LINGUIST List 14.851

Mon Mar 24 2003

Qs: Linguistic Scanning Software, Polysynthesis

Editor for this issue: Naomi Fox <foxlinguistlist.org>

FUND DRIVE 2003 To give you an incentive to donate, many of our Supporting Publishers have generously donated some amazing linguistic prizes. As a donor you are automatically entered into this prize draw. To find out what's on offer and the rules etc., visit: http://linguistlist.org/prizedraw.html We still have a long way to go, however, to reach our target of $50,000. Please make a donation at: http://linguistlist.org/donation.html The LINGUIST List depends on the generous contributions from subscribers like you; we would not be able to operate without your help. The moderators, staff, and student editors at LINGUIST would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your continuous support. We'd like to remind readers that the responses to queries are usually best posted to the individual asking the question. That individual is then strongly encouraged to post a summary to the list. This policy was instituted to help control the huge volume of mail on LINGUIST; so we would appreciate your cooperating with it whenever it seems appropriate. In addition to posting a summary, we'd like to remind people that it is usually a good idea to personally thank those individuals who have taken the trouble to respond to the query. To post to LINGUIST, use our convenient web form at http://linguistlist.org/LL/posttolinguist.html.

Directory

  1. John Kyle, OCR software preferences
  2. Florian Zellmayer, Polysynthesis -- Additive Combining Forms

Message 1: OCR software preferences

 Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 16:32:10 -0600
From: John Kyle <jkyleku.edu>
Subject: OCR software preferences

I recently purchased my first scanner and have been trying my hand at
scanning documents. The software which came with the scanner has many
of the major world's languages but many of the documents I hope to
scan are written in either IPA or various 'Americanist' alphabets with
plenty of diacritics. If you could email me personally with the
different types of software you prefer for doing linguist scanning I
would gladly post a summary. Also, please include any tips or tricks
you use. Thank you in advance

John Kyle
jkyleku.edu
Mail to author|Respond to list|Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue

Message 2: Polysynthesis -- Additive Combining Forms

 Date: Thu, 20 Mar 2003 12:22:22 +0000
From: Florian Zellmayer <zellmayerchello.at>
Subject: Polysynthesis -- Additive Combining Forms

Dear linguists,

I'm looking for languages with additive combining forms. They will, I
expect, be mostly polysynthetic languages, but any other type is of
interest to me as well.
	
Assume a morpheme X occurs either in morphological isolation as X, or
as the sole major lexical category morpheme in a word ...X...
	
Now, the morpheme X has an additive combining as I understand it if X
needs some marker x if it occurs in a compound as in XxY or YXx or the
like, or in a word which contains more than one major lexical class
morpheme such as ...Xx...Y... for instance.
	
Note that ''additive combining forms'' are not the same as linkers. A
linker is more or less automatically inserted between two or more
major lexical class morphemes in compounds or polysynthetic forms,
whereas an additive combining form is used to derive a bound form Xx
or xX from a free morpheme X. Note further that, as stated above, that
these things are only relevant to open lexical class morphemes, and
that inflection does not count. So for instance, /bird/ in /bird-s/ is
still in isolation as it is the sole major lexical class morpheme in
/bird-s/. If /bird/ was to enter into a compound such as /black-bird/,
it is no longer in isolation.
	
An example of an additive combining form from Washo is below (Mithun
1984:886):
	
/m�:k'o/ ''knee'', NOUN
/m�:k'o-E/ ''knee'', LEXICAL PREFIX
/m�:k'o-E-�we'/ > /m�:k'oy�we'/ ''to kneel'', VERB
	
I'm looking forward to your answers, and I'd be happy if you'd add
references as well. I'll post a summary.
Mail to author|Respond to list|Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue