Adwan

Adwan (Ad: Aðwana) is a partially naturalistic con-lang invented for the sake of gaining a wider understanding of general linguistics. The language itself developed a life of its own, and with each passing day, it grows with more vocabulary, more additions, and more characteristics that make it stand out from other inflecting languages.

Lessons
Chapter 1: A Concise Explanation and Overview of Adwanic Basics and Adwanic Grammar

Name
The name "aðwana" comes from the archaic Adwanic noun, "aðe", which means "mind"; and "wan", which means "to speak". It is an archaic compound word, not used anymore due to an evolved vocabulary, which means "a spoken mind."

Phonology
Adwan has a moderately unique phonology, as it has extensive use of using the consonant /j/ coupled with both vowels AND consonants. It is said that Adwan tends to sound like a mixture of Icelandic, Norwegian, Czech, and Polish.

Alphabet and Orthography
Adwan is a fairly phonetic language; everything is sounded out as it is written. "Pevle" will always be pronounced /pevle/, and "Ar" will always be pronounced /ar/. There is only one sound change that isn't marked directly by the orthography, and that is the nasalization of ‘m’. Generally, for a lot of consonants, ’m’ will become nasalized; so if ‘m’ isn't a dominant, stressed consonant, it will be /ɱ/; A good English example is the word "symphony". You don't say /sɪmfəni:/, you say /sɪɱfəni:/. M is NEVER nazalized when in the beggining of a word, or when predecing a vowel. Note, for the vowels A, E, I, O, U and Y, an acute accent can be added to focus stress on that particular syllable (this happens a lot when the stress isn't on the penultimate syllable. When the penultimate syllable rule is broken, an acute accent occurs to guide stress, and elongate the noun). Ex: HOWEVER, for consonants, the acute accent represents a preceding /j/ sound; ŕ = jr; ś=js, etc. This is mainly due to the fact that when there'd be vowels preceding the j which preceded consonants, new phonemes would form and throw off the meanings. NOTE: Consonants with acute accents are a seperate letter of the alphabet, and are, therefore, a part of the alphabet, as opposed to vowels which are just stress-change indicators.
 * the verb Fwývan has stress on the first syllable, as opposed to the default penultimate syllable. Also, many times declensions will switch around stress levels which will end up in acute accents falling above many vowels.

Dialect changes
There are two different dialects that are mutually intelligible; the eastern dialect, which has the pronunciations below, tend to reflect the more Slavic side of Adwan. These changes don't make any difference to a non-native speaker, as they all fall within the same sound-range and Adwan doesn't need to make distinctions between them. \
 * A: a becomes æ
 * E: ɛ becomes e
 * Č: tʃ becomes tɕ, or tʂ
 * G: g becomes ɣ
 * Ĥ: x becomes χ or ç
 * J: j becomes ʎ
 * Ĵ: dʒ becomes dʑ
 * Ö: œ becomes y or ø
 * Š: ʃ becomes ɕ, or ʂ
 * V: v becomes β
 * Ž: ʒ becomes ʑ

Syntax and Morphology
As in many Indo-European languages, Adwan is highly inflected; Adwan inflects nouns for number, grammatical case, and, seldomly, gender; Adjectives, and numbers decline for grammatical case; pronouns decline for grammatical person and gramatical case, and determiners decline for grammatical case. Verbs are conjugated (and agglutinated, to an extent) for tense, mood, and aspect. A distinctive feature in Adwan is the lack of auxilliary verbs, as they are all conjugated into the verb. Due to heavy inflections, Adwan also lacks articles, so there is no difference between "the cat likes mice" or "a cat likes mice"'; the distinction between a regular cat liking mice, and cats generally liking mice is made thanks to the Generic tense of verbs.

Word Order
Adwan's general word order follows a VOS pattern, and, sometimes, a VSO pattern if the subject is in posession of someone or something. However, due to the heavy inflection that Adwan goes through, word order is quite free. The standard is VOS and VSO, yet many pieces of literature and poetry can follow other word orders. Other word orders are also used to emphasize things, if only used seldomly. Usually, questions are formed using intonation and stress (and the usage of a question mark), but if incredibly important, or necessary, OSV and SOV is used.

General Rules:
 * Adjectives don't have any specific order, though they usually precede the noun. Due to declensions, however, in many dialects, they are all grouped together and form a section of their own, and either go SOV, or SOAV, or SVOA.
 * It is a general rule that prepositions precede the object they are attached to. It is not a strictly enforced rule with sentences that only have one preposition, but with complex sentences with many prepositions, they must always precede the object.
 * Adverbs, generally, always follow a verb.
 * Commas do not denote stops, but merely break sentences down to a verbal phrase. For pauses that commas tend to be used for, such as in the English language, a hypen (-) or a double comma are used.
 * Usually, direct objects come first, and then indirect objects.

Gender
Editing.

Case
Adwan inflects its Nouns, Adjectives, Pronouns, and Numbers. Nouns are inflected for number, grammatical case, and occasionally, gender; Adjectives are inflected for grammatical case; Pronouns are inflected for case, person, and number, and determiners and numbers are inflected for grammatical case.

In Adwan, there are 7 cases; the Nominative, which marks the subject; the Accusative, which marks the direct object; the Ablative, which marks the causative object; the Genitive case, which marks relationship and posession; the Dative case, which marks the indirect object; the Locative case, which marks the location, and the Vocative case, which marks the noun being addressed.

A good way to find out the case of a noun is to ask yourself these questions:

Nominative: ''who? what?''

Accusative: I see what/who?

Ablative: because of who/what?

Genitive: of who/what?

Dative: to whom/what?

Locative: at/around what?

Vocative: I call whom?

Noun Declensions
Nouns are one of the most important parts of speech in Adwan. Each noun is declined for above case according to function in speech and preposition, if any. Nouns are declined for Grammatical Case, Number, Animacy and Inanimacy, and, seldomly, Gender. Nouns will alwayseither end in -a or -e; nouns ending in -a are animate nouns (nouns that are living), whilst nouns ending in -e are inanimate. There are a couple of exceptions and irregularities, however, as some inanimate nouns end in -a, mainly due to Adwanic culture percieving said nouns to be essential to life and believed them to be spiritually alive. Forest in Adwan, Ărena, is technically inanimate, yet since it ends in -a, it is declined as an animate noun would be.

Nouns are, for the most part, generally declined as neuter nouns, though gender declensions are the same as neuter declensions, only with different suffixes. Most nouns are neuter by default until specified otherwise. For example: Parent in Adwan is Fevna, Father in Adwan is Fevnaš, and Mother is Fevnač. Masculine nouns are declined like neuter nouns are, but also have the extra -š added. Feminine nouns, too, only they have -č. NOTE: Inanimate Nouns RARELY ever feminine or masculine. They are only ever masculine or feminine in children's books or in narratives that animate inanimate objects. To make them masculine, simply follow the pattern and add -š to the already declined noun; to make it feminine, add -č.

Second note: NO NOUNS have the letters "h", or "j" as their penultimate letter.

Fevna means Parent; Sykle means Bicycle.

These are the only declensions nouns go through. There are no other classes of nouns.

Irregular Nouns
In Adwan, just like in every language, there are irregular nouns: Many nouns in Adwan that end in -a like animate nouns do are usually essential to life; food, countries, languages and people of knowledge and wisdom are usually considered to be essential.
 * Afkra - Apple
 * Arebyna - Tree
 * Aðẃana - Adwan
 * Ărena - Forest
 * Bybla - Book
 * Byblyobéfa - Bookcase
 * Cyna - Word
 * Estajyna - Spanish
 * Francja - France
 * Jenja - Pear
 * Jona - Noun
 * Jyla - Hill
 * Kacana - Canada
 * Lyra - Name
 * Nasjona - Country
 * Noréga - Norway
 * Nyha - Year
 * Owa - Water
 * Sjéda - Sea
 * Šlyna - Child
 * Úrefra - Banana
 * Vindura - Wind
 * Vjoška - House
 * Vora - Greeting
 * Wyra - Hug
 * Yca - Here
 * Yðjoma - Language
 * Žernaca - Professor

Personal pronouns
Personal pronouns are the most irregular of all words in Adwan, for they don't necessarily follow a uniform way of changing affixes like Nouns and Adjectives do. Personal pronouns don't all end in the same suffix, leaving personal pronouns in Adwan to be the most irregular parts of speech in the whole language.

Pronouns also decline to the Comitative case, which is similar to the instrumental case, and it represents "with". Therefore, kona is with me. Note: Personal Pronouns declined in the Genitive are the equivalent to both English posessive determiners, and possessive pronouns. Adwan has no distinction between posessive pronouns and posessive adjectives, for the role of posession is maintained solely by the genitive declensions of said pronouns.

Demostrative Pronouns
Along with personal pronouns, demonstrative pronouns are irregular, too, and don't follow a pattern of suffix-changing declensions, like Nouns, Adjectives, and Numbers do.

Demonstrative pronouns in Adwan have three distinctions: proximal, which refers to objects near the speaker (this, in English), medial, objects near the address, and distal, objects far from both (that for English) (Note: That in English can be both medial and distal). This is similar to the demonstrative pronouns in Spanish (este/esto/esta for proximal, ese/eso/esa for medial, aquello/aquel/aquella for distal).

If you can see, all declined forms of each demonstrative pronoun keeps the first and last letters of the word, and declines by changing, adding or subtracting infixes, rather than changing prefixes or suffixes. Adwanic demonstrative pronouns go through a process of Vowel Migration when changing to plural; each vowel is assigned a specific part in a cycle of vowels phonemes, and to pluralize, they go through a transformation that leads them to the next vowel in line.

The order of Vowel Migration has three different cycles, and they go as so:

First Cycle: Y = U, U = E, E = A, A = Y

Second Cycle: Ö = Ĕ, Ĕ = Ą, Ą = Ë, Ë = Ö

Third Cycle: Ï = I, I = Ę, Ę = O, O= Ï

Verbs
Verbs in Adwan are conjugated by affix changes and agglutinations, depending on the tenses used. Verbs in Adwan are conjugated for Tense, Mood, Aspect Number and Person, not to mention the class of verbs they are. There are three classes of verbs in Adwan; -an verbs, -en verbs, and -on verbs; they are all conjugated differently, yet follow a similar patter in conjugation. There are no verbs that are conjugated irregularly. Ironically, while other languages have verbs that follow orthographies and have irregular conjugations, Adwan has verbs that don't follow verb suffix rules, but follow a particular conjugation pattern.

There is no distinction as to why some verbs end in -on, -en, and -an.

To Be
Adwan has 3 different types of to be's. The first one is a locative to be, to be used when in, at, or near a location. This verb is Čyren; usually, in informal writing, Čyren could be used and the noun, although declined in the locative, wouldn't require a preposition if it was simple, as context could tell the rest. Also, when Čyren is used, it is a great indicator for a noun in the locative case.

The second verb for to be is Ïn, and it is used exclusively with predicate adjectives. The usage of Ïn used to be rare, as adjectives had different declensions, but Ïn was revived with the loss of the Predicate Adjective declensions. Generally, if you're adding an adjective after ‘to be’, Ïn would be used.

The last but not least verb is Þuðan, the first verb in the entire Adwan language. This verb is used when neither of the two other ‘to be's’ match the criteria, say I am a boy would use þuðan, so on and so forth.

Note:
Verbs conjugations work with suffixes; the tense, aspect, mood and voice of a verb depends on what suffix is strung to the person-conjugated verb. Tenses to do with time are not moveable, as you cannot have a past tense AND a future tense in one verb. The present tense conjugation acts as a base for the agglutinations that go on in the verbs. The present tense will ALWAYS be added to the end of a verb, unless the verb is in the Infinitive.

Tenses and Aspects
Tenses and Aspects are not interchangable suffixes like the rest of the conjugations. Tenses always go first, and you can only have one tense per verb.

Present Tense
Here are the present tense conjugations of Þuðan, Čyren, and Eščon(to make).

Note: ALL verbs will have these initial endings, in every tense, mood and aspect, for all conjugations past the present tense are affixed on, rather than conjugated on.

Past Tense, -je
The past tense in Adwan points out simple events that happened in the past. They don't tell a time, or the manner in which they happened, but merely that they happened in general. The past tense in Adwan is formed by adding the suffix -je to present tense verbs.
 * -an verbs in the past tense tend to end with their -an conjugations + the past tense suffix, -je; so "I jumped", which is Rompan, would look like rompasje. "Romp" is the root, "as" is the person conjugation", and "je" is the past tense.
 * -en verbs, like Sëvjen, to show, in the past tense (I showed), would be sëvjasje.
 * -on verbs like Eščon, to make, in the past tense (I made), would be eščasje.

Future Tense, -arë
The future tense states what will happen in the future, and, like the past tense, does not state the particular time or manner in which it will happen. The future tense in Adwan is formed by adding -rë to the present tense verb. In English, the typical future verb is formed by adding the auxilliary "will" before the verb (I will be, I will show, etc).
 * Þuðan becomes þuðasarë in the future.
 * Čyren becomes čyracarë in the future.
 * Eščon becomes eščazarë in the future.

Imperfect, -ęin
The imperfect tense expresses recurring actions in the past. English doesn't make too much of a distinction, but it is very much like French's imperfect conjugation; in the imperfect, I was in French is étais; in Adwan, the imperfect for I was is either þuðasęin, Ïnasęin, or Čyracęin. A good example of the distinction in English would be "I used to be", as opposed to "I was". English has many ways to express the imperfect, although even then, those distinctions can also be regular past forms.

I rode my bike every day; rode would be in the imperfect, because it happened habitually.

Continuous Present, -eży
The continuous present states the verb that is in the process of being done. English makes a distinction by adding the verb 'to be' before the verb, and turning the verb into its gerund.
 * To be, in the continous present in English is "I am being"; in Adwan, it could either be þuðaseży, čyraceży, or ïnaseży, depending on which 'to be' would be required.
 * I am making, would be Eščazeży.

Continuous Past, -yčny
The continuous past is often easily confused with the imperfect tense, as they both describe actions that happened continually in the past; however, there is a definite distinction that goes on. The imperfect states things that continously happened one after ther other, many times, the continuous past states things that were already happening, continuosly, just that once. In Adwan, to form the continuous past, you add -yčny to the verb which has already been conjugated for person, which, coincidentially, is also the present by default.

"Every summer for three years, I rode my bike to work," would require "rode" to be conjugated to the imperfect, as it happened many times.

"Last summer, I was riding my bike to work," the verb "riding" would be conjugated in the continous past, since it happened once, continuously.
 * I was being = þuðasyčny.
 * I was showing = sëvjacyčny.
 * They were making = eščyžyčny.

Continuous Future, -eþöj
The continuous future describes a continuous event that will occur, as opposed to what continuous event has already passed. The English equivalent is something like "I will be being" (that is the general idea, although "will be being" is grammatically incorrect in English due to the kind of verb ‘to be’ is, in Adwan it's acceptable), or "I will be making". It's usually formed, in English, by adding ‘will be’ before the verb in its gerund form. In Adwan, the continuous future is formed by adding the suffix -eþöj after the present conjugation.
 * I will be eating (using the verb Alëten); Alëtaceþöj.
 * I will be exploring (using the verb Zespen): Zespaceþöj.
 * I will be riding my bike (using the verb Yrkan); Yrkaseþöj syklu za.

Perfect Present, -ẃynï
The perfect present describes an event that happened in the past before the present. It is somewhat thought to be the opposite of the imperfect, as the imperfect states continuous, habitual things in the past, and the perfect present states of things that happened only once in the past. the English equivalent is something along the lines of "I have been..." for the verb "to be". The perfect present is formed by adding the suffix -ẃynï to the verb conjugated for present tense.
 * I have been --> Þuðasẃynï.
 * I have ridden my bike --> Yrkasẃynï syklu za.

Phrases
Þuðys nasjonu sað abytys plus upyż Ĕceżenehy Kanaca, kelyfjys žę Aznafykóšanë fę anocene Yznafukóšanë fę ynacene në al upë šlă Oznafykóšanu Kanaca.
 * Canada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean. (Wikipedia)