Posted by Glenn Kempf on 00:01 2/22/02
In reply to: Kanaran posted by Gareth Wilson on 19:14 5/21/02
A response to Julao's new Kanaran Web site (and thanks to Mark for letting us bouce each other's worlds around this way ;-):
Dear Julao (or do you prefer Julian in English?),
After a little fiddling, I was able to get to the Kanaran site (so please disregard the previous E-mail in which I said I couldn't open it). I read your Kanari grammar, and being a big map fan, I checked out the map too. :-)
Your explanation of the language seems clear and straightforward (I especially like the case usage examples and the table of correlatives), and I hope that you will be able to add vocabulary, sample sentences and texts to demonstrate how everything is put together. I only have two grammatical questions, both very similar:
1. Are the genitive and possessive case endings used together (i.e. Julaol geremor<, Julao's hammer), or do they have separate functions? (At least some of the Turkic languages work as in the example, although the possessive can be used alone if the context is clear.)
2. How do the prepositions and the case endings, especially those with similar functions; i.e., indicating location and direction, work together? You give the example Anderiladh aveû, "I'm going to Anderil," without a preposition, but the preposition edzo, "to, towards." Would an alternate form therefore be Edzo Anderiladh aveû< or maybe simply Edzo Anderil aveû? Would the meaning be slightly different? (The more specific prepositions, such as "outside", "near", etc., more clearly express meanings that the case ending alone cannot provide, but theit objects might take case endings as well, such as -in(a) to indicate location (being outside) and -adh(a) to indicate movement (going outside), as in Verdurian and Russian.)
Those are a couple of my thoughts; please keep in mind that I'm an even bigger amateur--you're way ahead of me already. :-) Good luck, and I look forward to seeing more of your world!
Ad onlelán,
Glenn