Kxì, ma frapo!
Vospxìvomun lefpom! ’Oli’a Vospxìvolaw ulte polähem krr a tìtxen si 🙂 . . . sì krr a postì amip.
We haven’t had any new words in a long time, so here are a few to start. Most of these stem from the backlog of suggestions conveyed to me by members of the LEP, our Lexical Expansion Project. Irayo nìtxan, ma sulfätu anawm!
lesung (adj., le.SUNG) ‘additional’
This is just a missing derivative of sung ‘add.’
Fìtìoeyktìng lesung srunga’ lu nìtxan.
‘This additional explanation is very helpful.’
fyawa (conj., FYAW.a) ‘how’ (introducing a subordinate clause)
This was a terrific contribution! It fills a long-standing gap and will surely prove useful. Fyawa is a contraction of fya’o a, one that would have developed naturally in Na’vi. You can also think of it as ‘the way in which.’
Fyawa fkol tsat sar loho oer.
’How that’s used surprises me.’
Just as with similar subordinate conjunctions—for example: teynga, teyngla, teyngta, teyngä, teyngra, teyngria—there’s a family of related forms, one for each Na’vi case:
fyawla from fya’ol a
fyawta from fya’ot a
fyawä from fya’oä a
fyawra from fya’or a
fyawria from fya’ori a
So, for example:
Ke tslam oel fyawta nga tsakrr soli.
’I don’t understand how you did that.’
Perhaps some of you would like to contribute examples in the comments of how the other forms are used! 🙂
säfwew (n., sä.FWEW) ‘search’
As you would suspect, säfwew, from fwew ‘look for, seek,’ is a noun meaning ‘an instance of searching.’
Oey tsmukanìri säfwew ke flängä.
‘Sadly, the search for my brother was unsuccessful.’
fpaksye (vin., FPAK.sye, inf. 1, 1) ’hold one’s breath’
From fpak ’suspend an action’ + syeha si ‘to breathe.’
Penunyol tsun nga fpivaksye payäo?
‘How long can you hold your breath under water?’
angu (n., A.ngu) ‘spoon, ladle’
Sa’nokìl oeru kolar fyawta sar fìrìkit sko angu.
‘Mother taught me how to use this leaf as a spoon.’
mawat (adj., MA.wat) ‘damaged’
In contrast to fwel ‘broken,’ mawat implies something is damaged but still usable.
Ngey tsko ke lu fwel, ma ’eveng. Mawat nì’aw.
’Your bow isn’t broken, child. It’s only damaged.’
sä’eko (n., sä.’E.ko) ‘attack’
Aysä’eko a ta Sawtute ke ftayang liven kawkrr.
‘The attacks from the Skypeople will never stop.’
me’ (vin.) ‘choke’
This is the verb for the inhibition of breathing due to something caught in the throat.
Fo mere’! Srung si for!
’They’re choking! Help them!’
Note that the causative form with <eyk> isn’t used for deliberate strangulation; it simply means that something is causing unintended choking:
Tsatsnganìri txo tsat yivom ngal nìwin nìhawng, tsun ngati meykive’.
‘If you eat that meat too fast, it can choke you (i.e., cause you to choke).’
säsngap (n., sä.SNGAP) ‘sting’
Säsngap zize’ä tìsraw si nìngay.
‘The sting of a hellfire wasp is really painful.’
’itu (n., ’I.tu) ‘son or daughter’
This word is long overdue! I became aware of it while chatting with a member of the lì’fyaolo’, who informed me that it’s been used pretty much forever in the community, but never officially canonized. It serves an obvious purpose. We’ve long had ’ite ‘daughter’ and ’itan ‘son,’ but not a gender-neutral word for ‘son or daughter.’ We do have ’eveng, of course, but that usually implies ‘child,’ i.e., not an adult. In English, a 65-year-old man, in introducing his 40-year-old son, normally wouldn’t say, “This is my child.” He’d say, “This is my son,” since a son can be any age. But English doesn’t have a commonly used gender-neutral word for ‘son or daughter.’ (“Offspring” obviously doesn’t fill the bill!) Now Na’vi officially does.
Polpxaya ’itu lu ngar?
‘How many sons and daughters do you have?’
There’s much more in my backlog of LEP submissions to consider, but for now I’ll stop here.
Hayalovay, ma eylan!
