Kanduadas

General information
Kanduadas (natively, Kanduatas [ˈkäⁿdwädäs]) is the official language and a national language of the country Kanduai on the moon Chesnon. Chesnon is the name in English of the moon as well as the species. They call themselves Cesnon (singulative: Cesnem).

Phonology

 * The standard language is based on the dialect of Makiór [mäˈcɤ̞ɾ] (great-city, the Kanduaians are not the most creative namers).

Consonants

 * 1) [n] is in free variation with the regular pronunciation of /ŋ/ intervocalically.
 * 2) /d/ only contrasts with /t/ intervocalically.
 * 3) /ʔ/ only appears in a few conservative dialects.
 * 4) [ts] is an allophone of /tʃ/ in alveolar-dominant words.
 * 5) [ɹ] is an allophone of /r/ when word-initial or adjacent to /m/, /ŋ/, or /s/.
 * 6) /l/ varies as [ɫ] and [lʲ] depending on the surrounding vowels and consonants.

Vowels

 * The sounds are rounded or unrounded according to the rules of roundness harmony. A vowel, usually the first vowel (that isn't /ə̃/) or the stressed vowel, dictates the roundness of a whole word.
 * [ǝ] and [ɵ̞] are the unstressed, word-final allophones of /a/, /e/, and /o/.
 * [ɨ̃] and [ʉ̃] are the allophones of /ə̃/ before a schwa.
 * the legal diphthongs are /äj/, /äw/, /e̞j/, /e̞w/, /o̞j/, and /ə̃w/.

Stress
Stress is placed on the antepenultimate syllable unless otherwise indicated by an acute accent in the romanizations.

Transliteration
The Kanduadas orthography, Bakanduaxel, is an alphasyllabary. This page is written with the Latin transliteration (Sbokanduaxel) shown below.

Native ordering
Consonants: 0, L, S, B, M, Mb, R, T, Nd, X, H, K, N, Ng, C, U

Vowels: -e, -o, -a, -i, -v, -u, -0

Nouns
Nouns decline according to case, gender, and number. The left side of a slash is the collective number, the right is for the singulative.

Uol
ex. Kior [co̞ɾ], cities

Mrabin
ex. Baso [bˠäsə], sauce

Ndrala
ex. Crimba [tʃjiᵐbˠə], horns

Case
The cases are:

Absolutive, which used for the argument of an intransitive verb, Ergative, which used for the subject of an transitive verb, and Accusative which used for the object of an transitive verb.

Gender
Gender is an interesting topic when talking about the Chesnon or their languages. They have three genders. And this is reflected in Kanduadas. The grammatical genders are: uol (with 3 declension classes), mrabin (4 classes), and ndrala (2 classes).

Chesnon are of course assigned the proper gender. Inanimate nouns are seemingly assigned at random or based on common derivational suffixes, and loanwords by form.

Number
The two grammatical numbers of Kanduadas may be of some interest to English speakers. The reason why is that the most basic and unmarked number is the one referring to multiple entities, called the collective. The number used for a single entity, the singulative, is more marked and is not used in compounds.

Pronouns

 * ex. Takea bausén u!
 * [ˈtäke̞ǝ bˠäwˈse̞ŋ ˈu]
 * 2s.ERG hit-2s.PRET 1s.ACC
 * You hit me!

TMA system
nonpast: used for current events.

preterite: used for past events that are complete or viewed as a single action.

imperfect: used for past events taking place over a period of time or happening many times.

conditional: used for events that may happen given certain conditions

presumptive: used for events that the speaker supposes/supposed happen(ed). When combined with the nonpast, it forms one of the two future tenses.

volitive: used for events that the speaker wants/wanted to happen. When combined with the nonpast, it forms the other future tense.

imperative: used for commands and requests.

Preterite
Oral stems: Nasal stems:

Dictionary forms
The lemma is the connegative form, typically ending in -u. Also provided in standard dictionaries are the theme type, stem type, and stem itself.

ex. Sulvu (athematic; regular nasal stem sulv-), "throw"

Negation
Negation is shown with a connegative plus the negative verb.

Undu [ˈuⁿdu], "don't" (athematic; irregular stem (h)u(nd)-)
 * ex. Mikuau hir nimo!,
 * [ˈmʲikwäw ˈhiɾ ˈɲimˠǝ]
 * eat-CONNEG NEG-2.IMP MPROX-ACC.mra
 * "Don't eat that!"

Examples
Coi [ˈtʃo̞j], "read" (athematic; -oi type stem co-)

Mikuau [ˈmʲikwäw], "eat" (thematic; -uau type stem miku-)

Demonstratives
There are no indefinite or definite articles. Instead, Kanduadas uses demonstratives. They decline as regular adjectives.

The Deictic positions are as follows:

Proximal: Anything that is close to the speaker.

Mesioproximal: Anything close to the listener.

Mesiodistal: Anything away from the speaker and the listener but still close by.

Distal: Anything away from the speaker and the listener and far away.

Adjectives
Adjectives typically come before nouns. They decline according to gender and case, not number. They are all regular.

ex. Selx, "joyous, friendly, chummy"

Adjectives also have positive and negative comparative (-ál/-ús) and superlative (-átel/-útes) forms.

Numerals
Since the Chesnon have six fingers on each hand, it's fitting that most of their languages are base-12 (duodecimal/dozenal) instead of base-10, Kanduadas being no exception.