Re: xruti

[Nick NICHOLAS <nsn@vis.mu.oz.au>]

Hu'tegh! nuq ja' Logical Language Group jay'?

=krefu is used to talk about events that recur, in which all sumti return to a
=previous value forming a relationship that existed in the past.  No agent
=is implied, and there is no focus on any of the sumti.

=xruti puts focus on ONE of the sumti, which becomes such that the relationship
=is restored to the previous value.  If the only thing about the relationship
=is this focus, though, I think that there are ways of indicating that focus.

=On the other hand, if the need for the focus is compounded with the need for
=an added agent who causes the return to previosu state by acting on the
=one sumti that is the focus - then we have the xruti that is in the gismu list.

=So there are two features that distinguish trhe current xruti from krefu.
=You seem to propose eliminating one of them.

I don't think this is such a problem; the remaining difference is salient
enough. The distinction Jorge points out, repetition versus reversion, is
even more salient. In fact, it may illuminate matters to start thinking of
xruti as 'revert', not 'return'. krefu cannot mean 'revert'. Changing xruti
in the way proposed is, in any case, quite consistent with recent changes
to other gismu.

=Now the question becomes whether a -gau lujvo adds an agent while preserving
=the focus on the x1 place.  I find this doubtful.

I agree with Jorge that I don't get you on this:

Under the new proposal, mi xruti leka vipsi: I revert to being second in
command.
do xrugau mi leka vipsi: you demote me.

We're still talking about what happens to {mi}; what's changed?

=Somewhere in all this, my mind is drawn to stika/cenba and galfi/binxo as
=being more relevant than gasnu tot his question.  These words have not seen
=much use in the language, especially in lujvo, and I think that may be a
=shortsightedness on the part of the people who have been making ad-hoc lujvo.

Part of the problem with these gismu is that their unraised versions are not
that user friendly, and that the *real* way to raise their subjects is not
-gau, but jai. Consider:

lenu mi kakpa cu galfi le dertu tarmi --- My digging changes the shape of the
soil.
mi galfygau lenu mi kakpa kei le dertu tarmi ---- I do digging to change the
shape of the soil. *Not* I change the shape of the soil.
mi jai galfi le dertu tarmi fai lenu mi kakpa --- I change the shape of the
soil by digging.

There is a broad class of gismu which are unraised, where their x1 is an
Instrument and their x2 a Patient, and where putting a -gau makes x2 the
Instrument and x3 the Patient, where we would prefer x2 to be the patient
(mi "change" le dertu tarmi, *not* mi "change" fi le dertu tarmi, which is
counterintuitive). The only way to achieve x2 Patient is jai, and I think
jai should figure in the gismu list alongside, or instead of, the -gau and
-zu'e proposals, for these gismu.

=Of course I was having similar unhappiness today over agentless muvdu, which
=seems rather too much like klama these days - I think there should be some
=clear semantic distinction but am not sure whether the additional x5 place in
=klama provides one which is meaningful.

The distinction is obvious: klama is an animate, volitional activity; muvdu
is not. klagau = I make you go --- you still propel yourself. muvgau --- I
move you, which I can do by having you forcibly lifted.

--
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Nick Nicholas. Linguistics, University of Melbourne.   nsn@krang.vis.mu.oz.au
        nsn@mundil.cs.mu.oz.au      nick_nicholas@muwayf.unimelb.edu.au
            AND MOVING SOON TO: nnich@speech.language.unimelb.edu.au