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[jal]

My absolute favourite article along these lines:

Looks interesting, thanks for sharing!


JAL

[jal]

But one could also analyze them as auxiliary verbs that obligatorily take VPs as their arguments.

You needn't have auxverbs to have a word take a VP. In English, prepositions can take VPs (even if they're then classified as "asverbs" but I think that's bogus): "I'll come after the part" vs. "I'll come after the party has ended". Personally I'd only classify something as a verb, aux or not, is when it behaves like a verb, or it makes the verb after it behave less like a verb, like in Germanic languages where the auxverb is conjugated and the main verb is just a bare infinitive. But if in your case the main verb still behaves like a normal verb while the particle isn't, I'd say it's difficult to analyze it as a verb,


JAL

[bradrn]

If a language has unconjugated modal verbs, how do you know that they are verbs and not adverbs or prepositions or particles or something?

I think you are approaching this the wrong way. Whether a word with a modal meaning is a "verb" or an "adverb" or a "particle" or something else is a matter of language analysis - does the word behave like a verb syntactically or like an adverb? What are its diachronics? If there's no distinction between these two (e.g. because both auxiliary verbs and adverbs have the same syntactic position), does it really matter syncronically whether it's one or the other?

I need to know so that I'll know what to mark it as in the dictionary. The long story is this:

For my IAL I created a word with the meaning "should" (strong recommendation, coming either from oneself or someone else, to do smth). So it has no diachronics other than that I borrowed it from Tagalog, where it's an adverb. So far there's not been much that distinguishes TAM markers from either verbs or adverbs. TAM markers always occur before a verb, where adverbs may also occur. But one could also analyze them as auxiliary verbs that obligatorily take VPs as their arguments. Some of the other TAMs I have so far are these:
pan - PFV marker; classified as a verb because it can also be used as a normal verb meaning "finish"
corena - cessative marker; classified as a verb because it can also be used as a normal verb meaning "quit"
tama - another cessative marker; classified as a verb because it can also be used as a normal verb meaning "stop"
tela - PRF marker; classified as an adverb because it also means "already"
ti - PASS marker; classified as a verb because it can also be used as a copula meaning "become"

I thought hard about whether "should" should have some other sense beyond it's modality use, but decided against that. Maybe there isn't such a strong argument for why tela should be classified as an adverb, though it doesn't have any verb senses. I just chose adverb because all the four languages that I know well have a word meaning "already", and they're all classified as adverbs.

In that case, given that they have a restricted distribution which is different to other word types, it sounds like these words make up a new word class. Just mark them in the dictionary as ‘TAM marker’. No-one’s restricting you to a fixed set of Sanctioned Word Class Names.

[Qwynegold]

You needn't have auxverbs to have a word take a VP. In English, prepositions can take VPs (even if they're then classified as "asverbs" but I think that's bogus): "I'll come after the part" vs. "I'll come after the party has ended".

Aha, that's another possibility.

Personally I'd only classify something as a verb, aux or not, is when it behaves like a verb,

What exactly does that mean?

or it makes the verb after it behave less like a verb, like in Germanic languages where the auxverb is conjugated and the main verb is just a bare infinitive. But if in your case the main verb still behaves like a normal verb while the particle isn't, I'd say it's difficult to analyze it as a verb,

Hmm, it's hard to say in this language because there's no conjugations. You can make a nominalization, though that wouldn't be used in this context. Here's a couple of examples:

1SG should go to outside GEN bed
I should get out of bed.

today 1SG should clean floor
I should clean the floors today

If one removed "should" from these two sentences nothing else would change. Is that enough to be able to say that "go" and "clean" are finite? How do we know they're not zero-marked infinitives?

[Qwynegold]

No-one’s restricting you to a fixed set of Sanctioned Word Class Names.

I am! D:

[bradrn]

No-one’s restricting you to a fixed set of Sanctioned Word Class Names.

I am! D:

But… why? The traditionally Sanctioned Word Classes are barely even adequate to cover English, let alone such ‘exotic’ languages as Mandarin and Japanese. An IAL will almost certainly need to deviate from this list if it wants to avoid Eurocentrism (which IIRC was one of your goals).

[bradrn]

Personally I'd only classify something as a verb, aux or not, is when it behaves like a verb,

What exactly does that mean?

It’s language-specific. Sometimes it’s defined by an ability to take arguments; sometimes by an ability to take agreement markers; sometimes by an ability to head NPs without explicit nominalisation. Occasionally it’s more subtle, e.g. possessibility differences in some Salishan languages. (This is essentially the point of that article I linked.)

or it makes the verb after it behave less like a verb, like in Germanic languages where the auxverb is conjugated and the main verb is just a bare infinitive. But if in your case the main verb still behaves like a normal verb while the particle isn't, I'd say it's difficult to analyze it as a verb,

Hmm, it's hard to say in this language because there's no conjugations. You can make a nominalization, though that wouldn't be used in this context. Here's a couple of examples:

1SG should go to outside GEN bed
I should get out of bed.

today 1SG should clean floor
I should clean the floors today

If one removed "should" from these two sentences nothing else would change. Is that enough to be able to say that "go" and "clean" are finite? How do we know they're not zero-marked infinitives?

‘Zero-marked infinitive’ is basically inapplicable as a concept to most languages outside English, since it presupposes the concept of an ‘infinitive’, and one which has explicit marking at that. From what I’ve seen, finiteness doesn’t seem to be a very relevant concept for your language, especially given that verbs are completely uninflected.

[jal]

Personally I'd only classify something as a verb, aux or not, is when it behaves like a verb,

What exactly does that mean?

Whatever the behaviour of verbs is in a certain language (syntactically, morphologically, semantically, pragmatically, whatever).

1SG should go to outside GEN bed
I should get out of bed.

today 1SG should clean floor
I should clean the floors today

If one removed "should" from these two sentences nothing else would change.

But could one remove "get out" or "clean"? No? In that case, I'd say "should" is not a verb, but just a modal particle. There's really no reason to call it an "auxiliary verb" if there's nothing verbnessy about it.


JAL

[quinterbeck]

My absolute favourite article along these lines: http://alex.francois.online.fr/data/Ale ... -in-Lg.pdf. I think every conlanger should read it. (I’ve already linked it a handful of times here.)

Good article, thanks!

The author's calculation to estimate the maximum "grammatical space" available (section 6.3.2) could use some refinement IMO. The uppermost range of the scale corresponds to invalid tables. For example in the 6×7 table, 39 'word class - function' assignments would require two word classes to have all 7 functions, thus no longer being distinct word classes. Does it make sense to include those values as being 'available space'?

[Qwynegold]

But… why? The traditionally Sanctioned Word Classes are barely even adequate to cover English, let alone such ‘exotic’ languages as Mandarin and Japanese. An IAL will almost certainly need to deviate from this list if it wants to avoid Eurocentrism (which IIRC was one of your goals).

For the most part I think they are adequate.

[Qwynegold]

‘Zero-marked infinitive’ is basically inapplicable as a concept to most languages outside English, since it presupposes the concept of an ‘infinitive’, and one which has explicit marking at that. From what I’ve seen, finiteness doesn’t seem to be a very relevant concept for your language, especially given that verbs are completely uninflected.

Oh, I see.

Personally I'd only classify something as a verb, aux or not, is when it behaves like a verb,

What exactly does that mean?

Whatever the behaviour of verbs is in a certain language (syntactically, morphologically, semantically, pragmatically, whatever).

1SG should go to outside GEN bed
I should get out of bed.

today 1SG should clean floor
I should clean the floors today

If one removed "should" from these two sentences nothing else would change.

But could one remove "get out" or "clean"? No? In that case, I'd say "should" is not a verb, but just a modal particle. There's really no reason to call it an "auxiliary verb" if there's nothing verbnessy about it.


JAL

Hmm, okay. I'm now contemplating whether I should actually make a new part of speech called modal particles, or whether I should just class it as an adverb. I don't know if adverb makes sense. There are two reasons I'm hesitant to use the term modal particle. One is that it's a type of particle, right? So it seems a little iffy to me to have both particles and prepositions in the same language. The other reason is that it feels iffy to add an unconventional part of speech that contains extremely few words. (I discovered that I also have an imperative marker, which I so far had classified as an adverb. But it should belong to the same part of speech as "should", so that would be the only other modal particle. Maybe there'll also be a word "please" that will also be that PoS.)

Thanks for helping me analyzing this everyone!

[jal]

Hmm, okay. I'm now contemplating whether I should actually make a new part of speech called modal particles

You don't "make" parts of speeches, you analyze the language and if a certain group of words act more or less like an established word class, you use that class. If you have words that act like modal particles do in other languages, then call them modal particles.

or whether I should just class it as an adverb. I don't know if adverb makes sense.

"adverb" is in many European languages a mixed bag of "if we don't know what it is, we'll call it an adverb, because it's associated with a verb" - which gets us in the mess that English has a load of prepositions that double as adverbs, as I wrote before. You could call it an adverb if that makes sense for your language, but don't call it an adverb out of convenience for describing the language!

There are two reasons I'm hesitant to use the term modal particle. One is that it's a type of particle, right? So it seems a little iffy to me to have both particles and prepositions in the same language.

Particles are words that don't easily fit into another class. I'm not sure why you are getting prepositions into the mix, as they are not associated at all with particles. Most languages will have both prepositions (or other kinds of adpositions) as well as particles of some sort.

The other reason is that it feels iffy to add an unconventional part of speech that contains extremely few words.

It's quite common to have "parts of speech that contain few words", these are called "closed classes" (like pronouns). And particles aren't "unconventional" at all.

I discovered that I also have an imperative marker, which I so far had classified as an adverb. But it should belong to the same part of speech as "should", so that would be the only other modal particle.

I'd say that in that case either you haven't analyzed your language quite well enough, or it is a bit unrealistic. Languages that have modal verbs or modal particles tend to have more than one or two.

Maybe there'll also be a word "please" that will also be that PoS.

That would be a kind of optative or desiderative mood?


JAL

[bradrn]

Hmm, okay. I'm now contemplating whether I should actually make a new part of speech called modal particles

You don't "make" parts of speeches, you analyze the language and if a certain group of words act more or less like an established word class, you use that class. If you have words that act like modal particles do in other languages, then call them modal particles.

This.

or whether I should just class it as an adverb. I don't know if adverb makes sense.

"adverb" is in many European languages a mixed bag of "if we don't know what it is, we'll call it an adverb, because it's associated with a verb" - which gets us in the mess that English has a load of prepositions that double as adverbs, as I wrote before. You could call it an adverb if that makes sense for your language, but don't call it an adverb out of convenience for describing the language!

Yep, this is exactly what I was talking about when I said English word classes were ‘barely adequate’. It is obvious that words like ‘very’, ‘ago’, ‘not’, ‘quick’ and ‘up’ all have totally different syntactic behaviour, yet all are classified as ‘adverbs’.

I discovered that I also have an imperative marker, which I so far had classified as an adverb. But it should belong to the same part of speech as "should", so that would be the only other modal particle.

I'd say that in that case either you haven't analyzed your language quite well enough, or it is a bit unrealistic. Languages that have modal verbs or modal particles tend to have more than one or two.

I have a funny feeling this is because, if analysing a language with only one or two modal verbs or particles, linguists don’t tend to go to the trouble of explicitly identifying them as a separate class. I suspect there exist many languages which actually do have only one or two modal words.

Maybe there'll also be a word "please" that will also be that PoS.

That would be a kind of optative or desiderative mood?

A politeness marker, surely?

[jal]

Yep, this is exactly what I was talking about when I said English word classes were ‘barely adequate’. It is obvious that words like ‘very’, ‘ago’, ‘not’, ‘quick’ and ‘up’ all have totally different syntactic behaviour, yet all are classified as ‘adverbs’.

Indeed. And "out" is classified differently in "I throuw it out" (adverb) and "I throw it out the window" (preposition), which also seems a bit suspicious to me...

I have a funny feeling this is because, if analysing a language with only one or two modal verbs or particles, linguists don’t tend to go to the trouble of explicitly identifying them as a separate class. I suspect there exist many languages which actually do have only one or two modal words.

Fair enough. Though it'd be interested to know how many languages do, and whether these modal words would not indeed be part of some larger class of words (for example, Dutch has many modal words that are classified as adverbs, many of those doubling as actual adverbs).

Maybe there'll also be a word "please" that will also be that PoS.

That would be a kind of optative or desiderative mood?

A politeness marker, surely?

Depends on how it's used I'd say. If it is used like English subjunctive as in "Could you pass me the salt please", I wouldn't call it a politeness marker, but I'd need to see all uses to give an informed opinion. In general, what I'd call a politeness marker would have a broader application than just questions (cf. Japanese honourifics, or Standard European 2nd person politeness distinctions.


JAL

[Pabappa]

is it possible that out the window could be classified as an adverbial phrase? that might resolve the contradiction.

on the other hand, i see no problem calling out a preposition even in the first sentence .... it's well known that sentences can end with prepositions, even if it's considered to be nonstandard. one could even argue it depends whether the meaning of "out" is literal or metaphorical ..... it'd be a preposition if literal use was intended (e.g. if it was just a short form of "outside"), but an adverb if a metaphorical sense was intended, since "to throw out" has a specific meaning of its own.

i separated these two paragraphs because theyre about unrelated things ... the second paragraph is just me going out on a limb, but the first paraphraph is, i think, in line with standard English grammar analysis.

[bradrn]

Yep, this is exactly what I was talking about when I said English word classes were ‘barely adequate’. It is obvious that words like ‘very’, ‘ago’, ‘not’, ‘quick’ and ‘up’ all have totally different syntactic behaviour, yet all are classified as ‘adverbs’.

Indeed. And "out" is classified differently in "I throuw it out" (adverb) and "I throw it out the window" (preposition), which also seems a bit suspicious to me...

No, it is used in two different syntactic contexts. But this does not necessarily mean that it is classified differently in the two sentences. It could just mean that it’s a separate word class defined by appearing in these contexts. If there’s a bunch of words which regularly can appear in both these contexts, it’s easier to analyse it as a separate word class; otherwise it’s multiple membership or homophony. In the case of ‘up’, I’m still undecided; I remember that at one point I analysed it as a member of a separate word class of ‘directionals’, but I can’t recall my reasoning at the time.

That would be a kind of optative or desiderative mood?

A politeness marker, surely?

Depends on how it's used I'd say. If it is used like English subjunctive as in "Could you pass me the salt please", I wouldn't call it a politeness marker, but I'd need to see all uses to give an informed opinion. In general, what I'd call a politeness marker would have a broader application than just questions (cf. Japanese honourifics, or Standard European 2nd person politeness distinctions.

‘Could you pass me the salt please?’ (question)
‘Please leave me alone.’ (imperative)
‘Mummy, I want to go to the toystore please.’ (declarative)

So it’s not just questions. In fact, any restriction appears to be semantic, not syntactic: *I like to go to the toystore please is ungrammatical for me, despite being parallel to I want to go to the toystore please.

[Qwynegold]

You don't "make" parts of speeches, you analyze the language and if a certain group of words act more or less like an established word class, you use that class. If you have words that act like modal particles do in other languages, then call them modal particles.

It's a conlang; reality can be whatever I want it to be. Do you, or anyone else, have examples of languages that are often analyzed as having a part of speech of modal particles? And possibly a link to something I can take a look at?

"adverb" is in many European languages a mixed bag of "if we don't know what it is, we'll call it an adverb, because it's associated with a verb" - which gets us in the mess that English has a load of prepositions that double as adverbs, as I wrote before. You could call it an adverb if that makes sense for your language, but don't call it an adverb out of convenience for describing the language!

Okay, I'll skip the adverb idea.

Particles are words that don't easily fit into another class. I'm not sure why you are getting prepositions into the mix, as they are not associated at all with particles. Most languages will have both prepositions (or other kinds of adpositions) as well as particles of some sort.

To me prepositions and particles are weakly differentiated. They're both function words and they both take an argument of some kind. Now, prepositions literally have to have something following, but if we called them adpositions instead, then how do you distinguish between adpositions and particles?

And particles aren't "unconventional" at all.

No, I meant modal particles. I have never seen a language claimed to have that as a part of speech.

I'd say that in that case either you haven't analyzed your language quite well enough, or it is a bit unrealistic. Languages that have modal verbs or modal particles tend to have more than one or two.

Hmm, maybe I just haven't created enough words yet.

[Qwynegold]

Indeed. And "out" is classified differently in "I throuw it out" (adverb) and "I throw it out the window" (preposition), which also seems a bit suspicious to me...

I'd call out an adverb in both sentences. I'd analyze "out the window" as a set phrase, with a dropped preposition. That preposition would be of(?) From would've made more literal sense, but you know prepositions are always full of weird quirks.

[bradrn]

You don't "make" parts of speeches, you analyze the language and if a certain group of words act more or less like an established word class, you use that class. If you have words that act like modal particles do in other languages, then call them modal particles.

It's a conlang; reality can be whatever I want it to be.

True… but on the other hand, conlangs are certainly languages, and so are amenable to linguistic analysis. I am allowed to believe that jal has a better analysis of your conlang; if you disagree you’ll have to convince me otherwise. (Which I welcome, by the way. The discussion is interesting!)

Do you, or anyone else, have examples of languages that are often analyzed as having a part of speech of modal particles? And possibly a link to something I can take a look at?

I know of no language with a word class of ‘modal particles’ specifically. Limbu comes close, in that it has a set of clause-final modal words, except that for no clear reason van Driem analyses them as examples of ‘adverbials’, as opposed to other clause-final ‘particles’. (‘Adverbial’ is another one of those words with no clear meaning.) That doesn’t mean you can’t have such a word class though; your previous post describing your language sounds like a pretty clear description of a modal particle word class.

Particles are words that don't easily fit into another class. I'm not sure why you are getting prepositions into the mix, as they are not associated at all with particles. Most languages will have both prepositions (or other kinds of adpositions) as well as particles of some sort.

To me prepositions and particles are weakly differentiated. They're both function words and they both take an argument of some kind.

I’m not sure where you saw this. To me, ‘particles’ have always been function words which do not take an argument. If a function word takes an argument, it’s an adposition.

[Rounin Ryuuji]

I know of no language with a word class of ‘modal particles’ specifically. Limbu comes close, in that it has a set of clause-final modal words, except that for no clear reason van Driem analyses them as examples of ‘adverbials’, as opposed to other clause-final ‘particles’. (‘Adverbial’ is another one of those words with no clear meaning.) That doesn’t mean you can’t have such a word class though; your previous post describing your language sounds like a pretty clear description of a modal particle word class.

I think some stage of pre-attestation Japanese may have: the verb affix -ba (forms a hypothetical mood) is thought to be cognate with the nominal topic marker -wa; similarly, a different hypothetical marker *-nto is probably some sort of particle that was absorbed into the exclamatory stem of verbs to form the Old and Classical Japanese concessive. This analysis might be contemplated, however, by certain nominal particles having evolved from verbs, so particle-like verbal affixes may have originally been auxiliaries. A "transitive switch" *-e appears to have existed, too, but I suspect this was some sort of verb of potential originally.