5.11. Conversion of simple selbri

Conversion is the process of changing a selbri so that its places appear in a different order. This is not the same as labeling the sumti with the cmavo of FA, as mentioned in Section 5.7, and then rearranging the order in which the sumti are spoken or written. Conversion transforms the selbri into a distinct, though closely related, selbri with renumbered places.

In Lojban, conversion is accomplished by placing a cmavo of selma'o SE before the selbri:

Example 5.109.

prami

I love you.

is equivalent in meaning to:

Example 5.110.

do	se	prami	mi
You	[swap x₁ and x₂]	love	me.

You are loved by me.

Conversion is fully explained in Section 9.4. For the purposes of this chapter, the important point about conversion is that it applies only to the following simple selbri. When trying to convert a tanru, therefore, it is necessary to be careful! Consider Example 5.111:

Example 5.111.

la	.alis.	cu	cadzu	klama	le	zarci
That-named	Alice		is-a-walker	type-of-goer-to	the	market.
That-named	Alice		walkingly	goes-to	the	market.

Alice walks to the market.

To convert this sentence so that le zarci is in the x₁ place, one correct way is:

Example 5.112.

le	zarci	cu	se
The	market		is-a-[swap x₁/x₂]
The	market

ke	cadzu	klama	[ke'e]	la	.alis.
(	walker	type-of-goer-to	)	that-named	Alice.
	is-walkingly	gone-to-by		that-named	Alice.

The ke … ke'e brackets cause the entire tanru to be converted by the se, which would otherwise convert only cadzu, leading to:

Example 5.113.

le	zarci	cu	se	cadzu
The	market		(is-a-[swap x₁/x₂]	walker)
The	market			is-a-walking-surface

klama	la	.alis.
type-of-goer-to	that-named	Alice.
type-of-goer-to	that-named	Alice.

whatever that might mean. An alternative approach, since the place structure of cadzu klama is that of klama alone, is to convert only the latter:

Example 5.114.

le	zarci	cu	cadzu	se klama	la	.alis.
The	market		walkingly	is-gone-to-by	that-named	Alice.

But the tanru in Example 5.114 may or may not have the same meaning as that in Example 5.111; in particular, because cadzu is not converted, there is a suggestion that although Alice is the goer, the market is the walker. With a different sumti as x₁, this seemingly odd interpretation might make considerable sense:

Example 5.115.

la	.djan.	cu	cadzu	se klama	la	.alis
That-named	John		walkingly	is-gone-to-by	that-named	Alice

suggests that Alice is going to John, who is a moving target.

There is an alternative type of conversion, using the cmavo jai of selma'o JAI optionally followed by a modal or tense construction. Grammatically, such a combination behaves exactly like conversion using SE. More details can be found in Section 9.12.