tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Aug 14 13:31:18 1995
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Re: }} {-wI'} on sentences
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: }} {-wI'} on sentences
- Date: Mon, 14 Aug 1995 13:31:18 -0400 (EDT)
According to Alan Anderson:
>
> I wrote:
> > ...(It's a feature
> > of the language that when one places "-er" on a phrase like "eat meat", the
> > object moves to the front of the verb to get out of the way of the "-er".
>
> charghwI' writes:
> >This is completely fiction. You are looking at this pair of
> >words in a completely confused manner and making up a rule that
> >you reverse the "normal" word order when you add "-er" to the
> >verb.
>
> You falsely accuse me, sir. I am not "making up" a rule. I learned in 4th
> grade this feature of the "ACTOR" transformation in English grammar. My
> specific example of "meat eater" comes from a discussion my class had when
> we were discussing adjectives, and our teacher told us that "meat" is NOT
> an adjective in that phrase.
The thing to recognize here is that with a language like
English, unlike Klingon, the rules of grammar were not created
first and then people started making sentences which followed
the rules. People made sentences for generations before anybody
tried to figure out the rules. Language came first. Linguists
came later.
In the case of Klingon, the linguist came first. Of course, he
tried to make it look like the language came first, and that is
certainly the greatest challenge for him as those who use the
language seek to use it for things that Okrand did not
especially foresee. I'm repeatedly surprised at how much he
really DID foresee and prepare for in such a tiny book...
Anyway, the term "meat eater" and others like it existed long
before terms like "attributive noun" or "ACTOR transformation"
existed. They are both attempts to explain a term which people
use and understand.
Given that this "ACTOR transformation" business seems rather
specialized and it describes something that the much broader
"attributive noun" explanation already carries quite nicely, I
wonder what use it really serves.
By that, I mean that given yoDtargh's nice example of "Romulan
traitor", there are times when "ACTOR transformation" fails to
explain a word pair that it should explain while "attributive
noun" explains it quite nicely. Meanwhile, I can't imagine an
instance of a word pair that "ACTOR transformation" theory
explains that the concept of an "attributive noun" fails to
explain.
This is exactly the nature of my argument about the {N VwI'}
case. For me, it is {N-N}, just like any other {N-N}. The
theory of using a nominal clause appears to work sometimes and
fail at other times, while the explanation of noun-noun does
not fail in any circumstance that an unjustifiable nominal
clause succeeds. And all this happens in a context where {-wI'}
is explicitly excluded from the list of Type 9 verb suffixes
which involve clauses.
> The interpretation that I learned in grammar school :-) is that the pair of
> words "meat eater" is a noun clause (I'm not sure of the term anymore)
> derived from the phrase "eats meat". I remember this specific example
> distinctly. The way it was written on the blackboard was approximately:
>
> EATS MEAT ------> MEAT EATER
> T-ACTOR
>
> I haven't seen transformational grammar mentioned in school since I started
> Junior High school, so I don't know if this is the current way to describe
> it.
I hope not. Of course, grammar school is also where they tell
you that the smallest particle is an electron and that the only
other subatomic particles are neutrons and protons. They teach
you that dinosaurs were cold blooded. Then there's the Big
Bang, taught as a fact rather than a rather far fetched theory
without much evidence behind it that can't be explained other
ways. They teach you about how some white guy bought Manhattan
for a bucket of beads and neglect to tell you about the Trail
of Tears a.k.a. "The Removal". In 1492 Columbus sailed the
ocean blue, but let's not talk about the genecide he left
behind...
Let's face it. When we try to teach complex things to the
relatively young, we usually come up with some rather unusual
simplifications that may not hold up to much scruteny. Add in
that the teachers do not always have a strong personal interest
in some of the topics they are required to teach.
Everybody does the best they can given their available
resources. Meanwhile, I wouldn't consider grammar school
grammar to all be comprehensive and accurate while tackling an
alien language.
>From your point of view, I appear to be making up rules to justify my
> position? Interesting. From my point of view you have just extended your
> attack on my interpretation of Klingon to attack also my knowledge of
> English grammar.
Point taken.
> >You don't say, "eat meat", then add "-er" to "eat" and then
> >reverse the words. You just say, "eat", then add "-er" to be a
> >noun and then you take the word "meat" and associate it with
> >that noun. A "meat tenderizing hammer" is also called a "meat
> >hammer". Does that mean that "ham" is a verb and the root of
> >this was some sentence about hamming meat?
>
> If "ham" were a verb from which "hammer" were derived, then I indeed would
> interpret "meat hammer" as a "thing which hams meat". However, hammer is a
> simple noun (from Old English "hamor") which just happens to end in "-er".
> I have no problem with such a pairing of two simple nouns.
So, if you have no problem with the pairing of two simple nouns
and you can agree that a verb alone with {-er} becomes a noun
and that using that noun as a simple noun in such a pair of
simple nouns works fine, THEN WHY CLING TO THIS ODD "ACTOR
TRANSFORMATION" BULLSHIT?
> Replace
> "hammer" with "club" to remove the incidental "-er" and "meat club" fits my
> interpretation of genitive. "Meat hammerer", on the other hand, DOES mean
> to me "thing which hammers meat".
It also means "hammerer which is associated with meat". When
the more general rule does a fine job of explaining the
incident, why bother with a more specific rule? We could
similarly build a special rule for every verb in the English
language. Of course, this would be ridiculously redundent, but
then so is the rule you are pushing so hard.
> >Meat sauce. // A sauce made of meat. Fine in English, but it does
> // not fit my understanding of noun-noun in Klingon.
Perhaps the problem lies less in noun-noun than in your
understanding of noun-noun.
> >Meat hammer. // The hammer is defined by its use with meat. Fine.
> >Meat cleaver. // A thing which cleaves meat. I don't hear the
> // word "cleaver" used by itself as a simple noun.
A cleaver is a knife with a very rectangular side view. The
blade is very heavy and protrudes massively from the handle:
___________________________________________
(_________________ |
| |
| |
| |
|_________________________|
You'll probably find a listing for it in your dictionary. Mine
says, "butcher's chopping tool for carcasses." It doesn't need
an object in order to be a noun.
> >Meat knife. // The knife is defined by its use with meat. Fine.
Attributive noun, perhaps?
> >Meat offering.// (Uh, oh. I'll get to this one later.)
> >Meat wagon. // I'll pass on this one; it's a colloquialism.
Regardless, the concept of an attributive noun explains it
quite effectively. In fact, all of these examples are
explainable by the concept of an attributive noun, WHICH IS MY
POINT. INSTEAD OF QUIBBLING OVER WHETHER OR NOT YOUR
SPECIALIZED AND UNNECESSARY RULE APPLIES TO EACH OF THESE
CASES, WHY DON'T YOU JUST RECOGNIZE THAT A DIFFERENT, FAR MORE
GLOBAL RULE EXPLAINS THEM ALL?
> >Meat tea. [for those Britts among us]
> // Since "tea" here is a meal rather than a drink,
> // and "meat" defines which meal is being discussed,
> // I think this is a genitive noun-noun construction.
Duh.
> >Meat store. // The store is defined by its selling meat. Fine.
> >Meat salesman.// Because of the word "salesman" this is borderline.
> // In Klingon, this would be {HaDI'baH ngevwI'},
> // "meat seller", which I don't see as a "genitive".
> >Meat eater. // One who eats meat. I don't think it fits noun-noun.
[wince.]
...
> There's nothing mysterious about the ACTOR transformation; it simply seems
> that you either have never heard of it or you have forgotten it.
I believe that I have never heard of it. If indeed I had heard
of it, I quite appropriately forgot it, since one of the
functions of being a student is to think and to realize that
everything they teach you in school is not necessarily
accurate. You have to filter through it and hold on to those
things which prove to be most true in the long run and let go
of nit-picky little things which don't really work all that
well.
> I'm afraid I'm about to dig myself in deeper here, but I would be
> abandoning my principles if I just ignored how I feel about these. I've
> rearranged the examples to put similar constructions together.
>
> >Energy policy...Energy field...Energy conduit...
> >Energy department...Energy bill
>
> These all fit my interpretation of noun-noun (with the disclaimer that
> "conduit" is probably {qengwI'} in Klingon, not a simple noun).
When you add {-wI'} to a verb, you get a simple noun. Deal with
it. Stop pretending that you can collect together more than one
word and put {-wI'} on that clause. You can't. Stop pretending
that somehow a verb with {-wI'} is something different from a
simple noun. It isn't. It never was. It never will be.
> >Energy monitor...Energy changer
>
> These are the N-V-wI' examples which trouble me so.
Have you considered therapy?
> >Energy storage...Energy consumption...Energy accumulation
>
> I have to say it. I don't really relish the response I'm going to get, but
> I have to say it. These fit the pattern N-V-ghach. If I propose that
> {-wI'} works on a verb with an object, the same arguments apply to
> {-ghach}. This is the category in which I would place "meat offering".
While I'm not all that attracted to using {-ghach}, the truth
is that any legitimate word created by adding {-ghach} to a
verb with an appropriate suffix becomes every bit as much of a
noun as any word derived from a verb with {-wI'}. I've never
doubted that. There's no problem created here. The attributive
noun concept handles these two with equal ease and effectiveness.
> >Bill changer.
> >Sorry. That just kinda happened.
>
> No problem. After my sincere but horrifying suggestion that {-ghach} might
> be permitted to act on a verb with an object, I think we need some comic
> relief.
I hope you can recognize that any time I'm flaming this much,
my entire personna is being presented with comic intent. It is
only the assurance you sent that this kind of argument is what
you live for that has driven me to provide you with so much to
live through. I don't REALLY think you are a stubborn, thick
headed idiot just because you act like one. {{:)> I'm certain
that you are really a nice, sensitive, understanding,
intelligent person. A bad old teacher just seared one of your
synapses at an impressionable age and now you seem to have no
ability to comprehend this specific point of grammar. Hopefully
it just affected your brain and not your genetic structure so
that this trait will not be passed on to your progeny.
> >In 6.2.2, describing subordinate clauses, Okrand says, "Klingon
> >verbs ending in Type 9 suffixes (other than {-'a'}
> >INTERROGATIVE and {-wI'} ONE WHO DOES, ONE WHICH DOES) always
> >occur in sentences with another verb. Hence, they are verbs in
> >subordinate clauses." This rather specifically rejects {-wI'}
> >as a subordinate clause marker, and if {-wI'} is not a
> >subordinate clause marker, just exactly what kind of clause do
> >you suggest that it marks?
>
> It's a "nominalizer". It doesn't "mark" a subordinate clause, it "creates"
> a noun clause, or as TKD calls it, a "compound noun".
Now you are WAAAAAAAAAAAAY off base. To say that {-bogh}
"marks" a relative clause is to say that it creates one. When
you see {-bogh}, you know that you are looking at a relative
clause. When you want to create a relative clause, you use
{-bogh}. There is no other means for creating a relative
clause. To say that {-meH} "marks" a purpose clause is to say
that it creates one. You can't have a purpose clause without
{-meH}.
To explicitly except {-wI'} from the list of verbs that can be
involved in subordinate clauses is to state that a verb with
{-wI'} cannot create one. A lone verb gets {-wI'} added to the
end and then becomes a noun before any other grammatical action
occurs. You cannot lump together multiple words and somehow
apply {-wI'} to the clause. TKD explicitly says you can't do
this.
Why, oh why isn't this enough?
Also, please recognize that a compound noun is a single word.
It is not a clause of any sort.
> "noun-noun" is the
> only kind of compound noun defined by TKD, but I find that definition
> deficient when it comes to {woj choHwI'} etc.
The noun-noun construction appears in TKD near the topic of
compound nouns, but the former is not a subset of the latter.
It is a different thing altogether. Actually, if you look,
you'll see that it isn't really all that near.
> >Will you PLEASE admit that this deals a death blow to your
> >argument? I feel like the knight at the bridge when the other
> >knight with no arms and no legs is spewing blood and screaming,
> >"Come back here, you coward! I'll bite your legs off!" The
> >fight is over. Just lay down and die, okay?
>
> "Just a flesh wound."
[ ]
> I have argued myself into a very dark corner where I am faced with a
> multitude of ravenous beasts bearing the name {-ghach}. This has
> substantially weakened my resolve. charghwI', I thank you. You have
> forced me to explore the logical limits of my proposal, and I've reached a
> conclusion that is "anathema to the concept of a Klingon sentence." Your
> tolerance for novel constructions is obviously much lower than mine; I had
> to pursue the implications much farther before I ran into sufficiently
> uncomfortable conclusions. I must now either accept that {woj choHwI'} is
> indeed a noun-noun construction, or permit both {-wI'} AND {-ghach} to act
> on verbs with objects.
>
> I choose now to reject objects on a verb with {-ghach}. By association, I
> must reject objects on a verb with {-wI'). I must expand my interpretation
> of the noun-noun construction to encompass "energy changer" etc.
Well, it is a strange reason to give up the fight, but I'll
accept it.
> charghwI', maybe I should get you a T-shirt that says:
>
> chargh
> I won the vs -wI' debate of 1995!
> ghunchu'
>
> I at least owe you a box of chocolate-covered tribbles.
I'm sure many of us are quite ready for the end of this thread.
> -- ghunchu'wI'
charghwI'
--
\___
o_/ \
<\__,\
"> | Get a grip.
` |