Talk:Z11390

English agent nouns derived from verbs ending in "-ant"/"-ent"

For many English verbs there are two sets of agent nouns that can be constructed from verbs, those that generally end in "-er"/"-or" (for which this function is designed), as well as those that end in "-ant"/"-ent".

For example, the verb "to serve" has both agentive nouns "server" and "servant", and from "to inform" can be formed both "informer" and "informant". Other verbs favor agentive nouns formed with "-ant"/"-ent", over "-er"/"-or", for example, with "to participate" we have "participant", but "participator", while grammatical, is not so much used (the same goes with "claimant", from "to claim"—"claimer" is not so much used, as well as "deterrent" from "to deter", as opposed to "deterrer").

Then there is the issue of what exactly "agent" is intended to mean in the description of this function—if it is not restricted to the more limited sense of a person who is the agent, and allows the more general sense of "agent" as "something or someone that is the means by which an action is carried out", then we also have many words like "sealant", the "-ant"/"-ent" agentive noun of the verb "to seal", "pollutant" from "to pollute", etc.

Further complicating the issue of "-ant"/"-ent" agentive nouns is the fact that some words like "defendant", from "to defend", appear to represent not so much the agent, but the passive recipient of the action (e.g. a "defender" defends the "defendant"). Some agent nouns formed with "-ant"/"-ent" have very different meanings than their "-er"/"-or" counterparts, for example, "protester" (which can also be spelled "protestor", representing yet another complication for this function) is quite different than "protestant", though both are agent nouns formed from "to protest". Then there are some verbs like "to misdemean", which exclusively form agent nouns with "-ant"/"-ent"—i.e. "misdemeanant" is an agent noun, but "misdemeanor" is certainly not, and the verb "to reenter" has "reentrant", but not "reenterer". There is also the verb "to subtend", which has agentive noun "subtendent", but not "subtender".

So in general, my question is, how can this function be adapted to cover both of these different forms of agent nouns, both of which are common for many verbs? And then how to distinguish special cases like "defendant" that don’t work the same way, or cases like "protester"/"protestor"/"protestant", which have multiple forms, some with very different meanings?

PS there are also some phrasal verbs like "to cut off" that have dual agent nouns, for example "cutter off" (pl. "cutters off") and "cutter offer" (pl. "cutter offers"), while others, like "to egg on" have only "egger on" (pl. "eggers on"), but not so much "egger oner" (although there is affectation for this too).

Hermes Thrice Great (talk) 05:43, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't think this can be done tbh, after thinking about this for a while, I found this post on english stackexchange :[1], what is basically said in the answers is that the ending of the agent noun depends on the origin of the word, whether it comes from latin or germanic. Given that I'm absolutely new here and stumbled on this function quickly, I don't know what should be done about impossible to realize functions. Lastrik (talk) 23:52, 14 December 2023 (UTC)