A WAKALIAN PRIMER by Joost Winter --- 1. Phonology and stress ======================= The Wakalian phonology contains five vowels (a, e, i, o, u), without distinction of length, which are pronounced as in Italian. Furthermore, there are eightteen consonants (b, d, g, p, t, k, m, n, ng, s, z, f, v, c, j, l, w, y), all pronounced as in English, with the exception of 'c' which has the sound of the English 'ch' in chair. A syllable always consists of a single consonant (note here that the digraph 'ng' is considered a single consonant) followed by a single vowel, and the stress always is put on the next to last syllable in a word. A syllable starting with 'w' can only end in -a, -e, or -i, and a syllable starting with 'y' can only end in -a, -o, or -u. The only exceptions to the main syllable rule are the ending -n, which is used to signify the end of a (main or subordinate) sentence, and the initial tense markers, which consist of a vowel only. 2. Sentence structure ===================== The basic sentence structure is VSO (Verb-Subject-Object), or more precisely: [tense marker]-[modifiers]-[verb stem] [subject] [object]-n There are three tense markers: e- (present tense), a- (past tense), and o- (future tense). Some modifiers include the modifier -lo- (negation), and the modifier -ki- (to indicate the perfective aspect). Some examples (wilu: human/man/woman/person, laju: to buy, malu: house, de: I): Elaju wilu malun. The person buys the house. Olaju de malun. I will buy whe house. Akilolaju wilu malun. The person had not bought the house. In sentences containing a direct as well as an indirect object, the structure is: [tense marker]-[modifiers]-[verb stem] [subject] [d. object] [i. object]-n As in (tofe: man, mafe: woman): Edona tofe malu mafen. The man gives the house to the woman. Any number of noun phrases at the end of a sentence can be left out, in which case they are left unspecified: Edona tofe malun. The man gives the house (to someone). Edona tofen. The man gives (something) (to someone). Edonan. Someone gives (something). A noun can be followed by one or more subordinate sentences, which have the same structure as the main sentence. In the subordinate sentence, the pronoun 'ke' refers back to the noun the subordinate sentence is a specification of: (joda: think, or 'to think of') Ejoda wilu elaju ke malun-en. The person who buys the house, thinks. Here an additional -en is put after 'malu-n' to signify that the main sentence as well as the subordinate sentence are terminated. Of course, 'ke' can also be put in other other positions: (gitu: being big) Egitu malu elaju wilu ken-en. The house which is bought by the person, is big. However, in a subordinate sentence, if 'ke' would be the last noun phrase, it can be left out and made implicit. (In other words: if a subordinate sentence does not contain the pronoun 'ke', it is filled in the first 'open' position. This differs from the case of main sentences where the first 'open' position is left unspecified.) So our last sentence can be rephrased as: Egitu malu elaju wilun-en. Note that verbs such as gitu can take the role of adjectives: Elaju wilu malu egitu ken-en. or: Elaju wilu malu egitun-en. The person buys a big house (lit: a house that is big). Other verbs can take the role of prepositions. An example of this is 'na', 'being in': (vido: to see, na: being in, bula: table) Ena wilu malun. The person is in the house. Evido wilu ena ke malun bulan. The person in the house sees the table. A difference with prepositions and adjectives in other languages is that verbs like na or gitu can take different tenses as well as modifiers: Evido wilu okina ke malun bulan. The person who will have been in the house sees the table. Elaju wilu malu agitun-en. The person buys a house that was big. Elaju wilu malu elogitun-en. The person buys a house that is not big. In fact, neither adjectives or prepositions exist as separate categories in Wakalian: both are expressed exclusively through verbs. 3. Number and definiteness ========================== It should be noted that in Wakalian, there are no (indefinite or definite) articles, and, as in e.g. Japanese or Chinese, there is no distinction between singular and plural. However, if we explicitly want to state the number, we can make use of the adjective-like verbs nujo ('being one'), and kajo ('being multiple'). Elaju wilu malun. The person buys the house. *or* A person buys the house. *or* The people buy the house. *or* People buy the house. Elaju wilu enujon malun. The/A/One person buys the house. Elaju wilu ekajon malun. (The) people buy the house. These specifications are only made when required by the context, and are generally left out. 4. Pronouns =========== Wakalian has the following personal pronouns: de I ge you ne he/she/it dege 'we', when some or all of the others comprising 'we' are present dene 'we', when none of the others comprising 'we' are present gege plural 'you', when two or more of 'you' are present gene plural 'you', when only one of 'you' is present nene they Furthermore, there is the neutral pronoun be, which can be used to leave a noun phrase unspecified. It might, depending on context, be translated as 'someone' or 'something', and can also be used to express the passive voice. Elaju be malun. Someone buys the house. *or* The house is being bought. Edona tofe be mafen. The man gives something to the woman. Finally, there is the reflexive pronoun 'se': Evido de sen. I see myself. Evido wilu sen. The person sees him/herself. Evido nene sen. They see themselves. 5. Numerals =========== nujo one nijo first nuwi two niwi second nuse three nise third nuda four ... nuli five nuna six nusu seven nulu eight nusa nine numo ten numojo eleven ... numoli fifteen numola sixteen nuwimo twenty nuwimona twenty-six nunamoda sixty-four These numerals can be used like other 'adjective-like' verbs. Examples: wilu enumon the ten people wilu enimon the tenth person 6. Duality between nouns and verbs ================================== Earlier on, we already saw that in Wakalian neither adjectives nor prepositions exist as separate categories. In fact, in Wakalian nouns can also easily be used as verbs, and vice versa. Examples: Word: As noun: As verb: wilu person being a person/being human milo light being light najo smn/smth who is first being first muso someone/something poor poor The general rule is that, if a noun means "x", the corresponding verb means "being x" or "being an x"; and if a verb means "to x", the corresponding noun means "someone or something who/which x-es". 7. Adverbs ========== Consider the English sentence "The man thinks of the books in the house". Here "in the house" can be either an adverbial phrase specifying "think", or a specification of "books". In Wakalian, adverbs and adverbial phrases can be specified by the prefix u-, and are put directly after the verb they specify. (libo: book, bajo: strange, dato: much/to be much) malu egitu udaton-en a very big house Ejoda una ke malun wilu libon. The person thinks (in the house) of the books. Ejoda wilu libo ena ke malun. The person thinks of the books that are in the house. Ejoda ubajon wilun. The person thinks strangely. Ejoda wilu ebajon-en. The strange person thinks. Ejoda wilu bajon. The person thinks of (something strange/strange things/strange people). 8. The interrogative modifier ============================= Earlier on we saw the modifiers -ki-, indicating the perfective aspect, and the modifier -lo-, to indicate negation. Another modifier, -ti-, is used to make a sentence interrogative. Alaju Jona malun. John bought the house. Atilaju Jona malun? Did John buy the house? It is also possible to add the modifier -ti- to other parts of speech than the main verb of the sentence: Alaju tiJona malun? Did *John* buy the house? ("Someone bought the house, but was it John?") Alaju Jona timalun? Did John buy *the house*? ("John bought something, but was it the house?") There is one word which is by itself interrogative, 'ti', which, when used as a noun, means 'who/what?': Alaju ti malun? Who bought the house? Alaju Jona tin? What did John buy? Egitu malu elaju tin-en? The house which is bought by *whom* is big? Used as a verb/adjective, 'ti' means 'which': Alaju Jona malu etin-en? Which house did John buy? You can express multiple questions in a single sentence by multiple uses of -ti-: Atilaju Jona malu etikan-en? Did John buy a house, and if so, which? Other interrogative pronouns can be constructed through usage of 'ti' in combination with other words. E.g.: tudo etin 'when'? (lit: 'which time?') Alaju une ke tudo etin-en Jona malun? When did John buy the house? (lit: At which time did John buy the house?) angumo tin 'why'? (lit: 'caused by what?') 9. The word 'ne' ================ Earlier on, we saw the word 'ne' being listed as the third person singular pronoun: here we will see that the same word can be used for a number of other purposes. Used nominally, other than he/she/it, it can also mean 'that': Elovo de nen. I want it./I want that. Used as an adjective/verb, 'ne' can be used to mean either 'the' or 'that'. Note again that, unless a specific stress is desired, Wakalian does not mark definiteness of nouns. tofe enen *the* man/that man Also, just like 'ti' could be used to express interrogatives such as 'when' in combination with other phrases, with the help of 'ne' the corresponding demonstratives, like 'then', can be expressed: Alaju une ke tudo enen-en Jona malun. John did buy the house then/at that time. 10. Verbal nouns ================ To construct more complicated intensional sentences such as "He wants to buy a house", in Wakalian a construct called the verbal noun is utilized. The verbal noun is characterized by the prefixes 'za-', 'ze-', and 'zo-', depending on tense. From a sentence such as: Elaju de malun. I buy a house. We can construct a verbal noun as follows: zelaju de malun 'the buying of the house by me'. The verbal noun can occur in any position where any noun phrase can occur. For example: Elavo ne libon. He wants a book. Elavo ne zelaju de malun-en. He wants me to buy the house. In the auxiliary sentence started by the verbal noun, the back-referring pronoun 'ke' can be used to refer back to the subject: Elavo ne zelaju ke malun-en. He wants to buy the house. Elavo ne zelado mafe ken-en. He wants to be loved by the woman. Angumo ti zalaju Jona malun-en? Why did John buy the house? (lit: "What caused that John did buy the house?") Unlike in regular subordinate sentences, however, in verbal noun phrases the pronoun 'ke' is not by default filled in the next open position. Verbal nouns can vary in tense, and take other modifiers: Elavo ne zalaju de malun-en. He wants that I did buy the house. Elavo ne zololaju de malun-en. He wants that I will not buy the house. If the interrogative modifier 'ti' is used inside a verbal noun phrase, only the verbal noun phrase, and not the main sentence, becomes questioning: Elavo ne zegono ke zetigitu malun-enen. He wants to know whether the house is big. Elavo ne zegono ke zegitu malun-enen. He wants to know that the house is big. 11. Comparatives ================ In Wakalian, comparatives can be expressed by the verb 'bo', which expresses that one thing is more in intensity that another at a certain property, and the verb 'ba', which expresses equal intensity. Both 'bo' and 'ba' take two nouns, that are compared, as the first two arguments, and a verbal noun as the last argument, in which 'ke' refers back to the two nouns are compared. Examples: Ebo Jona Peto zalado ke Marin-en. John loves Mary more than Pete. (as in: John loves Mary more than Pete loves Mary.) Ebo Mari Peto zalado Jona ken-en. John loves Mary more than Pete. (as in: John loves Mary more than John loves Pete.) Ebo malu eli den malu eli gen zegitun-en. My house is larger than your house. Eba malu eli den malu eli gen zegitun-en. My house is as large as your house. 12. Conjunctions ================ One special word category that is still left in Wakalian, are the conjunctions. Some important ones: ka and fo or mu but Conjunctions can be used to combine noun phrases as well as sentences: Elaju Jona ka Peto malun. John and Pete buy a house. Elaju Jona malun ka elaju Peto libon. John buys a house and Pete buys a book. Elaju Jona fo Peto malun. John or Pete buys a house. Elaju Jona malun mu elaju Peto libon. John buys a house but Pete buys a book. 13. Vocabulary ============== Note that the prefixes ki-, ti- and lo- are not used to start words, because they are used as verb modifiers. Also the prefixes nu- and ni- are not used to begin words except for the two classes of numerals, and the prefixes za-, ze-, and zo- are not used as they indicate verbal nouns. ba to be equal in intensity or strength than bejo to be strange, something or someone strange bo to be more in intensity or strength than bula table bulo red cano to begin ceto to be difficult, hardship dalado dollar dato much, to be much dona give faso to be behind someone or something fo or gara to rule gato to cost gitu to be big gono to know gu to be on jamo land, country joda to think, to think of ka and kajo to be multiple lado to love laju to buy lacano to create li to have libo book lavo to want mafe woman, girl, to be female majo to eat malu house matu call mu but milo light muso to be poor na to be in naco dog ne to be at (a certain time) ni-, nu- [used for numbers] ngako to hit ngumo to cause pasano to breed po to be intended for polo bread sila forest socu dark, being dark tabo make tofe man, to be masculine tomobi car tudo time, era vaco to burn, to be burned by [someone/something] vido see vo towards wakali island wilu human, to be human 14. Some example phrases and sentences ====================================== wilu ejodan the thinking person wilu ekijodan the person who has thought wilu ojodan the person who will think wilu olaju ke malun the person who will buy a house malu olaju ben the house which will be bought malu ololaju wilun the house which will not be bought by the person Agato malu egitun olaju Jonan dalalo enumon-en. The big house that John has bought cost ten dollars. Appendix A. Phoneme inventory ============================= Letter X-SAMPA phoneme Vowels: a a e e/@ (@ in unstressed syllables) i i o o u u Consonants: p p b b m m t t d d n n k k g g ng N f f v v s s z z c tS j dZ l l w w y j