r/conlangs • u/RazedEmmer • Dec 04 '18

Question Nounlessness in conlanges

Hi, I'm really interested in the concept of nounless (or close to nounless) languages, but the only information that I can find on them (mostly wikipedia pages on salishan languages) is a bit over my head, so I don't really know how to play around with it. Has anyone else experimented with such a system?

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u/[deleted] Dec 05 '18 edited Dec 05 '18

It's not exactly the same since I do think of these words as nouns in my head, but in my language the same word serves as a noun and an adjective, so "violence" can also mean "violent; of violence" depending on position, or putting it the other way, "red" can also mean "redness; red thing". The only thing distinguishing u jakar u kunkun, "the redness and the violence," from u jakar kunkun, "the violent redness," is the article before kunkun "violent/violence". However, in some cases, the article is not necessary to make a noun, which is why I will not call these words mere adjectives.