Are there any other published examples? Have any here tried the exercise? Could a language develop/function without a subset of content words?
Edit: Or prepositions.
I do not think it is the same. Languages "without" a subset of content words only lack them syntactically. The exercise I mention removes such content words semantically. The kit mocks the idea for the most part.Axiem wrote:I think this is touched upon in the Language Construction Kit.
The Language Construction Kit wrote:instead of saying "The wall is red", you say "The wall reds"; likewise, instead of "the red wall" you say "the redding wall".
This is applying verb affixes to adjectives and nouns. Esperanto is more efficient: it defines parts of speech solely by affixes.The Language Construction Kit wrote:"The rock is under the tree" could be expressed as something like "There is stonying below the growing, greening, flourishing", or perhaps "It stones while under it grows greeningly."
Language Log wrote:A VERBLESS POST
A verbless novel? Why?? What reason for the accomplishment by this showy fool in France, Michel Thaler, his effort at an entire novel with no verbs (perhaps not a wise or lucrative publication venture, given the not total incorrectness of my speculations) recently evident amongst the vast efflux of absurd literary pretense in the French language? Well, whatever his reasons, in response, my own contribution: a verbless post (the first on Language Log).
Language Log wrote:TO POST VERBLESSLY IS SO JEJUNE!
While having earlier always been been totally disinclined to attempt to write nounlessly, to denominalize (hmm... denoun, perhaps?) is now starting to seem potentially enjoyable and might turn out to be exhilarating, though admittedly rather elliptical. Go figure!
Language Log wrote:WRITING PREPOSITIONLESSLY
Language Log fans will no doubt want to be sure, having seen a verbless post and a nounless one, that any other lexical category could likewise be eliminated, and intelligible prose still be written. This post constitutes one such exercise that is not too difficult: it absolutely and completely lacks prepositions. It is not too appallingly difficult to write this way (I confess that early drafts slipped many times, but I fixed them). However, it's a bit more difficult when we adopt the modern conception that The Cambridge Grammar advances. This conception entails that far more words get classified "preposition".
The results here are distinctly different from those offered by the kit. It seems quite difficult to accomplish.Language Log wrote:WRITING WITHOUT ADJECTIVES
With regard to whether one could write English without ever using an adjective (since we've seen examples of writing with no verbs and with no nouns and with no prepositions ), we are of course told by some that writing of quality never uses adjectives at all: "sages of writing" are alleged to agree that adjectives are to be avoided completely by writers of taste and discernment (I discussed this topic here). The sages who do say such things, if there are such sages, are nutballs. They should be drummed out of the grammar service, stripped of their sagehood. It is an absurdity to suggest that writing fails in some way when adjectives are permitted.