tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Feb 03 17:16:08 1995
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Re: how to thank
- From: [email protected]
- Subject: Re: how to thank
- Date: Fri, 3 Feb 1995 20:16:20 -0500
[apposition comments deleted...]
>Apposition has been on the short list for Okrand for a long
>time. In particular, it is closely related to proper use of the
>verb {pong}, since "Klingons call me charghwI'" is a statement
>in which "me" and "charghwI'" are restatements of the same
>entity with two different nouns.
I realize you *did* say "closely related", but I want to point out just
how different these constructions are. The {pong} question is an
issue of a verb with double objects, i.e., it assign two object roles. Most
transitive verbs assign one object role, and would sound strange if you tried
to put another object there: *"I put the ball the table." You can't do it.
But with {pong}, which takes two objects, you can.
Apposition, on the other hand, is where you have one more object than the
verb assigns roles for, and the two objects "share" the role: I put the ball,
the red one, on the table." The "ball" and "the red one" are in the same
grammatical relation to the verb. This is decidedly *not* what is happening
with {pong}.
--Holtej