# Mottainai or The Language Discussions **URL:** \ **Category:** Not Games\ **Created:** [21 November 2022 10:42 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537 "2022-11-21T10:42:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![lalunaverde](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/lalunaverde/32/28591_2.png) [@lalunaverde](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/lalunaverde)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 14:51 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/184 "2026-02-03T14:51:29Z")
I was told last night that my home language has a _1st Person Dual_!? WTF is that? And it turns out I’m using the word intuitively without question. We also have 1st Person Plural Inclusive and 1st Person Plural Exclusive. Again, I wasn’t aware but have been using the words like it was nothing. > **Grammatical Persons** > > | Grammatical Persons | Word | Nearest English | > | --- | --- | --- | > | 1st Person Singular | iyaku/yaku | | > | 1st Person Dual | ikata | You and I | > | 1st Person Plural Inclusive | ikatamu / itamu | | > | 1st Person Plural Exclusive | ikami | Us, but not you haha | > | 2nd Person Singular | ika | | > | 2nd Person Plural | ikayu | y’all | > | 3rd Person Singular | iya | he/she as it’s gender neutral | > | 3rd Person Plural | ila | | Possessive form are the same but with a _k/ke-_ prefix, instead of _i-_. It now make sense when I emphasises the word _ours_ in English to express 1st Person Dual, because the word doesn’t exists in English, but want to express it. ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 15:07 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/185 "2026-02-03T15:07:54Z")
> [@apcshields](#): > > I’m saying that I think “New Zealander” can function as an English adjective. If I’m right, then it does make grammatical sense. If I’m wrong, then it doesn’t. ‘New Zealander’ is a noun. “I am a New Zealander” makes grammatical sense, “I am New Zealander” doesn’t follow the rules of English. For all that it’s perfectly understandable, it is something that only a non-native speaker would say. I believe your belief that ‘New Zealander’ can function as an English adjective is incorrect! ---
**Author:** ![apcshields](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/apcshields/32/1058_2.png) [@apcshields](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/apcshields)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 15:16 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/186 "2026-02-03T15:16:37Z")
😂 I know it’s a noun. But lots of nouns are adjectives. And if the context helps, I am as native a speaker of English as anyone could be—I wasn’t actually speaking it when I was born, but I did start pretty early on. ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 15:44 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/187 "2026-02-03T15:44:54Z")
> [@apcshields](#): > > But lots of nouns are adjectives Are you sure? ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 15:46 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/188 "2026-02-03T15:46:06Z")
> [@apcshields](#): > > I wasn’t actually speaking it when I was born Well, neither was I, but then nor was anyone! ---
**Author:** ![apcshields](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/apcshields/32/1058_2.png) [@apcshields](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/apcshields)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 15:58 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/189 "2026-02-03T15:58:01Z")
I’m probably missing something humorous, but, yes. See noun adjuncts and nominalized adjectives. ---
**Author:** ![Assussanni](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/assussanni/32/11057_2.png) [@Assussanni](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/Assussanni)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 16:38 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/190 "2026-02-03T16:38:45Z")
> [@lalunaverde](#): > > | Grammatical Persons | Word | Nearest English | > | --- | --- | --- | > | 2nd Person Plural | ikayu | y’all | An American colleague once told me that they consider “y’all” to be the 2nd Person Singular, and that the correct 2nd Person Plural is “all y’all”. To this day I’m genuinely not sure how serious they were being, but I don’t think they were entirely joking. ---
**Author:** ![COMaestro](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/comaestro/32/1030_2.png) [@COMaestro](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/COMaestro)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 17:49 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/191 "2026-02-03T17:49:29Z")
> [@BertFill](#): > > ‘New Zealander’ is a noun. “I am a New Zealander” makes grammatical sense, “I am New Zealander” doesn’t follow the rules of English. Maybe it needs to be “New Zealandian” instead. Same way “I am American” or “I am Canadian” is just the same as saying “I am an American” or “I am a Canadian”. “New Zealander” sounds wrong because of the “-er” ending, while “I am New Zealandian” works fine. ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 20:31 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/192 "2026-02-03T20:31:41Z")
> [@apcshields](#): > > See noun adjuncts and nominalized adjectives. But this isn’t either of those, it’s just a noun. ---
**Author:** ![dscheidt](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@dscheidt](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/dscheidt)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 20:52 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/193 "2026-02-03T20:52:30Z")
Y’all is an indefinite plural. It’s probably plural, but it might be referring to a singular person. All y’all is definitely plural. The big difference is plain y’all can refer to a subset of the group being addressed, while all y’all certainly includes the whole group. “Y’all get off my lawn!” yelled at a group on the lawn might not include your cousin, but just the riff raff with her, for instance. You could also yell that without knowing how many people are on your lawn. Racking the slide of a shotgun immediately after is entirely optional. You can also tell a single individual “all y’all come over for supper.”, meaning ‘bring your family’ (or some other group, probably obvious from context.). ---
**Author:** ![apcshields](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/apcshields/32/1058_2.png) [@apcshields](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/apcshields)\ **Post date:** [3 February 2026 22:07 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/194 "2026-02-03T22:07:22Z")
I guess I’m not expressing myself clearly. I thought you were asking for justification of my claim that lots of nouns are adjectives. I gave you the two examples of classes of words that have noun and adjective roles that I could remember off-hand. To my mind, these by themselves constitute “lots”. (I reject any kind of claim about a word’s ‘essential part of speech’. That’s why I’m talking about ‘roles’. I’m not saying you’re making such a claim, but this is related to a claim I’m about to make, so I mention it.) We both agree that ‘New Zealander’ can be used as a noun. I’m saying I don’t see why it can’t also be used as an adjective. (It seems to me that it fits the correct language niche to be used for that purpose, and, no, I don’t think ending in ‘-er’ makes that less likely.) English has a long habit of using words that have usage as nouns also as adjectives (see above), and we’ve described a clear need for an adjective which has a particular meaning related to the meaning of this noun. We could certainly tack on endings to get ‘New Zealandic’ or ‘New Zealandish’, but I think part of the point of this conversation has been that those sound silly and that there’s no clear form to prefer. I’m saying that in that situation, ‘New Zealander’ is a strong choice: unlike a lot of the other variants, it’s already well-attested as an English word, it has a related usage, it would rarely be confused with that other usage, and it doesn’t sound any _more_ silly than the other suggestions. Since English is not a language in which words with noun usage cannot have adjectival usage, there’s no impediment. And this gets to the final point—usage defines the language, so saying, “I haven’t used this word (or even ‘a word’) this way before,” cannot be a valid impediment in a discussion of use. The word has the potential to be used this way, so the only question that remains is whether people will use it this way. I think I have a set of reasonable arguments why people might _want_ to use ‘New Zealander’ adjectively. ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [4 February 2026 07:36 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/195 "2026-02-04T07:36:20Z")
Ok, got it. I think. So seeing as that’s not the reason why ‘New Zealander’ _isn’t_ used as an adjective, there must be another reason why it isn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Benkyo](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/benkyo/32/1026_2.png) [@Benkyo](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/Benkyo)\ **Post date:** [4 February 2026 07:43 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/196 "2026-02-04T07:43:37Z")
Probably something very simple, like the fact that “new” is already an adjective. How language develops and is used doesn’t have to make sense. ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [4 February 2026 07:43 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/197 "2026-02-04T07:43:44Z")
Language is great. ‘Australian’ can be both adjective and noun. “I am Australian.” “I am an Australian.” ‘New Zealander’ is only a noun. “I am a New Zealander.” You can’t correctly say “I am New Zealander.” ‘English’ is only an adjective. “I am English.” You can’t correctly say “I am an English.” ---
**Author:** ![Benkyo](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/benkyo/32/1026_2.png) [@Benkyo](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/Benkyo)\ **Post date:** [4 February 2026 08:30 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/198 "2026-02-04T08:30:02Z")
I’m sure there’s plenty of analysis that could be done for origin adjectives for York vs. New York, Jersey vs. New Jersey, Egypt vs. New Egypt, Zealand vs. New Zealand, etc. (Today I learned the word “demonym”) ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [4 February 2026 08:59 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/199 "2026-02-04T08:59:36Z")
Every day’s a schoolday, right? Today I learned that there’s a New Egypt. ---
**Author:** ![dscheidt](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@dscheidt](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/dscheidt)\ **Post date:** [4 February 2026 13:48 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/200 "2026-02-04T13:48:53Z")
It’s the self-proclaimed center of New Jersey! I’ve been there – I knew someone who raced at the track there, a long long time ago. ---
**Author:** ![BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BertFill](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/BertFill)\ **Post date:** [4 February 2026 17:49 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/201 "2026-02-04T17:49:08Z")
My knowledge of New Jersey has increased substantially today! If I ever find myself in the area, is New Egypt worth a visit? I suspect the answer might be no - fulsome apologies to all New Egyptians if the answer is in fact yes. ---
**Author:** ![Phil](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/phil/32/1508_2.png) [@Phil](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/Phil)\ **Post date:** [5 February 2026 05:24 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/202 "2026-02-05T05:24:42Z")
> [@BertFill](#): > > So old that when I lived in NZ as a child, the fruit was still called ‘chinese gooseberry’ as much if not more than ‘kiwifruit.’ You certainly don’t hear that much nowadays. I’m old enough to be familiar with it, but I’ve no idea whether the kids these days know it. Mum sometimes used it, as it was the name she was familiar with growing up. ---
**Author:** ![Acacia](https://discussion.tekeli.li/user_avatar/discussion.tekeli.li/acacia/32/6915_2.png) [@Acacia](https://discussion.tekeli.li/u/Acacia)\ **Post date:** [6 February 2026 18:36 UTC](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537/203 "2026-02-06T18:36:55Z")
> [@Benkyo](#): > > And that’s not even touching on the fact that the common word for “people from the US of A” reads like they could come from anywhere on two continents. It’s just that awkward artifact - United States of Mexico, United States of Brasil, United States of America. Everyone else just goes by the the non-ambiguous identifier (officially now, in Brasil). We have to keep the “US” part around to distinguish from the continents. But it makes us harder to pin down than the Mexicans. (now I’m a little curious, looks like Columbia and Venezuela also used to be the United States but Columbia dropped the prefix over 100 years ago.) [Previous page](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537.md?page=9) [Next page](https://discussion.tekeli.li/t/mottainai-or-the-language-discussions/4537.md?page=11)