Тема: На'Ви
Common Name:Na'vi
Na'vi Name:Na'vi or “The People”
Range:Various biomes of Pandora. Population concentrated in rainforest regions. Outlying clans have been detected on each continent and in subarctic, swampland and mountainous regions.
Anatomy:Smooth skin is iridescent, cyan color. Long, prehensile tail. Skull is proportionately small, high cheekbones, feline ears and a protruding, snout. Bioluminescent markings for identification, mood display. Average lifespan is similar to that of a human. Despite skin color, Na'vi have red blood.
Feeding Ecology:Omnivore. Hunter and gatherer with incipient agriculture, including brewing.
Size:Average male is three meters tall, females slightly smaller.
Notes:Generally peaceful, but ferocious in defense of home, clan and family.
Overview
The Na'vi are the only known species outside of Earth to have human-like intelligence. Although their society is essentially Neolithic, they have developed a vibrant, complex culture based on a profound spiritual connection to their moon, to one another, and to the deity they call Eywa. They are superb artisans who celebrate the interconnectedness of nature through storytelling, song, dance and crafts.
In many respects, the Na'vi body is almost human-like (and, even by human standards, beautiful). The waist is narrow and elongated. The shoulders are very wide, creating a v-shaped upper back. The neck is twice as long as an average human and can rotate, owl-like, almost 180 degrees.
The Na'vi body is more slender than the average human and is reminiscent of a Masai or Watusi. But the musculature is sharply defined, giving no sense of emaciation despite the thin proportions (they have roughly four times the strength of the average human). Their almond-shaped, cat-like eyes are large and hypersensitive to various bands of light. For balancing their long torso and legs, the Na'vi have a long, prehensile lemur-like tail. Their feet feature opposable “thumb toes” which allow for excellent grip on tree branches and vines with all four limbs. They can traverse the landscape on the surface as well as from tree branch to tree branch.
The abundant flora and fauna of Pandora have ensured a steady population of Na'vi; it is hypothesized that there was little Darwinian pressure to adapt new traits. Indeed, studies indicate that the number of Na'vi have remained remarkably consistent over the eons. The widespread access to natural resources has also helped limit (but not eliminate) warfare among the various Na'vi clans.
The Na'vi use a variety of simple, yet expertly crafted weapons for hunting and infrequent clan warefare. The Omaticaya clan prefer a nearly two-meter long recurve bow as their primary hunting weapon. These bows are made of wood collected from Hometree. They are very sturdy and are frequently used as close-quarter melee weapons once the arrows have run out. Some bows meant specifically for warfare or ceremonial purposes are reinforced with additional bracing, often made from ribs or wing bones of sacred animals. These war bows require enormous strength to draw, even by Na'vi standards. A typical Omaticaya arrow is almost two-meters long and made from the shoots of a hard, segmented grass resembling bamboo. The flat, slender arrowheads are made of a volcanic glass similar to obsidian which craftsmen have learned to heat-temper for drastically improved shatter resistance after knapping. They are then coated in a neurotoxin harvested from a local scorpion analog. The toxin is very potent, and is lethal to most of Pandora's fauna as well as Terran mammals. The fletchings are made with a pair (as opposed to the typical three fletching arrangement of Earth's history) of wings take from a parasitic flying insect that are arranged perpendicular to the flat head at the front.
The Omaticaya also carry a hunting knife whose 25-30cm reverse curved blade is fashioned from the wing claw of the Ikran, (banshee). These knives are used in the hunt to deliver a coup de grace to a downed prey animal. They are also used in melee fighting and for ceremonial purposes.
In addition to the neural interface the Na'vi also have a spoken language.
Na'vi Phonetics and Phonology
Na’vi has 20 consonants, 7 vowels, 4 diphthongs, and 2 syllabic “pseudovowels,” rr and ll.
1. Consonants
The consonants are (in the “official” Na’vi transcription): Ejectives: px tx kx Voiceless Stops: p t k ’ Affricate: ts Voiceless fricatives: f s h Voiced fricatives: v z Nasals: m n ng Liquids: r, l Glides: w y
Note the following:
*
The consonants “ts”, “f”, and “s” (but not “h”) can occur as the first element of a syllable-initial consonant cluster.
*
The consonants “px”, “tx”, “kx”, “p”, “t”, “’”, “m”, “n”, “ng”, “r,l” can occur in syllable-final position.
Note also:
*
px, tx, kx, ts, and ng are digraphs representing the three ejectives, the affricate, and the velar nasal respectively.
*
In the “scientific” transcription, ts is replaced by c and ng by g. For commercial purposes, however—and also for ease of reading by the actors—the “official” transcription is preferred.
*
The letters b, d, j, and q never appear in Na’vi.
2. Vowels, Diphthongs, and “Pseudovowels”
Vowels
Na’vi has a 7-vowel system:
i , ì u
e o
ä a
Transcription and phonetics:
i (i)
ì (I)
e [ε] Note: always lax
ä [æ]
u (u) or (U)
o [o]
a [a]
Diphthongs
Na’vi has 4 diphthongs: aw [aw], ew [εw], ay [aj], ey [εj].
3. Syllable structure and phonotactic constraints
Every syllable has a single vowel or diphthong at its center. Each vowel or diphthong in a word corresponds to a separate syllable. A single vowel or diphthong may be a syllable by itself.
Within syllables, Na’vi vowels and diphthongs can be preceded by either one or two consonants. They can also be followed by one consonant. That is, the syllable structure is (C)(C)V(C), where V represents a vowel or a diphthong. Restrictions on which consonants can occur in which positions are given below.
Initial consonants. Any consonant can occur at the beginning of a syllable.
Consonant clusters. Clusters of two consonants can occur, but only in syllable-initial position and only in the following combinations:
f, s, ts + {p, t, k, px, tx, kx, m, n, ng, r, l, w, y}
There are thus 39 possible initial C-clusters, all of which are attested in the lexicon.
Final consonants. Only certain consonants occur in syllable-final position. These are:
Ejectives: px tx kx
Stops: p t k ’
Nasals: m n ng
Liquids: r, l
Pseudovowels. In CV syllables, the liquids l and r can replace the vowel. When they are syllabic they are lengthened (the r is very strongly trilled, the l always front and “light”) and written ll and rr respectively.
Note: Sequences of stop + liquid, though they cannot occur initially, may be found medially. In such cases, however, a syllable boundary intervenes. Example: ikran ‘banshee’ divides as ik-ran, not *i-kran.
4. Vowel clusters
Na’vi allows unlimited sequences of vowels in a word. If no glottal stop intervenes, the vowels in such clusters glide smoothly from one to another. Each such vowel represents a separate syllable.
Examples: tsaleioae (6 syllables), meoauniaea (8 syllables)
5. Phonetic detail and phonology
Voiceless stops are unaspirated. In final position they are unreleased.
Na’vi r is a flap, as in Spanish pero or Indonesian surat.
Word stress in Na’vi is unpredictable and distinctive. Stress must thus be specified for each word. (In learning materials only, the stressed syllable in a word is underlined.)
E.g. tute ‘person’, tute ‘female person’
Lenition. Following certain adpositions and prefixes, initial consonants mutate as follows:
px, tx, kx ⇒ p, t, k
p, t/ts, k ⇒ f, s, h
Glottal stop:
’ ⇒ Ø
8 C’s participate in rule: px, tx, kx, ’, p, t, ts, k
12 C’s do not: f, s, h, v, z, m, n, ng, r, l, w, y
Word Classes and Morphology
1. Nouns
Nouns are inflected for case and number but only rarely for gender.
Number
Number (singular, dual, trial, plural) is indicated by prefixes, each of which triggers lenition:
Short plurals: When the plural marker ay- is prefixed to a word beginning with a lenitable consonant, it may be dropped after lenition has occurred.
Example : The plural of tokx ‘body’ is ay+tokx. Thus we have :
*aytokx → aysokx ‘bodies’
But now the plural is marked redundantly, first by the prefix itself and second by lenition of the initial consonant of the singular. So the ay- may be optionally dropped, yielding tokx ‘body’ vs. sokx ‘bodies’.
Case
Nouns and pronouns take six cases (counting Topical as a case): Subjective, Agentive, Patientive, Genitive, Dative, Topical. The case system is tripartite—i.e., it distinguishes between intransitive subjects (S), transitive subjects (A), and objects (P). Case morphemes are suffixes, generally with several allomorphs. Changes to the noun base sometimes occur with the Genitive.
The Topical form of a noun or pronoun establishes a loose semantic connection to the clause and has a wide range of uses. It may be translated along the lines of “with regard to,” “as for,” “turning to,” “concerning,” etc., but it can also appear where a genitive or dative might be expected.
Example: Oeri ta peyä fahew akewong ontu teya längu. I-TOP from his smell alien nose full is-NEG-ATTITUDE
‘My nose is full of his alien smell.’
2. Pronouns
Like nouns, pronouns exist in singular, dual, trial, and plural forms. In the first person dual, trial, and plural, a distinction is made between inclusive and exclusive forms.
3. Verbs
Verbs are inflected for tense, aspect, mood/dependency, and speaker attitude, but not for person or number. Verb inflections are effected exclusively through infixes, which are of two types—first position and second position.
With monosyllabic verb roots, first-position infixes simply come before second-position ones. With multisyllabic roots, however, first-position infixes occur in the penultimate syllable and second-position ones in the final syllable.
First-position infixes indicate tense, aspect, or mood; there are also participial and reflexive infixes in this position, the latter being in “pre-first” position so it can co-occur with other first-position infixes. Second-position infixes indicate speaker attitude—positive orientation, negative orientation, or uncertainty/indirect knowledge. Many of these infixes are optional on the sentence level. (In discourse, however, overt indication of tense or aspect may be required.)
Aspect is perfective or imperfective. Tense has five points on the time line: present, past proximate, past general, future proximate, future general. Verbs can be inflected for tense alone, aspect alone, or a combination of tense and aspect.
Selected examples:
Root: taron ‘hunt’
Note: English translations are only approximate and represent one of several possibilities.
Tense only:
taron ‘hunt’
tìmaron ‘just now hunted’
tayaron ‘will hunt’
Aspect only:
teraron ‘be hunting’
tolaron ‘have hunted’
Both tense and aspect:
tìrmaron ‘was just now hunting’
Many more such forms exist.
Including second-position infixes:
tìrmareion ‘was just now hunting (and the speaker feels positive about it)’
tayarängon ‘will hunt (and the speaker feels negative about it)’
In the last two examples, the root is indicated in bold.
4. Adjectives
Adjectives are invariant and undeclined. A derivational prefix forms adjectives out of other parts of speech.
5. Adpositions
These can either precede or follow their heads with no semantic distinction; in the latter case, they’re bound to the noun or pronoun. E.g., ‘with you’ = hu nga or ngahu.
Certain adpositions, when in pre-nominal position, trigger lenition. There’s no predicting which do and which don’t—they simply have to be learned. (Adpositions are marked in the lexicon as either ADP+ or ADP-.)
Because of the “short plural” phenomenon, ADP+ adpositions can yield ambiguous structures. Example: mì ‘in’ is ADP+; does mì sokx mean ‘in the body’ or ‘in the bodies’? The language has developed ways of dealing with these potential ambiguities.
Syntax
The most notable aspect of Na’vi syntax is the freedom of word order. The case system allows all 6 sequences of S, O, and V. Additionally, adjectives, genitives, and relative clauses can either precede or follow their heads.
Nouns and adjectives are tied together by the morpheme a, which comes between them and is attached as a bound morpheme to the adjective. For example, ‘long river’ is either ngima kilvan or kilvan angim.
