Talk:Lojban grammar

General reference on editing
Article development Writing better articles Avoid weasel words Explain jargon Layout Footnotes Citing sources Text formatting Headings

Specific reference on Lojban grammar
Phonology & Orthography (CLL3)

Morphology (CLL4)

Orthography: letteral system, alien alphabets, accent/punctuation marks, compound lerfu words, acronyms, computerized character codes (CLL17)

Syntax and semantics: selbri (CLL5) Syntax: sumti, descriptions, individuals, masses, sets, vocative phrases, names (CLL6) Syntax: sumti and selbri Syntax: complex sumti Syntax: attachments to sumti, selbri and sentences Syntax: pro-sumti, pro-bridi (CLL7) Syntax: relative clauses/phrases, possessive sumti (CLL8) Syntax: tagging places, conversion, sentence connection, modal selbri, modal relative phrases, modal negation (CLL9) Syntax: sentence structures Syntax: logical/non-logical connectives (CLL14) Syntax: logical connectives Syntax: abstraction (events, qualities, quantities, truth-value, sentence...), indirect question, sumti raising (CLL11) Syntax: negation (CLL15) Syntax: existential claims, prenexes, variables, universal claims, restricted claims, negation boundaries, selbri variables (CLL16) Syntax: mathematical expressions (CLL18) Syntax: structure of texts (CLL19)

Semantics: tenses (CLL10) Semantics: lujvo/tanru/gismu place structures, comparatives & superlatives (CLL12) Semantics: emotion and attitudinal indicators (CLL13)

Formal grammars (CLL21)

Linguistic issues pertaining to Lojban

Other useful references
Vocabularly (jbovlaste) Vocabularly (gismu) Vocabularly (cmavo)

Compound (linguistics) Semantics Syntax Formal grammar

Style: Lojban texts & English translations
In the Lojban comunity it is common for Lojbanists to bracket Lojban words or phrases like e.g. {coi do ma nuzba}; on this article, the editors (including myself) seem to agree on using italic form instead of brackets, so like e.g. coi do ma nuzba. The English translations, on the other hand, normally have double quotation marks, e.g. "Hi, what's up?". Translations, however, may be without such markings when it is obvious (see the example below). These styles are in accordance with the convention of other language articles.

For the sample texts I have experimented to use colour codes which slightly differentiates the sample's visual appearance from the main paragraph:
 * mi ba'o klama le zarci I have-gone-to the-market.


 * mi capu'o klama le zarci I am-going-to the-market.

The bolds simply indicate the parts on which the discussion is focusing (this example is from the section "tenses"). This, I hope, would give rise to readability. The colour code is #506060.--Mednak 10:30, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Old discussions
The previous discussions on the content of this article can be found in the archives of Talk:Lojban. --Mednak 11:31, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Style of article
I have fairly good linguistic knowledge and yet despite having read this article on a number of occasions, I cannot make head-nor-tail of it; it is appallingly written in a way that is impenetrable. I believe it needs to be re-written in a style that is understandable for anyone wanting to know about the language can understand.

Phonology and orthography
I'm no linguist and are therefore not accostumed with linguistic vocabulary. Thus I ask. Is phonology and orthography really a part of the grammar? --Emuzesto 16:30, 17 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Grammar says: "As the word is understood by most modern linguists, the subfields of grammar are phonetics, phonology, orthography, morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics". The grammar is a collection of rules which governs the use of a language. That means that "Lojban grammar" is a set of principles with which people are mutually enabled to utilize it as a communal communication device. Phonology and orthography are definitely part of such principles. If they are not correctly practiced or understood among the users, transmission of the expressed ideas/information will be defective in some way or may even be impossible. An allegedly Lojbanic expression like mi.Nelshi tuHa qo'awi will be problematic for Lojbanists because its orthography is not in accordance with what is commonly shared by themselves, and this is precisely an indication of the fact that orthography is by no means unrelated to the core system in whcih strings of letters or words become viable expressions of a language. The same goes for phonology. When you err either in the orthography or phonology, your expression will be ungrammatical, just like putting a preposition in a wrong place will make your sentence invalid. I'm not a linguist either, by the way. --Mednak 17:51, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Head Section
the head section (or intro, or whatever) sounds really pro-lojban, without sources. Esperanto, for instance, is referred to as "experimental" despite the fact that Esperanto is use more widely that lojban. Could someone clean this up to keep things accurate? Sonicsuns 06:02, 27 October 2007 (UTC) Pro-Lojban? Aren't all IALs experimental? Cosman246 (talk) 22:00, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Empty Sections
There are several empty sections. Could an expert Lojbanist fix them please? Cosman246 (talk) 21:58, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Arabic
I’ve removed the example from Arabic because it is simply wrong. ما عِندِي قَلَمُ absolutely cannot be glossed as I | not have | a pen (SVO), and the analogy with the Lojban sentence is completely wrong. --Babelfisch (talk) 03:13, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Scientific analysis
This article should not be exclusively written in the Lojban community jargon, but also provide a standard linguistic analysis in standard linguistic terms (e.g. bridi → phrase, sumti → argument, selbri → predicate, brivla → verb, cmavo → particle, cmene → noun, gismu → root, lujvo → compound, fu’ila → loanword, tanru → serial verb / compound verb, rafsi → derived form / combining form, etc.). Hasn’t this been done before? (Any “outside” sources? As it is now, this looks a bit like a cult, not a language.) --Babelfisch (talk) 07:14, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Indeed, there should be some mappings to English grammar terms:
 * bridi → clause, sumti → argument/noun/pronoun, selbri → predicate (~=main verb), brivla → verb word, cmavo → particle, cmene → name, gismu → root verb/core verb, lujvo → affix verb, tanru → serial verb / compound verb, fu’ivla → loanword, rafsi → affix.Gleki.arxokuna (talk) 09:21, 14 April 2015 (UTC)

Why is the gramatical nonsense section there?
What purpose does it serve? It teaches no one anything about Lojban grammar (the thing this article is about), so why's it there?50.49.147.29 (talk) 01:57, 2 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Agreed. The copy is below Gleki.arxokuna (talk) 13:35, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

grammatical nonsense
Lojban has a formal grammar which does not proscribe all the strings of words that a human would consider ungrammatical. One can say things like "*Either he and I will go". Some of these grammatical, but nonsensical, constructions are:


 * Converting a conjunction other than u with se, or converting any conjunction with te, ve, or xe.


 * ko'a te.u mi klama le briju se.a le ckule
 * He (whether-or-not-3) I go to the office (or, arguments exchanged) the school.


 * Using ra'o with a member of selma'o go'a that does not take an antecedent.


 * le gerku cu du ra'o le mlatu
 * The dog is (update pronouns) the cat.


 * Using kau after a word that's not a question word, in a clause not abstracted with du'u.


 * mi pilno le skami kau
 * I am using the computer (indirect question).


 * Using a term that is not a sumti where only a sumti makes sense.


 * mi viska le gerku pe na ku
 * I saw the dog of not.


 * Joining two sentences with bi'i.


 * mi viska le xrula .ibi'i do klama le ckule
 * Between I see the flower and you go to school.

Translations
It's impossible to understand the examples since almost all of them are without translation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.128.108.56 (talk) 00:13, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

"Grouping" section is almost entirely wrong
All but one example does not parse, and the one that does parse only does so incidentally due to its use of `lo'u`-`le'u` quotes which do not require the inner contents to be grammatically correct. Additionally, many of the translations are wrong. Matt-bacon-bcm (talk) 04:57, 9 October 2022 (UTC)