Difference between revisions of "Taiji language"

Revision as of 22:57, 8 July 2010

Theory

The Taiji language is based on the eight trigrams of the ba gua. Each of these is assigned a value for when it occurs as a syllable onset and when it occurs as a syllable nucleus. These trigrams can then be paired as the sixty-four hexagrams of the I Ching, each representing a syllable. Since Taiji is intended to be primarily a written language, assigning phonetic values to each trigram by which to reference them trigrams and hexagrams is primarily a matter of convenience rather than absolute necessity. The values that each trigram is assigned are not arbitrary. Instead, each line of the trigram is interpretted as encoding some information about the consonant or vowel it represents. For the consonants, the first line is taken to indicate voicing and the last place. For the vowels, the first line indicates roundness, the second line indicates closeness and the third line indicates backness.

Phonology

Though each of the eight trigrams available is assigned a value as a syllable onset and as a syllable nucleus, there are only seven consonants and eight vowels in its phonemic inventory. This is because the trigram ☷ indicates no consonant as an onset.

Consonants

Taiji's sum total of seven consonants is very sparse compared to most natural languages. Also notable are its complete lack of sibilants, liquids and semivowels. All of these peculiarities are a necessary result of the restrictions imposed by the underlying theory of the language's design. Neither voicing or length is contrastive, consonants may only appear syllable initially and clusters of them do not occur.

There are few allophonic processes which operate on these consonants. Before the vowel /i/, the velars /k/ and /ŋ/ are fronted to /t͡ʃ/ and /ɲ/ respectively. Between vowels, the consonant /h/ becomes /ɦ/.

Vowels

Where Taiji's consonant inventory is lacking, its vowel inventory is slightly heavy at eight vowels. Not only is this a slightly high number, but three of the eight are either a front rounded vowel or a back unrounded vowel, both of which are uncommon in natural languages. Vowel clusters may occur.

Vowel clusters of identical vowels may occur phonemically. However, there is an allophonic rule which inserts an epethentic [ɦ] between such vowels. This process operates both within a word and across word boundries.

Grammar

Taiji is a highly analytical language, and is almost completely devoid of inflection. Grammatical information is instead conveyed through a robust set of grammatical particles. These particles constitute the core of the language's grammar. They are all monosyllabic, contrasting with content words, which must contain at least two syllables. There are only two such open classes, nouns and verbs.

Nouns

Nouns are modified by gramamtical particles indicating case and definiteness. They also distinguish the category of number, but this is marked using partial reduplication.

Number

There are two grammatical numbers in Taiji, the singular and the plural. For countable nouns, the singular is used for once instance of the noun and the plural for multiple. Uncountable mass nouns always use the singular form. The singular is unmarked. The plural is indicated by partial reduplication in which the first vowel of the noun is appended to its front.

Definiteness

There is no truly separate lexical class of articles in Taiji, but the grammatical category of definitness is still relevent. All nouns are either indefinite or definite. The indefinite is simply left unmarked. Definiteness is meanwhile marked using the third person pronouns, which are placed before the noun phrases as a definite article. If the phrase is singular, the singular pronoun ☷☳ is used, while for plural phrases the plural pronoun ☶☰ is used. Names are an exception, and never take either pronoun as they are inherently definite.

Case

There are six cases. The grammatical particles used to distinguish between them follow the nouns they modify.

The most basic case is the absolutive case. No particle is used to mark it, and it is used as the citation form for all nouns. Its compliment is the ergative case, marked by the particle ☷☶. For intransitive verbs, either may be used to mark the clause's subject. The choice is conditioned by the semantics of the verb. For verbs which describe involuntary actions or states, the absolutive is used while the ergative is used for verbs whose subject has volition. For most verbs the choice is lexically conditioned, but for some either case may be appropriate depending on circumstances.

The third core case is the dative, marked by the particle ☷☵. It is primarily used to mark the recipient for verbs of giving and sending. It is also used with intransitive verbs to mark the perceiver of a sensation or emotion. One important construction that uses the dative like this is the indication of possession. The possessor takes the dative case in a sentence where the possessed item appears as the subject of the existential verb ☰☴. The dative is also used outside of a clause's core arguments with verbs describing places or times. In these constructions it is interpretted as allative, indicating motion towards the marked noun.

There are two separate genitive cases, both used to mark possession. The two are distinguished by the alienability of the possession in question. In cases where the possession is somehow fundamental and not subject to trivial changes, the inalienable genitive particle ☲☷ is used. This includes all descriptions of an object's composition, even it may be later changed. If a possession can be trivially lost,then the particle ☲☵ is used instead. The difference between the two genitives can be used to create meaningful contrasts. Nouns with either genitive particle always precede the noun modified by the phrase. The alienable genitive is also used as an ablative with nouns of place and time, indicating motion away from. Similarly, it is used in comparisons to mark the object being compared to.

The final case is the instrumental, marked by the particle ☱☷. It has several uses. The characteristic one is marking the means of an act. When used with a noun of location it instead assumes a locational meaning, and likewise a temporal one when used with nouns of time. It is also used with the passive voice to reintroduce the deleted subject argument, as well as with some inherently passive verbs.

For meanings not covered by these 6 cases, or for the resolution of ambiguity, a number of words related to the noun by the inalienable genitive can be used. The word itself takes either the alienable dative, genitive or instrumental case according to the same semantic rules that govern their use as obliques elsewhere.

Verbs

Taiji verbs distinguish tense, aspect, mood and voice. These categories are primarily marked using auxiliary verbs, which themselves have meaning on their own. Several of these auxiliary verbs are irregular, using suppletion to distinguish these categories. There are also several purely grammatical particles which modify verbs.

Tense and Aspect

Taiji distinguishes two tenses, non-past and past, and three aspects, imperfective, perfective and progressive.

Tense and the imperfective and perfective aspects are all marked using the auxiliary verb ☳☴, "to do". ☳☴ is irregular, and has a different form for the present and past imperfective and perfective. Each form of the verb may be used as an auxiliary to indicate the same tense and aspect for the main verb. The citation form of the verb ☳☴ is its the non-past imperfective. It is only used in negative sentences to avoid confusion with the progressive tense. Otherwise the present imperfective is unmarked. Its non-past perfective form is ☰☷, its past imperfective form is ☲☶ and its past perfective form is ☵☰.

The progressive aspect is indicated by the auxiliary verb ☰☴, "to exist". Not all verbs can form the progressive using ☰☴. Verbs which describe states can not be seen as a progress, and have no progressive aspect.