ANTARCTICAN
GRAMMAR (XOXOTE NAPAAKISU UU)
This
is a comprehensive description of Antarctican grammar in English. Below will
list all the different subsections of the grammar and roughly how it works. The
grammar and language presented here will be from the capital city dialect of
the language which is regarded as the standard language for all official
purposes throughout the country.
I: PHONOLOGY
Antarctican has
a relatively simple phonology as far as world languages go. There are a total of
15 phonemes in the language. There are 10 consonants and 5 vowels. There are
slightly different phonemes for each of the dialects of Antarctican but all of
the dialects are mutually intelligible. The only differences between the
dialects are slightly different places of articulation of the consonants and
vowels, as well as differing word stress.
CONSONANTS
Voiceless
bilabial plosive |
/p/ |
can be realized as the allophones [pʰ] , [p] or [b] depending on dialect and position
of the word in a sentence. |
Voiceless
alveolar plosive |
/t/ |
can be realized as the allophones [tʰ], [t] or [d] depending on dialect and
position of the word in a sentence |
Voiceless
velar plosive |
/k/ |
can be realized as the allophones [kʰ], [k] or [g] depending on dialect and
position of the word in a sentence. |
Bilabial
nasal |
/m/ |
can be realized as the allophones [m] and [ɱ] depending on dialect and position of the word in a
sentence. |
Alveolar
nasal |
/n/ |
can be realized as the allophones [n] and [ŋ] depending
on dialect and position of the word in a sentence |
Voiceless
labiodental fricative |
/f/ |
can be realized as the allophones [f], [v], [ɸ] and [β] depending on dialect and position of
the word in a sentence |
Voiceless
alveolar fricative |
/s/ |
can be realized as the allophones [s] and [z]
depending on dialect and position of the word in a sentence |
Voiceless
postalveolar fricative |
/ʃ/ |
can be realized as the allophones [ʃ], [ʒ], [ʂ] and [ʐ] depending on dialect and position of
the word in a sentence |
Voiceless
glottal fricative |
/h/ |
can be realized as the allophones [h], [ħ] and [ʔ] depending on dialect and
position of the word in a sentence |
Alveolar
lateral approximant |
/l/ |
can be realized as the allophones [l] and [ɫ] depending on dialect and position of the word in a
sentence. |
VOWELS
Near-open
front unrounded vowel |
/æ/ |
can be realized as the allophones [æ] and [ɑ] depending on dialect and position of the word in a
sentence. |
Open-mid
front unrounded vowel |
/ɛ/ |
can be realized as the allophones [ɛ] and [e] depending on dialect and position of the
word in a sentence. |
Close
front unrounded vowel |
/i/ |
can be realized as the allophones [i] and [ɪ] depending on dialect and position of the word in a
sentence. |
Close
mid-back rounded vowel |
/o/ |
can be realized as the allophones [o] and [ɔ] depending on dialect and position of the word in a
sentence. |
Close back
rounded vowel |
/u/ |
can be realized as the allophones [u] and [ʊ] depending on dialect and position of the word in a
sentence. |
II: ORTHOGRAPHY
The Antarctican
language uses the latin alphabet for its writing system. There are 15 letters
in the alphabet. They are:
A, E, F, H,
I, K, L, M, N, O, P, S, T, U, X
The letters are generally pronounced as follows:
A |
/æ/ |
E |
/ɛ/ |
F |
/f/ |
H |
/h/ |
I |
/i/ |
K |
/k/ |
L |
/l/ |
M |
/m/ |
N |
/n/ |
O |
/o/ |
P |
/p/ |
S |
/s/ |
T |
/t/ |
U |
/u/ |
X |
/ʃ/ |
Writing the
vowels twice in a row lengthens the quality of the vowels: AA, EE, II, OO, UU
III: SYNTAX
First it must be
stated that the Antarctican language is an isolating language following the
convention of - Subject, Verb, Predicate (SVO). There are virtually no
prefixes, suffixes or declension of any type in the language. Word order is
extremely important in conveying ideas as changing around the word order can
completely change the meaning of a sentence. In this respect, the language is
similar to Chinese, Vietnamese, Indonesian and to a certain extent English as
far as syntax is concerned.
NOUNS
Nouns are not inflected
for number, case, gender, definiteness or anything else for that matter.
Usually plurals are indicated by context or when context is unavailable, a
numerical quantifier is placed in front of the noun (i.e. five banana, a few
apple). Case is indicated by word positioning in the sentence and by the use of
various prepositional particles that precede the noun. Using the particle
“faso” after the thing being possessed indicates possession. For example to say
John's car, you would say "Nexune faso John" which means "Car of
John". Posessive pronouns are formed by using the particle
"faso" before the pronoun in question (I, me = ei) and (my = faso ei)
and are usually placed after the noun they modify (i.e. Nexune faso ei = My car).
Definiteness (a, the) of the noun is specified by the context as there is no
other way to ascertain it syntactically.
PRONOUNS
The pronomial
system in Antarctican is slightly different than those in most European
languages. There are actually 4 persons and 2 plurals as Antarctican
distinguishes between animate and inanimate third person. The pronouns are as
follows:
Ei |
(1st person singular) |
Oa |
(2nd person singular) |
Oi |
(3rd person singular animate) |
Io |
(3rd person singular inanimate) |
Eu |
(1st person plural) |
Ea |
(2nd person plural) |
Ia |
(3rd person plural animate) |
Ie |
(3rd person plural inanimate) |
VERBS
Verbs also are
not normally inflected for tense or aspect and are usually understood from context
or through adverbials. However, if clarification is required, then there are a
system of grammatical particles which can make clear the context of when the
action of the verb took place as well as whether or not it was completed
(aspect of the verb). It should be noted in every day conversation that these
particles are not often used and are normally only used when clarification is
needed or in writing. It should also be noted that there are 3 moods of the
verb: Indicative, Conditional and Imperative. However, the mood is also not
often morphologically realized in the vernacular. The subjunctive mood does not
exist in Antarctican.
Here are the
different optional grammatical particles that can be used to indicate tense and
aspect. I will use the example of the verb to go to illustrate how these
particles are used.
I go / I am going |
Ei nitati / Ei nitati oo |
I will/shall go |
Ei nitati ua |
I have gone |
Ei nitati ui |
I went |
Ei nitati ui |
I had gone |
Ei nitati ui |
I will have gone
|
Ei nitati ua ui |
I will be going |
Ei nitati ua oo / Ei nitati ua |
I was going |
Ei nitati ui oo |
I would go
|
Ei nitati ue |
I would have gone |
Ei nitati ue ui |
Go! |
(Oa) nitati! |
The specific meaning of the particles is as follows:
ui |
past tense |
ua |
future tense |
oo |
action is not
completed (aspect) |
ue |
conditional
mood |
NOTE: The
grammatical particles above don’t exactly correspond to their English
equivalents in some cases.
The verb ‘to be’ in Antarctican is ‘hehupa’. However, this is only used where both the agent and the patient of the sentence (i.e. subject and object) are both nouns. If the object is an adjective, then the verb to be is omitted in which case you have what is called ‘zero copula’. However, if you have a situation where the copula is in the past or future tense, then you can the verb ‘to be’ with the corresponding tense or aspect marker (this is still optional though if the context is understood) For example:
Paris is a city
= Paliise hehupa tuxo
Paris is big =
Paliise nonaxi
Paris was big = Paliise hehupa ui nonaxi.
Note in the 1st
and 3rd examples, the verb to be is used either because the object
is a noun or not in the present tense.
There is a passive voice in Antarctican in addition to the active voice. To change a sentence to the passive voice, just reverse the subject and
object of the sentence and add the passive voice marker ‘kusose’ before the subject. If the subject is unknown or is unimportant, then you don’t
add the subject after the ‘kusose’. For example:
This book is written by John = Hohupi semesu kekesu kusose John
My arm is broken = Hapuha faso ei papi kusose
Note in the second example, the subject is unimportant, and so nothing is written after ‘kusose’.
In Antarctican, there are different words used to denote relative pronouns versus interrogative pronouns. In English for example, the words ‘who’ ‘that’ and ‘where’ can be either. It’s also important to note that unlike languages like English, all verbs in Antarctican must have a subject attached to the beginning of a dependent clause. There is also no distinction between restrictive and non-restrictive clauses. For example:
I know who did
this = Ei hexupa malofu oi xuxina ui fukako semesu [literally – I know who
(conj.) he do (past) thing this]
ADJECTIVES
AND DEMONSTRATIVES
Adjectives and
demonstratives usually come after the noun they modify. In the case of
adjectives, greetings are an exception to this rule (eg. Puxuna xohupa = good
day (greeting), Xohupa puxuna = It’s a good day (this specific day is good).
Adjectives and demonstratives don’t take any declension at all unlike in some
European languages. If there is more than one adjective describing the noun,
then you place the more prominent one directly after the noun followed by the
least prominent one. If it is unclear which one is more prominent or all the
adjectives seem to be of equal prominence, then the word order among the adjectives
is fairly free.
The Blue Car - Nexune pexinu
The Red and White Flag - Hatona fufuku kafemu
Hatona - Flag
Fufuku - Red
Kafemu - White.
To show
comparison between adjectives (i.e. big, bigger, biggest), you add adverbials
Big - nonaxi
bigger - nonaxi lusola (more big)
biggest - nonaxi kilulo (most big)
This house –
Toxihu semesu
These houses –
Toxihu semesu (can only distinguish from context or with an adverb or numerical
quantifier)
Demonstratives
can’t stand on their own like in other languages where they are often used as
pronouns. In this case, you need to add something before it for it to be
grammatical. For example:
This is a truck
= Fukako semesu hehupa mesisi.
This translates
literally as ‘Thing this is truck’. You can’t just say ‘Semesu hehupa mesisi’
as it wouldn’t make sense grammatically in Antarctican as demonstratives can
only modify other words like adjectives and can’t stand on their own.
ADVERBS
Adverbs are
fairly free to be placed anywhere in the sentence as long as their context is
clear. If it is unclear as to which part of speech the adverb is modifying,
then the adverb should be placed after the part of speech it is modifying.
I am really happy. - Ei fefake aa hetexe.
Or you can say - Ei hetexe fefake aa.
Either way is correct as the adverb (fefake aa) is free to move
around in the sentence.
WORD
CLASSES
Each word in
Antarctican comes with its own default word class - whether it be Noun, Verb, Adjective
or Adverb. In order to change each word from its default word class into
another word class, you simply add a grammatical particle. Here are the
grammatical particles:
ai |
change word into a noun from original word class |
ii |
change word into a verb from original word class |
aa |
change word into an adverb from original word class |
uu |
change word into an adjective from original word class |
uo |
change word into a person/thing that does the word in question (i.e.
carpentry - carpenter) |
au |
only used to change cardinal numbers into adjectival ordinal
numbers (i.e. one - first), and does not apply to any other word class except
numbers. |
For other word classes
such as: demonstratives, pronouns, modifiers and conjunctions; these words can
not be transformed and simply remain in their original word classes. To add a
word class change particle with these words would make the utterance
ungrammatical for all intents and purposes.
NOTE: I would
say that 70-80% of the vocabulary are verbs by their default word class, so if
in doubt, unless it’s obvious otherwise, assume that most words are verbs.
MAKING A
QUESTION OUT OF A STATEMENT
If you want to make question out of a statement, then you just add the word ‘kiaa’ after the end of the statement and it automatically makes it into a question. This does not apply if there is already a question word at the beginning of the sentence such as ‘what’, ‘where’ ‘how’ etc.
Example:
This is a book. = Fukako semesu hehupa hohupi.
This is a book? = Fukako semesu hehupa hohupi kiaa?
IV: CONCLUSION
This is a quick
explanation of Antarctican grammar. This sheet is not meant to be a full explanation
of all the different ins and outs of the language as there is some variation
among the dialects as to which features of the optional grammar are used or
not. I have mainly outlined a sketch of the grammar of the standard language of
the capital city. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to e-mail
me at: [email protected] for
more information.
Damien Ponech
2008