Tenata: A Constructed Language
Author: Lila Sadkin
MS Date: 06-01-2007
FL Date: 06-01-2015
FL Number: FL-00002D-00
Citation: Sadkin, Lila. 2007. “Tenata: A Constructed
Language.” FL-00002D-00, Fiat Lingua,
Copyright: © 2007 Lila Sadkin. This work is licensed under
a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-
NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Fiat Lingua is produced and maintained by the Language Creation Society (LCS). For more information
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Tenata: A Constructed Language
Lila Sadkin
Introduction
Tenata (stress on the first syllable) is spoken in Southern
Korapan. Korapan is one of the countries on the continent
Atiensen. Tenata is a minority language on the continent, whose
name transliterates to Tinisen in Tenata, although the Tenata
people are not very involved in continental affairs, so the word
is rarely used. The Tenata people as a whole keep to themselves in
their region, although the network of villages is very dynamic,
and a person will usually have lived in several villages over her
lifetime.
Geographically, the area is mostly flatland, though there are
smaller mountains and forested areas in the east, and the climate
is temperate, with a fair amount of rain, lending itself
beautifully to agriculture. The region is dotted with variously-
sized villages, each predominantly self-sufficient, though they do
trade with each other, mostly for art and other specialties. Some
of the very small villages in an area will function as one
extended village. There is no central power in a village or any
collection of villages.
The main unit is a “collective” of people rather like a
family, but the word family is misleading here, because it does
not refer to relation by blood or marriage. The biological/marital
family does exist, but it isn’t the primary unit of identification
for an individual. A collective isn’t a fixed, permanant unit, but
rather changes from season to season. Each aspect of life’s tasks,
such as agriculture, production of household goods, and so forth,
are taken care of by a collective, which consists of the people
whose talents, knowledge, and ability equip them for the task at
hand. For example, during planting season a group will form around
each crop (in bigger villages) or a group of crops (in smaller),
and they will all live in the “collective house” until the
planting is completed. Planting is a community-wide affair and
other activities, aside from collective-internal recreation,
effectively cease. After all the planting for the season is done,
villages have a celebration which is also the dissolution of the
current collectives and the forming of new ones. Harvest season
works the same way. During the rest of the year, when there are
not community-wide tasks to do, most people live in the smaller
family-houses, rather than the collective-houses, though there are
still collectives that do various things such as taking care of
the animals, weaving, pottery, smaller gardening, academic
activities, and taking care of other aspects of life.
Young children generally stay with one of their parents in
the parent’s chosen collectives. Older children are free to choose
their own collective to participate in, and they are encouraged to
try out as much as they can to figure out what they have a passion
for.
The role of the elders is primarily education. They usually
“retire” when they feel ready, though retirement is not ceasing
work–it is a change from active participation in a collective
(though they certainly still can if they wish) to supervising and
instructing the children in the group as well as directing the
progress of the collective in general.
The impermanent nature of the collective is reflected in the
Tenata language, whose words are semantically flexible. The
speaker is free to use semantic suffixes and compounding to coax a
variety of shades of meaning from a single root. The language also
doesn’t make much distinction between nouns, verbs, adjectives,
and adverbs, choosing instead to pay more attention to the
difference between lexical (semantic) and grammatical categories.
Two important postulates in Tenata are validity and
responsibility. Validity appears predominantly as sentence-level
discourse particles. They indicate belief in the utterance and who
is doing the [non]believing. Responsibility appears in some of the
aspect morphemes in Tenata’s verbal inflection.
In Tenata, most parts of speech are bound. Compounding is
frequent and so words tend to be quite long. Sentences, on the
other hand, tend to be short. They have a minimum of three words
(occasionally two, within context that permits the dropping of
validity statements), and they rarely have more than fifteen,
although this is because of compounding.
Phonology
Tenata phonology is fairly simple. There are five phonemic
vowels and twenty-two phonemic consonants.
Vowels:
/i/ /e/ /a/ /o/ /u/
These have their traditional phonemic values.
Consonants:
/p/ /t/ /k/ /q/
/f/ /s/ /c/ /x/
/pf/ /ps/ /ts/ /tc/ /ks/ /kx/
/m/ /n/ /ny/ /ng/
/w/ /r/ /l/ /j/
Consonants are as in English except for the following:
/q/: uvular stop
/f/: bilabial fricative
/c/: palatal fricative
/x/: velar fricative
/ny/: palatal nasal
/j/: palatal glide
Stops are aspirated in stressed syllables, unaspirated
elsewhere.
Syllable Structure
A syllable has these possible forms:
CV(C)
[fricative][stop | glide]V(C)
[stop][glide]V(C)
Exceptions: /q/ and /x/ do not combine with any other
consonants.
A syllable can only end in a consonant if it’s the final syllable
in the morpheme: morpheme-internal syllable division always occurs
after a vowel, not after a consonant.
At morpheme boundaries, an additional unstressed vowel is
often inserted between morpheme-final and morpheme-initial
consonants, to break up clusters. This will always happen to
prevent the combination of two consonants with the same manner of
articulation, and often in other conditions as well, though
sometimes the two consonants remain adjacent. The inserted vowel
will always harmonize to the place of the preceeding vowel. In the
breakdowns for the examples, this vowel is indicated with .V.
Stress
The location of stress in a Tenata word depends on the
category of the word. Because Tenata’s parts of speech do not
correspond to English parts of speech, stress will be explained in
the section below.
The Categories of Tenata Summarized
Every Tenata sentence (with the exception of minimal answers
and other sentences within larger discourse structures) contains
at least three “words”, or /-can-/. These three words must contain
the five parts of speech–/lume/, /teja/, /kowu/, /ngona/, and
/ruma/. Note: the previous words should actually be written with
hyphens, indicating that they are not free forms: /-lume-/, etc,
but for ease of reading they are written without the hyphens when
they are being used descriptively in the text.
In English, a complete sentence minimally consists of a noun
and a verb. Tenata does not make the same noun/verb distinction,
so a minimal sentence consists of a /-lumecan/, ‘semantic word’,
a /-ngonacan/, ‘verbal inflection word’, and /-rumacan/, ‘validity
word’.
What follows is an introduction to each category, and each
will be treated with more detail later.
/-lume-/ means ‘semantic root’ and so encompasses nouns,
verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. The same /lume/ can be used in any
of these categories, within semantic boundaries.
EXAMPLE: /-witena-/
noun: death
verb: to die
adjective: dead
adverb: deadly
EXAMPLE: /-kinya-/
noun: water
verb: to water
adjective: watery
adverb: in a water-like way, waterily, waterly
A /lume/ must always take /kowu/, function (case) prefixes, and
/teja/, categorical suffixes, to form a complete word that can be
used in a sentence.
/teja/ are categorical suffixes that always attach to /lume/.
They add further semantic information to the word and are never
optional. A particular /lume/ can take different /teja/ to
indicate different meanings, again within semantic boundaries.
EXAMPLE: /-kinya-/ ‘water’
/kinya.men/ ‘water.food’ “drinking water”
/kinya.mi/ ‘water.living’ “water” (not anthropomorphized,
often used when talking about a moving body of water such as a
river or stream)
/kinya.ci/ ‘water.human’ “water-demigod” (the person in
control of water)
/kinya.kim/ ‘water.building’ (used when speaking of
aquatic creatures’ living places)
There are also /teja/ that mean ‘art’, ‘tool’, ‘event’, and
others. More than one can also appear on a single /lume/ to make
further semantic distinctions.
/lume/ always have stress on their first syllable. In
compounds, the head of the compound, which is usually the final
/lume/, will have the primary stress.
/kowu/ are prefixes on /lume/ that mark functional roles in a
sentence, like case marking but with a few important distinctions.
These differences will be explained further in their own section.
There are nine /kowu/ and each /lume/ in a sentence must take one:
action, actor, recipient, beneficiary, purpose, direction,
location, instrument, auxiliary. Their functions will be explained
more thoroughly later. There is never stress on /kowu/.
/ngona/ are verbal inflection. They assemble to form a
separate word in a sentence. They collectively consist of mood and
three groups of contrasting aspects. The moods are indicative,
negative, interrogative, and hortative. The aspects are {for ones’
own benefit | for other’s benefit}, {intentional | accidental},
and {perfective | imperfective | habitual}. They are strung
together in this order, though the benefit and intention aspects
can be ommitted, and the benefit aspect can be replaced with a
pronoun, indicating the beneficiary (or maleficiary, with a
reversal suffix) directly. Stress in /ngonacan/ (the whole verbal
inflection word) is on the mood morpheme, word-initial.
/ruma/ are validity statements or discourse particles, and
indicate validity according to someone. They consist of two parts,
person and validity judgment. Person can be the speaker, subject,
a marked referent /lume/, common knowledge, a pronoun, or a fully-
inflected /lume/. Validity is true, unknown, or false, with
unknown being an end to itself, not a question left dangling, such
as the English “maybe.” /ruma/ is the last word in a sentence and
usually in conversation carries across sentences until it’s
changed. /ruma/ can also be suffixed onto /lume/, after /teja/,
particularly if the rest of the sentence is carrying a
different /ruma/. The stress in /rumacan/ is on the person, again
word-initial.
In addition to these five major categories, there are also
/feni/, conjunctions, and /jeso/, pronouns. /feni/ are the only
category in Tenata that can stand alone:
EXAMPLE: /-kajimekim tin -mosilimen/ “houses and fields”
Here the /feni/, /tin/, stands alone, without suffixes. They can
also be attached to /lume/. More examples are in the /feni/
section below.
/feni/ hold a special place in writing, and are often used in
writing where they aren’t used in speech, because the tokens for
them are repeated in writing where they aren’t in speech, and so
form aesthetically pleasing designs. /jeso/ can act in most
positions in a sentence, in place of /lume/ or in the /ngona/,
verbal inflection, or /ruma/, validity statement. /jeso/ are
further explained in their own section below.
There is also one morpheme, /x/, which is a reversal suffix.
It can attach to /lume/, /teja/, /ngona/, and /ruma/ and reverse
their meaning. It is most frequently used with /teja/ and /ngona/.
EXAMPLES:
/lume/: /-coref-/ ‘light’ /-coref.e.x-/ ‘dark,
extinguish’
/teja/: /-mi/ ‘living’ /-mi.x/ ‘not living’
/ngona/: /-xo/ ‘for one’s own benefit’ /-xo.x/ ‘for one’s
own detriment’
/ruma/: /-tus/ ‘true’ /-tus.u.x/ ‘not true’ This is
semantically different than /-tom/ ‘false’. /-tusux/ is more
uncertain and indicates an impermanent state: “Well, it’s not true
now, but maybe later it will be.”
Writing System
Tenata has a two-part writing system that reflects the
distinction between lexical or semantic and grammatical
categories. /lume/ are written with a phonemic alphabet, while the
rest of the language, /teja/, /kowu/, /ngona/ and /ruma/, as well
as /feni/ and /jeso/, are written with unique, unanalyzable
tokens. The language is not written in single lines but rather in
blocks that correspond to sentences. Tenata writing does not
always correspond directly to speech. /feni/ are very frequently
repeated in writing, while they do not repeat in speech (except in
very stylized recitations), and the /kowu/ and /teja/ are often
repeated when a /feni/ is bound to a /lume/. A token can also
repeat to fill space when the writing is serving in an artistic
position. The Tenata people treat writing as art, and they take
the time to make even the most mundane writings beautiful. The
blocks are usually written in columns from left to right, but this
can be changed to fit circumstances, such as over doorways, which
is a common place to see writing. Note: the writing system is
detailed at the end of this paper.
/teja/ Categorical Suffixes
/teja/ bring subtlety to the language. They can act like
gender by linking words together in a phrase, but they are
different from grammatical gender in that a word, or more
precisely a /lume/, does not belong to a particular /teja/. Also,
unlike grammatical gender, they carry their own semantic meaning
that modifies the /lume/ rather than being assigned according to
the meaning of the root. The most commonly-made distinctions that
are made are human, living, humanmade, food, nature, and
building/living space.
/-mi/ living
/-ci/ human
/-men/ food
/-lang/ humanmade
/-lu/ nature
/-kim/ living space
Other frequent /teja/ are /-xin/, art; /-tcje/, tool; and /-ping/,
event. The /teja/ class is a partially open one. /lume/ can
become /teja/ when they are frequently used as the final /lume/ in
a compound.
EXAMPLE: The /lume/ /-menin-/ ‘food’ at some point became
the /teja/ /-men/ ‘food’. Interestingly, the /lume/ was not lost,
so this results in the word /-menin.i.men/.
There is also a /teja/ that is used in possessive phrases.
Possession is formed by compounding, which is explained later, and
also requires the /teja/ /-kwa/ which indicates being
possessed. /-kwa/ is also the /teja/ that is used as a citation
form for /lume/. Being possessed is a natural state in Tenata
thought, and possessives are very common where in English
possessives are highly marked. Certain /lume/ almost always appear
with this /teja/.
EXAMPLES:
/-fisan-/ ‘help’ /-fisan.kwa/ ‘help.poss.’
/so.tju ru.fisan.kwa fi.sel/
“She helps me.” A more literal translation: “She gives
her help to me.”
More than one /teja/ can be used on a /lume/.
EXAMPLE: /-nitil-/ ‘berry’
/-nitili.mi.men/ ‘berry.living.food’ This would be
berries still on the bush, but that will be eaten. It contrasts
with /nitilimi/ which are berries on the bush but that won’t be
used as food, or /nitilimen/ which are berries for eating that
have already been picked.
EXAMPLE: /-numela-/ ‘forest’
/-numela.mi.kim/ ‘forest.living.building’
/kowu/ Function Prefixes
/kowu/ mark the functional role of each /lume/ in a sentence.
Any /lume/ (within semantic restrictions) can fill any role in a
sentence, and each role is marked with a prefix. A /lume/ can only
take one /kowu/. There are eight basic roles in Tenata, as well as
an auxiliary role.
actor
action
/so-/
/ti-/
recipient
/ru-/
beneficiary
/fi-/
purpose
location
/pe-/
/lo-/
direction
/ka-/
instrument
/ne-/
auxiliary
/mu-/
These labels work better for Tenata than the traditional labels
used to describe, for example, the Latin case system: nominative,
accusative, genitive, and so forth, because the uses of these are
not identical. The biggest difference is that action is not marked
any differently than any other function, and /ti-/, action, isn’t
required in a sentence. Another important point is that they are
always referring to the action of the clause, rather than
modifying other /lume/. Modification is done with compounding
rather than with /kowu/, and will be discussed later. Note: The
following examples are not full sentences, as they lack /ngona/,
verbal inflection, and /ruma/, validity.
/so-/, actor
The /lume/ marked /so-/ carries out the action in a sentence,
whether or not /ti-/ is present. Most sentences have this /kowu/
on one of its /lume/, but there are exceptions: the actor can be
omitted if it is the same over multiple sentences. This is very
commonly done in storytelling. This /kowu/ is essentially
equivalent to the subject case. The actor tends to appear near the
beginning of the sentence.
/ti-/, action
The action in a sentence looks just like any other /lume/,
taking the /ti/ prefix and a suitable categorical suffix. More
abstract actions will often take /-kwa/, the possessed suffix,
or /-ping/, the event suffix. A sentence does not have to have
a /lume/ marked /ti-/–the action in a sentence can be indicated
by the other elements in the sentence, through the “natural
states” in Tenata, explained below. The /lume/ marked with /ti-/
is usually the last /lume/ in the sentence.
/ru-/, recipient
Recipient in Tenata is the recipient of the action in a
sentence.
EXAMPLE: /so.limati.mi ru.kelmi.mi ti.pseta.mi/
‘actor.squirrel.living recipient.tree.living
action.climb.living’
“The squirrel climbed the tree.”
The climbing happened to the tree, it was done to the tree by the
squirrel. Tenata actions always act upon something: a /lume/
marked /ti-/ cannot act as an intransitive verb. While /ti-/ isn’t
required in a sentence, /ru-/ always is. It is the inflection that
will appear on a sentence containing one /lume/:
EXAMPLE: /ru.ksuwi.lu/
‘recipient.rain.nature’
“It rains” or “There is rain” or “Rain was given.”
EXAMPLE: /so.pinuce.mi ru.kewan.men/
‘actor.wheat.living recipient.nourishment.food’
“The wheat gives/has nourishment” or “The wheat is
nourishing.”
“A is B” sentences are formed with the /ru-/ prefix.
EXAMPLE: /so.sel ru.menya.ci/
‘actor.I recipient.person.human’
“I am a person.”
/ru-/ is not equivalent to direct object or accusative case,
because there are circumstances in which a /lume/ marked with
/ru-/ acts as the “verb” in the sentence as well as its direct
object. This is the Tenata “natural state.” A /-lumetejacan/
(compound of /lume/ and /teja/ with a categorical suffix /-can/,
meaning ‘language’ or ‘word,’ which translates roughly to ‘word’
itself) can act as a noun and a verb simultaneously, where the
verb is the natural state, or the expected action of the noun.
Rivers flow, food is eaten, plants grow. When there isn’t an
identifiable “verb” in a sentence it is usually the natural state
of the recipient, marked /ru-/, such as in the following
sentences. There is no word that means “give” or “have” in Tenata.
This is another aspect of natural states, relating to the state of
possession that /lume/ rest in. In a sentence without a /lume/
marked /ti-/, the action is often “give” or “have.”
EXAMPLE: /so.menya.ci ru.kinya.men/
‘actor.person.human recipient.water.food’
“The person drinks water.”
EXAMPLE: /so.menya.ci ru.ningi.mi.men/
‘actor.person.human recipient.garden.living.food’
“The people grow a garden” or “The people have a garden”
or “The people garden.”
/fi-/, beneficiary
The beneficiary in a Tenata sentence is whom the action
affected or was directed toward. This includes the English
indirect object:
EXAMPLE: /so.menya.ci ru.ninigi.mi.men fi.tsofi.mi/
‘actor.person.human recipient.garden.living.food
beneficiary.birds.living’
“The people grow a garden for the birds.”
/fi-/ also works differently within the Tenata framework,
where it acts more like the English direct object:
EXAMPLE: /so.menya.ci ru.kinya.men fi.kelmi.mi/
‘actor.person.human recipient.water.food
beneficiary.trees.living’
“The person waters the trees.”
In the English sentence, “person” is the subject, “waters” is the
verb and “trees” is the direct object. In the Tenata sentence,
“person” is the subject, “water” is the object, and “trees” is the
beneficiary of the hidden action, “give.” A better translation
would be “The person gives water to the trees.” This differs from
the following sentence:
EXAMPLE: /so.ksuwi.men ti.kinya.men ru.pinuce.mi/
‘actor.rain.food action.water.food
recipient.wheat.living’
“The rain waters the wheat.”
In this sentence, “rain” is the subject, “waters” is the action,
and “wheat” is the recipient of the action. The rain is performing
the action of watering, rather than giving, while the person in
the previous example was giving. /so.menya.ci/ /ru.pinuce.mi/
/ti.kinya.men/ ‘actor.person.human’ ‘recipient.wheat.living’
‘action.water.food’ “The person waters the wheat” is also
grammatical, but the /ti-/ /ru-/ construction is less common than
the /ru-/ /fi-/ construction for sentences in which the subject is
providing something for something else’s benefit.
/pe-/ purpose
/pe-/ indicates the purpose of the action. A sentence with a
word marked with /ti-/ is more likely to have an accompanying
/pe-/ word, while sentences utilizing natural states, those with
only /ru-/, are less likely to include /pe-/, purpose. /lume/ that
take /pe-/ often also take the /teja/ /-ping/, event.
EXAMPLE: /so.tju ru.xame.men.lang pe.tcesala.ping/
‘actor.she recip.bread.food.created purpose.party.event’
“She made bread for the party.”
Aside from the /pe- -ping/ construction, there is also another
interesting aspect to this sentence. “bread” is marked with
/-men/, food, and /-lang/, created. This determines that the
natural verb in the sentence is “make” because the /-lang/ is
included. Bread is of course a humanmade thing, and so in other
contexts /-lang/ is usually not specified, but in this case, the
making is the reason for the sentence, so /-lang/ is used. The
sentence /sotju ruxamemen petcesalaping/ would mean “She brought
bread to the party.”
/lo-/ location
/lo-/ indicates the location of an action. It is only used
for static locations, such as “in the field” or “between the
houses” or “under the table.” It cannot be used for such locations
as “toward the river” or “around the tree” or “into the room,”
which include movement and are indicated with the direction
/kowu/, /ka-/.
EXAMPLE: /so.tju ru.limo.mi ti.situ.mi lo.ningi.lang/
‘actor.she recip.vegetables.living action.plant.living
location.garden.created’
“She planted vegetables in the garden.”
/lo-/ is also used to mark time in a sentence. The time
/lume/ will be marked with /lo-/.
EXAMPLE: /so.tcela.ci ru.pinuce.men ti.nyufim.ping
lo.lefim.i.fuceli.lu/
‘actor.village.human recip.wheat.food
action.harvest.event location.this.V.week.nature’
“The village harvests the wheat this week.”
/ka-/ direction
/ka-/ indicates the direction of the action. The presence
of /ka-/ indicates some sort of movement, and often marks the
/lume/ where the action ended up, rather than the static place
where the action started and finished, as marked by /lo-/.
EXAMPLES:
/so.sel ru.lesune.ping ka.tsipe.mi/
‘actor.I recip.walk.event direction.stream.living’
“I walked to the stream.”
/so.tsofi.mi ru.xulin.ping ke.tipa.lu/
‘actor.bird.living recip.fly.event direct.up.nature’
“The bird flies upwards.”
/ne-/, instrument
/ne-/ marks the instrument with which the action is
performed. It is also used to mark the attitude of the actor
toward the action or the quality of the action.
EXAMPLES:
/so.menya.ci ru.cu.mi ne.nyexom.tcu ti.situ.mi/
‘actor.person.human recip.seed.living instr.stick.tool
action.plant.living’
“The person planted seeds with a stick.”
/so.tsofi.mi ti.finge.lang ru.perami.kim ne.kxeneny.mi.x/
‘actor.bird.living action.build.created
recip.nest.building instr.straw.living.reversal’
“The bird built a nest with straw.”
/ne.sunyu.si so.masafi.ci ru.tju.fipemu.kwa.lang
ti.nestasa.lang/
‘instr.difficulty.feeling actor.child.human
recip.they.clothing.poss.created action.clean.created’
“With difficulty, the children washed their clothes.”
This example shows the flexibility of word order in Tenata. Any
/kowu/ at the beginning of the sentence except /so-/ and /ru-/ are
marked.
/mu-/, auxiliary
The auxiliary marks secondary actions in a sentence, such as
“want”, “must”, “like”, “think”, and other similar constructions.
When it is used, more attention is called to the word than if it
were compounded with the main action in the sentence, which is the
other way to form these kinds of sentences. /mu-/ often matches
with the /teja/ /-kwa/.
EXAMPLE: /so.masafi.ci mu.cumen.kwa ru.nipem.ci/
‘actor.child.human aux.need.poss recip.sleep.human’
“The children need to sleep.”
/mu-/ can also be used on other /lume/, where it indicates a
marginal association to the action. It is kind of like an
afterthought, “and besides” or “oh, and by the way,” and in this
case it usually appears before /ngonarumacan/, verbal inflection
and validity, at the end of the sentence.
EXAMPLE: /ru.tiqami.men ti.nyufimi.men fi.sel
mu.si.lestiku.men/
‘recip.herbs.food action.harvest.food benef.I
aux.one.tomato.food’
“Pick some herbs for me. Oh, and a tomato.”
Compounding
Compounding is very frequent and serves two important
purposes in Tenata. One is modification. /lume/ are not
specifically nouns or adjectives, verbs or adverbs. They can be
used as modifiers by compounding. The modifiers preceed the
head /lume/. The stress for a compound goes on the head /lume/,
though the other /lume/ may keep secondary stress on their first
syllable. Secondary stress is more likely to be significant in
longer compounds or less frequently occurring compounds, to help
distinguish the individual /lume/.
EXAMPLE: /-tcela-/ ‘village’ /-nalic-/ ‘south’
/-nalicitcela-/ “southern village” or “village to the
south of here”
EXAMPLE: /-fipemu-/ ‘clothing’ /-nestasa-/ ‘clean’
/-litiwa-/ ‘dry’
/-nestasalitiwafipemu-/ “clean, dry clothing”
EXAMPLE: /-nestasa-/ ‘clean’ /-kotse-/ ‘busy’
/-kotsenestasa-/ “busily cleaning”
EXAMPLE: /-kotse-/ ‘busy’ /-soxang-/ ‘use’ /-x-/
reversal /-soxangax-/ ‘useless’
/-soxangaxakotse-/ “uselessly busy” or “unnecessary
busywork”
Compounding is also used for possessives. The possessor
precedes the possessed, and the whole compound takes the /teja/
/-kwa/ to indicate possession.
EXAMPLE: /-kelmi-/ ‘tree’ /-feja-/ ‘leaf’
/-kelmifeja-/ “tree leaves”
/-kelmifejakwa/ “tree’s leaves”
EXAMPLE: /-menya-/ ‘person’ /-kajime-/ ‘house’
/-menyakajime-/ “person house”
/-menyakajimekwa/ “person’s house”
A compound word, whether it’s a possessive or a modified
phrase, still takes /kowu/ and /teja/, just like a single /lume/.
They function just like a single /lume/ in a sentence, filling any
role available semantically.
EXAMPLES:
/so.nec ru.nestasa.litiwa.fipemu.lang/
‘actor.you’ ‘recip.clean.dry.clothing.created’
“You have clean dry clothing.”
/so.nira.limati.mi ru.foning.lupi.men ne.pipem.sunyu.si
ke.folo.weta.kwa.kim ti.jasan.pesali.men/
‘actor.small.squirrel.living recip.fruit.food
instr.large.difficulty.feeling direct.it.home.poss.building
action.slow.carry.food’
“The small squirrel slowly carried the sweet fruit to its
home with much difficulty.”
/jeso/
/jeso/ are pronouns and demonstratives. Tenata has three
categories of pronouns and demonstratives: human, nonhuman, and
nonliving. The first two categories are divided into four persons,
while the third has only one person.
Human
/sel/ ‘I, we exclusive’
/mese/ ‘we inclusive’
/nec/ ‘you’
/tju/ ‘she/he’
/kata/ ‘this’
/timi/ ‘that’
Nonhuman
/pina/ ‘I, we exc.’
/sem/ ‘we inc.’
/nafi/ ‘you’
/fol/ ‘she/he/it’
/lefim/ ‘this’
/tsilis/ ‘that’
Nonliving
/len/ ‘it’
/lati/ ‘this’
/seta/ ‘that’
/jeso/, when replacing /lume/ in a sentence, must take /kowu/
just like the /lume/. However, they do not need to take /teja/, as
the basic categories of human, nonhuman, and nonliving, are
already marked. However, the nonhuman and nonliving demonstratives
often do take /teja/, especially if they are used to replace
/lume/ marked /-men/ or /-lang/, as these are frequently used
categories, and especially when they take the /kowu/ /ru-/,
because the meaning of the sentence can change depending on the
/teja/.
EXAMPLES:
/so.sel ru.len.men/
‘actor.I recip.it.food’
“I ate it.”
/so.mese ru.len.lang/
‘actor.we recip.it.created’
“We made it.”
Tenata has a strong storytelling culture, and this is where
the ‘I’, ‘we’, and ‘you’ nonhuman pronouns are used extensively.
Most stories are told in first person, from the perspectives of
the characters in the story, rather than in third person, about
the characters, although storytellers will often interject their
own thoughts into the story during the telling, and make comments
on them with /ruma/.
EXAMPLES:
/so.pina lo.mosili.lang ti.sutekit.imi/
‘actor.I(nonhuman) location.field.created
action.grow.living’
“I grew in the field.”
/so.nec ru.pina.men ti.nyufimi.men/
‘actor.you(human) recip.me.food action.harvest.food’
“You harvested me.”
/so.pina ru.weta.kim lo.kelmi.mi ti.finge.lang/
‘actor.I recip.home.building location.tree.living
action.build.created’
“I built a home in the tree.”
/ngona/ Verbal Inflection
/ngona/ are verbal inflection, and they form a separate word
in a sentence. /ngona/ includes aspect and mood, but, notably, not
tense. Time is indicated with time /lume/ and not marked with
verbal inflection at all. In discourse it’s often mentioned once
and not again until it changes. Sometimes, if it’s semantically
significant, it will be mentioned more often, and it’s more
commonly used in stories, which often have a more structured,
formal tone. /ngona/ can be ommitted in speech if they are
identical in a series of sentences, in which case the last one
would include the /ngona/. They will rarely be ommitted in
writing. Note: The following examples, unlike the previous ones,
are complete, fully-inflected sentences.
Mood
Tenata has four moods:
/wa-/ indicative
/nge-/ interrogative
/xim-/ hortative
/qa-/ negative
One of these is always the first morpheme in the /-ngonacan/, or
verbal word. They can occasionally be the only /ngona/ present in
a sentence, but it’s more rare and usually only in storytelling.
They otherwise will always have aspect morphemes suffixed to them.
/wa-/ indicative
/wa-/ is naturally by far the most frequent mood. It is used
for statements of fact, opinion, and speculation alike, although
the /ruma/ used with each of these will differ.
/nge-/ interrogative
/nge-/ is used for questions in which the action of the
sentence is being questioned. /rume/ is used for other kinds of
questions, where it is not the /lume/ marked /ti-/ or /ru-/ that
is being questioned.
/xim-/ hortative
/xim-/ is used for asking someone to do something. It
replaces an imperative mood, because Tenata culture does not give
orders. It can be translated as an imperative, but it’s definitely
not ordering but encouraging. The Tenata people will confirm that
they cannot force anyone to do anything, so /xim-/ is a hortative
mood.
/qa-/ negative
/qa-/ is used to form a negative sentence, negating the
action in a sentence. Individual words can be negated with the
reversal suffix, /x/, but whole sentences are negated by using the
negative mood.
EXAMPLES:
Sotsofimi ruxamemen waxotitse slatus.
so.tsofi.mi
ru.xame.men
actor.bird.living
recipient.bread.food
wa.xo.ti.tse
sla.tus
ind.own-benefit.intent.habitual
speaker.true
“The bird eats bread.”
Sonec rukewanmen fimasafaci ngetjutife nectus.
so.nec
ru.kewan.men
actor.you
recip.nourish.food
fi.masaf.a.ci
benef.child.V.human
nge.tju.ti.fe
nec.tus
inter.they.intent.perf
you.true
“Did you feed the children?”
Somasafici tipesalikwa ruxamemen kakajimekim ximinectife
nectus.
so.masaf.a.ci
ti.pesali.kwa
ru.xame.men
actor.child.V.human action.carry.poss
recip.bread.food
ka.kajime.kim
xim.i.nec.ti.fe
nec.tus
direct.house.build hort.V.you.intent.perf
you.true
“Child, please bring the bread to the house.”
Ruksuwilu qapwe mesetus.
ru.ksuwi.lu
qa.pwe
mese.tus
recip.rain.nature
neg.imperf
we.true
“There hasn’t been rain.”
Aspect
Tenata has three categories of aspect. The members of a
category cannot appear together in one /ngonacan/, so at most one
from each category can be used.
Benefactive
/-xo-/ for one’s own benefit (refers to the actor in the
sentence)
/-ste-/ for other’s benefit
A pronoun can be used here in place of one of these to
directly indicate the benefactor.
Intention
/-ti-/ intentional
/-mos-/ accidental, incedental
Completion
/-fe-/ perfective
/-pwe-/ imperfective
/-tse-/ habitual
/-nic-/ unrealized (action has not actually occurred,
used as hypothetical or desired)
Aspect is applied in this order, although they may all not be
present. The most commonly omitted is benefactive, followed by
intention. Completion is rarely omitted.
EXAMPLES:
Sosel rupsomlang titifamlang waxoxomosfe slatus.
so.sel
ru.psom.lang
ti.tifam.lang
actor.I
recip.book.created action.lost.created
wa.xo.x.o.mos.fe
sla.tus
ind.owb.reverse.V.accidental.perf speaker.true
“I lost the book (accidentally, to my own detriment).”
Soqasefelang kakwaxilang ruwaksiping wamosfe slatus.
so.qasefe.lang
ka.kwaxi.lang
actor.glass.created
direct.floor.created
ru.waksi.ping
wa.mos.fe
sla.tus
recip.fall.event
ind.incident.perf
speaker.true
“The glass fell on the floor.”
Sotju rupanecemen wamecetipwe slatus.
so.tju
ru.panece.men
actor.she
recip.cook.food
wa.mece.ti.pwe
sla.tus
ind.we.intent.imperf
speaker.true
“She’s cooking for us.”
/ruma/ Validity Statement
The validity statement in Tentata indicates what the speaker
knows about the truth of her words. There are two parts in any
/rumacan/, person and validity.
Person:
/lu-/ common knowledge
/sla-/ speaker
/jis-/ subject (the actor in the sentence)
Pronouns can also be used to directly indicate
who is providing the validity statement.
Validity: /-tus/ true
/-ces/ unknown (an end in itself, not an
unanswered question, as with English “maybe”)
/-tom/ false
The /rumacan/ usually appears at the end of the sentence or
clause. If it is moved to the beginning of the sentence, it’s a
marked construction and indicates that the /ruma/ is different
than would have been expected.
EXAMPLES:
Sotju rukinyamen fiqetimi wastetife slatus.
so.tju
ru.kinya.men
fi.qeti.mi
actor.she
recip.water.food
benef.flower.living
wa.fe
sla.tus
ind.perfective
speaker.true
“She watered the flowers (I saw her do it).”
Slatom sotju rukinyamen fiqetimi wastetife.
sla.tom
so.tju
ru.kinya.men
speaker.false actor.she
recip.water.food
fi.qeti.mi
wa.fe
benef.flower.living ind.perfective
“I think she didn’t water the flowers (like she was
supposed to).”
This example in English uses an auxiliary verb, ‘think,’ while the
Tenata expresses this through /ruma/. The /rumacan/ is at the
beginning of the sentence, which makes the doubt of the statement
stronger.
Sotju rukinyamen fiqetimi wastetife jistus slatom.
so.tju
ru.kinya.men
fi.qeti.mi
actor.she
recip.water.food
benef.flower.living
wa.fe
jis.tus
sla.tom
ind.perfective
subject.true
speaker.false
“She says she watered the flowers (I don’t believe her).”
Like the previous example, the auxiliary verb ‘says’ is
represented by /ruma/, in this case /jistus/. In English, an
intonation pattern would be used to indicate disbelief: “She SAYS
she watered the flowers.”
sotju rukinyamen fiqetimi wastetife slaces
so.tju
ru.kinya.men
fi.qeti.mi
actor.she
recip.water.food
benef.flower.living
wa.fe
sla.ces
ind.perfective
speaker.unknown
“She watered the flowers (but I can’t confirm that she
did).”
/ruma/ can also be used within a word, when there is a
separate /rumacan/ referring to the whole sentence, but a
particular part of it is different. /-tus/, /-ces/, and /-tom/ can
be suffixed to a /lume/, after /teja/, to indicate the belief
about that part of the sentence. This is how questions that are
not questioning the action but one of the other /lume/ in the
sentence are formed. The thing in question is marked with the
questioner’s belief about it, and indicates what answer is
expected.
EXAMPLES:
Sonececes tipanecmen petcesalaping wastetife nectus.
so.nece.ces
ti.panec.men
actor.you.unknown
action.cook.food
pe.tcesala.ping
purpose.party.event
wa.ste.ti.fe
nec.tus
ind.other-benefit.intent.perf
you.true
“Did you cook for the party?” (Someone cooked, was it
you?)
Sonec tipanecmen petcesalapingtom wastetife nectus.
so.nec
ti.panec.men
actor.you
action.cook.food
pe.tcesala.ping.tom
purpose.party.event.false
wa.ste.ti.fe
nec.tus
ind.other-benefit.intent.perf
you.true
“Did you cook for the party?” (Why did you cook? I don’t
think it was for the party.)
/ruma/ can also be used along with the interrogative mood. In
this case it appears on the action /lume/ and it indicates the
expected answer.
EXAMPLE:
Sonec tinestasalangtus runecefipemukimlang ngexotife
nectus.
so.nec
ti.nestasa.lang.tus
actor.you
action.clean.created.true
ru.nece.fipemu.kwa.lang
recip.you.clothing.poss.created
nge.xo.ti.fe
nec.tus
inter.own-benefit.intent.perf
you.true
“Did you wash your clothes? (I think you did.)”
/feni/ Conjunctions
/feni/ are conjunctions. They can act in two ways, linking
two or more /lume/ together, in which case they are bound in
between the linked /lume/. These two lume must have the same
/teja/. They can also link phrases containing more than one
/lume/, or complete sentences, including /ngona/ and /ruma/, and
in this case the /feni/ stands alone between the two phrases or
sentences.
EXAMPLE: /-qeti-/ ‘flower’ /-limo-/ ‘vegetable’ /tin/
‘and’
/-qetitinilimomi/ “flowers and vegetables”
In this example, note that the compound takes the /teja/ /-mi/,
‘living’. Though /-limo-/ might be able to take the /teja/ /-men/,
‘food’, in the case of direct linking, the two /lume/ must take
the same /teja/. If two words do not share the same /teja/, they
must be linked with independent /teja/.
EXAMPLE: /-qeti.mi tin -limo.men/
‘flower.living and vegetable.food’
“flowers and vegetables”
In this example, the conjunction stands alone. In writing, there
would be at least two /tin/ written, and even three. They would
surround the linked words, and often would be written larger than
the /lume/. There is a lot of flexibility in how they are written,
adding interest to the already artistic script.
EXAMPLE: /ru.kinya.men fi.kelmi.mi tin ru.lestiku.men
ti.nyufimi.men/
‘recip.water.food benef.tree.living and
recip.tomato.food’ action.plant.food’
“water the trees and plant the tomatoes”
In this example two phrases are linked without their /ngona/ or
/ruma/, so they must take the same ones:
sonec mufisanaci rukinyamen fikelmimi tin rulestikumimen
tinyufimping ximimesetife nectus
so.nec
mu.fisana.ci
ru.kinya.men
actor.you
aux.help.human
recip.water.food
fi.kelmi.mi
tin ru.lestiku.mi.men
benef.tree.living
and recip.tomato.living.food
ti.nyufim.ping
ximi.mese.ti.fe
nec.tus
action.plant.event hort.we.intent.perf
you.true
“Will you help water the trees and plant the flowers?”
There are four different /feni/ that translate as ‘but’:
/jen/ ‘but (neutral), but not (this but not that)’
EXAMPLE: /-tsofi.jen.cesiton.mi/
‘bird.but.fish.living’
“birds but not fish”
EXAMPLE: /ru.fipemu.lang ti.nestasa.lang jen
ru.limo.mi ti.kinya.men/
‘recip.clothing.created action.clean.created but
recip.vegetables.living action.water.food’
“wash clothes but not water the vegetables”
/ksim/ ‘but (positive)’
EXAMPLE:
Ruksuwilu qapwe ksim sotsetalang rukinyamen wapwe
lutus.
ru.ksuwi.lu
qa.pwe
ksim
recip.rain.nature
neg.imperf
but
so.tseta.lang
ru.kinya.men
wa.pwe
actor.well.created recip.water.food
ind.imperf
lu.tus
common-knowledge.true
“It hasn’t rained, but the wells have water.”
/ston/ ‘but (negative)’
EXAMPLE:
Sosel rumolilisi wapwe ston rumeninimen qapwe
slatus.
so.sel
ru.molili.si
wa.pwe
actor.I
recip.hunger.feeling
ind.imperf
ston
ru.menini.men
qa.pwe
but
recip.food.food
neg.imperf
sla.tus
speaker.true
“I’m hungry but don’t have food.”
Text with Translation/Analysis
Here is a line-by-line translation of a Tenata narrative.
This is in a casual speech style, which can be identified by
/ngonarumacan/ being occasionally dropped where they are the same
as in previous sentences. First is the Tenata with morphemes
marked, the English morpheme-by-morpheme, and an English gloss.
This is followed by the entire Tenata, and finally the entire
English.
so.sel
actor.I
ka.sel.kawasa.kwa.ci
to.my.friend.poss.human who in.south.village.building
tja lo.nalici.tcela.kim
ti.weta.ci
action.home.human
wa.ti.pwe
ind.int.imperf
ti.tsili.ci
action.visit.human
lo.lani.ngixe.lu
in.before.day.nature
wa.xo.ti.fe
ind.owb.int.perf
sla.tus
speaker.true
“Yesterday I visited my friend who lives in a small village south
of here.”
so.tju.tin.cemo.kwa.ci
actor.she.and.family.poss.human
ru.qeti.mi
recip.flowers.living
fi.xaja.tcela.ci
benef.whole.village.human
ti.sutekiti.mi
action.grow.living
wa.tju.ti.pwe
ind.they.intent.imperf
“She and her family grow flowers for the whole village.”
ru.finyu.wen.lu
recip.summer.mid.nature ind.imperf
wa.pwe
niwa
so
ru.tju
recip.she
so.pipem.kotse.mi
actor.much.busy.living
wa.xo.ti.pwe
ind.owb.int.imperf
sla.tus
speaker.true
“It is midsummer, so she is very busy.” (much business has her)
so.qeti.mi
actor.flowers.living
ru.linpa.si
recip.readiness.feeling
pe.nyufim.ping
for.harvest.event
lo.tenyami.finyu.ngixi.lu
in.every.summer.day.nature
tin.lemin
and.also
ru.ksulim.qeti.mi
recip.night.flowers.living
pe.nyufim.ping
for.harvest.event
wa.ste.ti.pwe
ind.otb.int.imperf
tju.tus
she.true
“Flowers were ready to be picked and there were also night-
blooming flowers to pick.”
so.sel
actor.I
ru.fisan.ci
recip.help.human
fi.tju
benef.her
ne.xaja.sel.nyafa.kwa
instr.all.my.ability.poss
wa.ste.ti.pwe
ind.otb.int.imperf
sla.tus
speaker.true
“I helped her as best as I could.”
so.sel
actor.I
ru.witele.kwa
recip.permission.poss
pe.qeti.nyufim.ping
for.flower.harvest.event
qa.pwe
neg.imperf
ksim
but
ru.witele.kwa
recip.permission.poss
pe.kijana.tin.menin.pesali.lang
for.basket.and.food.carry.made
wa.pwe
ind.imperf
sla.tus
speaker.true
“I’m not allowed to pick flowers but I can carry baskets and
food.”
so.kise.ping
actor.work.event
ru.xasasin.ping
recip.fast.event
tsun
because
ne.sel.fisan.ping
inst.I.help.event
tju.tus
she.true
“She said the work went faster because I helped.”
so.tju
actor.she
mu.cumen.ci
aux.need.human
ru.nyufim.ngeste.mi.x
recip.harvest.part.live.reverse
ti.lunong.ping
action.set-aside.event
pe.litiwa.ping
for.dry.event
niwa
so
so.sel
actor.I
ru.ksulim.sengen.men
recip.night.meal.food
ti.panec.men
action.cook.food
kelil
while
so.tju
actor.she
ru.kise.ping
recip.work.event
wa.ste.ti.fe
ind.otb.int.perf
sla.tus
speaker.true
“She had to set aside part of the harves to dry, so I cooked
dinner while she worked.”
so.sel.tin.tju
actor.I.and.she
ru.pilifi.ci
recip.talk.human
“We talked.”
so.tsili.ping
actor.visit.event
ru.nucija.ping
recip.wonderful.event
wa.sel.mos.fe
ind.I.unint.perf
sla.tus
speaker.true
“The visit was wonderful for me.”
Sosel kaselkawasakwaci tja lonalicitcelakim tiwetaci watipwe
titsilici lolaningixelu waxotife slatus. Sotjutincemokwaci
ruqetimi fixajatcelaci tisutekitimi watjutipwe. Rufinyuwenlu wapwe
niwa rutju sopipemkotsemi waxotipwe slatus. Soqetimi rulinpasi
penyufimping lotenyamifinyungixilu tinlemin ruksulimqetimi
penyufimping wastetipwe tjutus. Sosel rufisanci fitju
nexajaselnyafakwa wastetipwe slatus. Sosel ruwitelekwa
peqetinyufimping qapwe ksim ruwitelekwa
pekijanatinimeninipesalilang wapwe slatus. sokiseping
ruxasasinping tsun neselfisanping tjutus. Sotju mucumenci
runyufimngestemix tilunongping pelitiwaping niwa sosel
ruksulimsengenmen tipanecmen kelil sotju rukiseping wastetife
slatus. Soseltintju rupilifici. Sotsiliping runucijaping
waselmosfe slatus.
Yesterday I visited my friend who lives in a small village south
of here. She and her family grow flowers for the whole village. It
is midsummer, so she is very busy. Flowers were ready to be picked
and there were also night-blooming flowers to pick. I helped her
as best as I could. I’m not allowed to pick flowers but I can
carry baskets and food. She said the work went faster because I
helped. She had to set aside part of the harvest to dry, so I
cooked dinner while she worked. We talked. The visit was wonderful
for me.
Endnote: On Conlangs
Constructed languages, or conlangs, are an interesting way to
explore linguistics. Linguistics approaches languages from the top
down, beginning with an existing human language and analyzing it,
breaking it down into its component parts. Furthermore, the
different areas of linguistics often work separately from one
another, so that we have studies of phonology, morphology, and
syntax that exist as separate entities rather than working
together to form a holistic view of a language. Sociolinguistics
seems even farther removed from these other areas, so that in
traditional theoretical linguistics, a language is pulled out from
its cultural context and loses its connection to its speakers.
Conlanging takes a different approach to language. Rather
than breaking down a language, it creates one from the bottom up,
starting with the basic components of language and using them to
create a unique system. The goal of conlanging is often to create
a fully-functioning language, but it can also be used more
limitedly, to explore a linguistic concept in a simple way,
because natural languages are very complex, so it is often
difficult to isolate one particular feature. A conlang can solve
this problem by being more simple than a natural human language so
that the feature in question is made clear.
A conlang is also often part of a con-world or a con-culture,
reinforcing the tie between language and culture. A conlang can
also explore linguistic ideas that do not exist in human
languages, and so expand linguistic boundaries, as in Amy
Thomson’s The Color of Distance, where shapes and patterns replace
sound and color is emotional intonation in an alien language.
Conlanging can complement linguistics by providing a different
perspective from which to explore language.
My purpose in creating this conlang, Tenata, was to explore a
language structure that was different from English and the other
familiar Indo-European languages. I began by identifying English
linguistic postulates that I did not want to have in Tenata. The
main ones that I wanted to try to eliminate were number, sex-based
gender, the absoluteness of ‘to be,’ and ranking/hierarchy. But a
language can’t be merely the absence of something, so the next
step, which actually occurred simultaneously, was creating a set
of linguistic principles to work from. One of the first things
that I wanted to do was to dissolve the lines between the parts of
speech that we too often take for granted. I initially wanted to
have a non-sex-based gender system. This evolved into /teja/,
which is not gender, but instead is a flexible categorizing
system. I found that this fits well with the flexibility of the
/lume/ system, and led me to another pervasive aspect of Tenata:
liquidity, or the way the language in my mind flows into sentences
rather than being blocks that are lined up just so. As I
continued, my writing system reflects this by being non-linear and
having its own rules that are related to but also in ways
different from the spoken language. Finally, I wanted to explore
the language from its own point of view, rather than imposing
English categories on a language that doesn’t have the same
categorical distinctions. This is how I settled on using Tenata
words to describe the language.
The whole conlanging process is a non-linear one. I found
myself going back to things I had thought were finished and
needing to change them because of a change I had made in a
different part of the grammar. The process emphasizes how language
is a complete system that needs to have all its parts working
together simultaneously in order to work. In conlanging, I can’t
decide that I want to work on my verbs first, and then I’ll do the
nouns, because in order to test my verbal paradigm I need
complements. The language needs to be imagined as a whole system
before the system can be built, and this requires a detour from a
linear way of thinking. This project has certainly influenced the
way I approach language and linguistics, and I believe that my
understanding of the way languages work has been enriched by this
process.
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Elgin, Suzette Haden. The Judas Rose. New York: The Feminist
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Elgin, Suzette Haden. Earthsong. New York: The Feminist Press,
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