tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Mar 30 11:43:54 1998

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Re: How big is the vocabulary?

>>Are you counting words like [ parHa' ] and [ Qochbe' ]?  If you're counting
>>words with suffixes, we could come up with a few thousand words.
>>Or are you counting only the words with suffixes that MO listed; which he
>>says he listed only for convenience, they are still just a word with a suffix.
>>
>
>Speaking for myself, my wordlist is almost entirely based on Okrand's 
>glossary entries (plus a few words mentioned in the body of texts like KGT
>which didn't make it into the glossaries).  I left the appropriateness of
>considering verb+suffix as separate words to him: if he included it 
>as a separate entry, then so did I.  

I included them in my list also; but the discussion is about determining the
size of our vocabulary.  We may include suffixed words in our lists but how
should we count them in reference to vocabulary size?
Should we count ghuHmoH because it was fortunate enough to make it into a
glossary but not include jejmoH even tho its just as valid a word?

MO said many more words could be listed with suffixes but he didn't feel it
necessary to clearify every combination (plus limited book size).  He listed
the suffixed words that he did for us to use as examples, to make us open
our minds to how ideas can be expressed by expanding our vocabulary with
suffixed words.

DloraH

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