - it's so exciting. There are things we use whole long phrases for in English that I can indicate with a one-syllable particle in senesh.
- There's an evidential (tju-) that I essentially think of as the "story evidential": you use it to indicate that what you're saying is fictional or somewhat dramatized or metaphorical. But you can switch to a cwe- evidential in a metaphorical statement (cwe- is basically "I witnessed/experienced this"), which indicates that the statement is literal. So if you say something like "ei cwe-ra shimeihin" instead of "ei tju-ra shimeihin," you're doing that thing we do in English when we say "I am literally dying." When in fact you are clearly doing nothing of the kind. (I mean, you would still say that if you were actually dying and then it would be literally true. That's a different situation.)
- You can use tju- for nonfictional stories too, but there it indicates the level of casualness. Stories with tju- are the kind you tell on tumblr: "OMG, you guys, let me tell you a story about [insert historical person here]." If you're actually citing sources, you'd use shau-. Or fjo-, if you're presenting a source that you want to disprove. (shau- is "I was told this/I read this and I trust the source." fjo- is "I was told this/I read this and I don't trust the source".)
- The pa- evidential means roughly "this is self-evidently true/everyone agrees this is true." If you use it in a simple declarative sentence - "The sky is blue", for example - that's what it does. When used in an argument or when expressing something that could be subjective - "Climate change is real," "Blue is the best color" - it indicates the surety of the speaker in their position, and their belief that everyone should agree with them. When used in the future tense - "I'm going to win this game" - it indicates determination and the speaker's will to make what they're saying come true.
- la- and ðei- are both for when you're not sure of the veracity of what you're saying. la- is basically "This is my opinion" and ðei- is "I'm unsure about this/don't have evidence one way or another". So, using an example from the last section, "Blue is the best color" with a la- evidential would translate to something like "I think blue is the best color", but if you use a ðei- evidential it's something like "I guess blue is the best color, maybe?" People who use a lot of softening expression in English (I think, I feel, I guess, maybe) would use a lot of la- and ðei- in senesh. This is coded feminine in English but not necessarily in senesh. It is coded as being more polite to soften your speech this way in senesh - overusing cwe- and pa- in subjective statements sounds harsh and kinda rude.
- Along those lines, it's considered rude to directly contradict something someone else has said or to give an outright denial in answer to a question. So if someone tells you the sky is green and you want to politely contradict them, you might say "mase ðei-rel ferti shwe," which is something like "Maybe that's not true." Or you could say "eiyo, le ahje la-rel uwim," which is "Well, I think the sky is blue." And if someone says "Are you coming to my party?" and you want to politely refuse, you might say "ei eiŋen-auŋ-fati." "ei auŋ-fati" is "I'm going to come" but the eiŋe- evidential means "This is self-evidently not true/everyone agrees that this isn't true." That kind of reply is culturally understood as saying no without literally saying 'no'.
( - This kind of thing is a cause of translation problems and culture clash in the stories that go with the language. The Junchei - the other major culture in the story - tend to think of the seneshi as obsequious and dishonest because they don't grok how polite speech works in senesh. When speaking senesh, the Junchei tend to use a lot of cwe- and pa- evidentials (because they have the least apparent nuance and thus seem easiest to use) and so they come across as harsh and unnecessarily blunt to the seneshi. I don't know anything about the Junchei language - Chuktai - other than the fact that it has a lot more voiced consonants than senesh, doesn't have the bilabial fricative that senesh has, and doesn't use evidentials.)
- In the future tense, la- and ðei- get used a lot. la- in the future tense indicates that the speaker hopes that what they're saying is true. It can also carry connotations of longing or yearning. "ei lan-auŋ-nuneli aut nei tonjetam iya" is basically "It is my opinion that I will return home soon" but it could be translated equally well as "I hope I will return home soon" or "I long for it to be true that I will return home soon," depending on the context. ðei- in the future tense indicates that the speaker doubts what they're saying is true, and can carry connotations of dread. So "ei ðein-auŋ-nuneli aut nei tonjetam iya" is basically "I am unsure whether I will return home soon," but could also be "I doubt that I will return home soon" or "I am apprehensive that I will not return home soon."
This would be a lot easier to write about if I were writing by hand where most of the evidentials are only two characters.
*Translating Hamilton lyrics, because why not double up on the nerdery, right?
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Date: 2015-11-30 10:54 pm (UTC)...I think I love you ♥
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Date: 2015-12-01 02:56 pm (UTC)(And now I have Thoughts on how characters in Hamilton use evidentials, but possibly that is only interesting to me.)