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new gismu and summary of changes to gismu/rafsi, etc.



Summary of gismu/rafsi related official changes approved in the last year

New gismu as approved in June 1990

1. Change "ckamu" to "mleca" for rafsi considerations
2. Add "daytime", change keyword for "day" (full day?, 24hr day?)
3. Add "virtue", as distinct from "good", to parallel with "evil"
4. Add "citrus"
5. Add "cabbage", to include broccoli, cauliflower, and perhaps lettuce
6. Add "hemp", to include natural rope, burlap, marijuana, and hashish
7. Add "protein"
8. Add "buckwheat"
9. Add "cassava", to include taro and yam, and other starchy roots (not tubers)
10. Add "sorghum"
11. Add "magenta" and "cyan" as the missing two subtractive primary colors
12. Change the keyword of "gismu" from "primitive" to "root word"
13.  Add "North America", the continent, as distinct from "merko",
   referring to the U.S.
14.  Add "South America", the continent, as distinct from "xispo",
   referring to Latin America
15. Add "Antarctica"

The following proposals were added with considerable debate and discussion:

1. Add "glimmering" to cover the concepts of morning and evening
twilight

2. Define "morning" and "evening" symmetrically

a. The specific symmetry required much debate; consensus was finally
built around a culture-dependent definition, wherein morning is the time
between sleep and work, and evening is the time between work and sleep,
according to the cultural norm.  In a tanru this could be modified to a
personal norm.

3. In a discussion of "decrease" as an opposite of "increase", initial
sentiment was only weakly for adding it

a. It was noticed that the existing place structure of increase was
transitive; it was proposed that by changing the place structure to the
intransitive "x1 is increased in property x2 by amount x3", an opposite
gismu for "decrease" would be bette r justified.  Without the change,
the semantic difference from "adjust" and "add" was felt to be too
small.

b. The vote to add "decrease" in parallel to the new meaning of
"increase" was approved.


2. It was decided to change the keywords for "tanru" and "lujvo".

3. The familial relationships never quite seem to satisfy.  It was
agreed to add "sire" and "dam" to the definitions of "patfu" and
"mamta" (no vote necessary since place structure change).  Later it was
suggested that we retain some unsatisfactory holes and combinations,
which are of uncertain importance.  The fact that American culture is
shifting away from traditional family structures makes it unlikely that
we (who are all Americans) can decide on a culturally neutral solution.
The choices are then to be maximally inclusive of the possible
relationships, or to pare the list in ways that ignore American
sensibilities.  The general preference seems to be for the former.
Thus, we can make the following matrix:

        Gender-neutral     Male            Female     Gender-neutral but
        but genetic                                   not-necessarily-genetic
1.      panzi              bersa           tixnu      se rirni
1a.                                                   verba
1b.                                                   cifnu
2.                         bruna           mensi      lunba
3.      se panzi           patfu           mamta      rirni ("rearer")
3a.                                        se jbena   "mother/father"

But note that as currently defined "patfu" and "mamta" are defined
biologically, whereas their counterparts (except "se jbena") need not
be.  The obvious suggestion is to make them non-biological.  However, it
can reasonably be argued that with animal br eeding and genetics, and in
some less transitional cultures, the biological parents have a uniquely
important role enough to be considered 'primitive'.  If so, the tanru
"mamta se panzi" and "patfu se panzi" may be too long to be
satisfactory.  They could be shortened by any of the options:

a. Change "panzi" to be its inverse, making "se panzi" into offspring;

b. Add a different gismu to be the inverse of "panzi";

c. Add two gismu to specifically represent the genetic relationships
"sire" and "dam"; Other options are possible.  Note also that "rirni" is
not quite the same as "mother/father", so we may need another genderless
general term here.

There is also the question of the extended family, which we have long
ignored.  We can be very specific about "mother-mother",
"father-sister", and other extended family relationships, but we cannot
be general.  This is a weakness in that most cul tures use general
terms, and in American culture, the extended family relationships are
getting so complex that specific terms will not suffice.  For discussion
purposes then, let us consider:

a. "elder/ancestor" for family members of generations preceding the
parents (including non-direct line, the relationship is more
social/ethnic than biological).  Gender would be added via tanru, as
would explicit biological lineage (or a place cou ld be used for
specifying lineage, with specific names used in alternation with
properties of the lineage of relation).  The conversion would give
"descendant" as well as "grandkids" in the broadest sense.

b. "aunt/uncle/godparent" for non-lineal (socio-ethnic) family members
of the parental generation.  The conversion would give "niece/nephew".

c. "cousin" for non-immediate (socio-ethnic) family members of the same
generation.  The generalized family relationship is still expressed by
"lanzu", which can be modified via tanru.

Other:

1. Days of the week were discussed prior to the gismu baseline
discussion, and it was decided to add color and continent based names as
alternatives to the number based names that have been standard.  In
addition, the number based names will be s et to run from 0 to 7, with
Sunday serving as both 0 and 7, depending on speaker
preference/orientation.

John Cowan expressed great skepticism that any alternate system would
catch on.  They seem too much like crackpot 'calendar reform' efforts,
and isn't well supported in numerical date representations.  He also
noted that not all cultures have a 7-day week (which had been previously
noted).  The generic concept of a week is the time between successive
market days, which ranges from 4 to 9 days in agrarian non-Western
cultures.  He thus suggested that "jeftu" add a place to indicate the
culture.  This requires no vote, since it is a place structure change.


Results, updated 6/24/91, to reflect comments at and after LogFest


gismu   rafsi           keyword         clue                  synonyms

bemro   bem             North American  berti merko
cicna                   cyan                        turquoise
dinri                   daytime                     daylight
dzena       dze         elder           grandparent ancestor
dzipo   zip dzi zi'o    Antarctican     dzucipni
famti                   aunt or uncle               godparent
jdika                   decrease                    reduce
ketco   ket tco         South American  Quechua
kobli                   cabbage         cole-       cauli-, broccoli, kale, kraut
lanbi                   protein         albumin     amino
marna                   hemp            marijuana   jute, cannabis
murse                   glimmering                  twilight, dawn, penumbra
nimre       mre         citrus          lime        lemon, citric
nukni   nuk             magenta         fuchsin     fuchsia
rorci   ror             procreate                   engender, sire, dam, beget
samcu                   cassava                     taro, manioc, tapioka, yam
sorgu   sog             sorghum
tamne                   cousin
vrude   vud     vu'e    virtue
xruba   xub             buckwheat       rhubarb     sorrel grass

rafsi changes needed for above changes

dotco   dot     do'o    German          delete rafsi tco
merli   mel     mei     measure         delete rafsi mre

previously approved changes to baseline

ckamu-                  less    deleted, replaced by mleca
mleca   mec     me'a    less

keyword changes

mukti   muk     mu'i    motive            was purpose
djedi   ded dje dei     full day          was day
gismu   gim     gi'u    root word         was primitive
tanru                   phrase compound   was metaphor
lujvo   luv jvo         affix compound    was cpd predicate


some lujvo conventions to eliminate need for some cmavo rafsi
   (there may be exceptions, i.e. lujvo of the pattern that are not of the
    convention)

cu'o preceded by number rafsi is probability rather than modification
fi'u with number rafsi is interpreted as fraction rather than modification
ka'e handled by kakne
li'i suctylifry- in first position
mu'e nunmulny- in first position
pu'u nunprucy- in first position
si'o suctysidby- in first position
su'u sucty- in first position
za'i nunzasty- in first position
zu'o nunzukty- in first position



summary of all proposed rafsi changes

( - after a rafsi means the rafsi was deassigned for reuse.)

CVC CCV CVV     cmavo/gismu

        ce'o    ce'o
        co'e    co'e
        fo'a-   forca (retains for, fro)
        fo'a    fo'a
        fo'e    fo'e
        fo'i    fo'i
        ke'e    ke'e
        le'e    le'e
        lo'e    lo'e
        me'a    mleca
        no'e    no'e
        nu'o    nu'o
        to'e    to'e
        ve'e    ve'e
        vu'e    vrude
        za'o    za'o
        ze'e    ze'e
        ze'o    ze'o
        zi'o    dzipo
        zo'a    zo'a
        zo'i    zo'i
    dze         dzena
    dzi         dzipo
    mre         nimre
    mre-        merli
    tco         ketco
    tco-        dotco
bem             bemro
biz             bi'o or bi'i
caz             ca'a
caz-            cadzu  (retains dzu)
cel             ce
cez             ce'i
daz             da'a
daz-            da     (no remaining rafsi)
dum             du'u
joz             jo'e
kep             ke'e
ket             ketco
kuz             ku'a
mec             mleca
mem             mei
mom             moi
nal             na'e
nal-            na
nar             na
nuk             nukni
pez             pe'a  (figurative lujvo - totally unpredictable place structure)
piv             pi'u
piz             pi
puz             pu'i
ror             rorci
roz             roi
sog             sorgu
sog             so'a
soj             so'e
sop             so'i (also has "so'i" added this one for series)
sos             so'o
sot             so'u
vud             vrude
xub             xruba
zip             dzipo
----
lojbab = Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
         2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA
         703-385-0273
         lojbab@snark.thyrsus.com