tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Feb 23 11:51:58 1995
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Re: Relative clause ambiguity
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Relative clause ambiguity
- Date: Thu, 23 Feb 95 14:51:53 EST
- In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>; from "A.Appleyard" at Feb 23, 95 12:38 pm
According to A.Appleyard:
>
...
> {DujDaq vIqIpbogh vIlegh} = "ship-in I-hit-(him/it)-REL I-see-(him/it)".
> i.e. you don't know which of the prefix pronouns means itself and which is
> there merely to agree with a noun. Likely the only way out of this ambiguity
> is to put in a separate object pronoun:-
> (1) {DujDaq vIqIpbogh ghaH vIlegh} = "I saw him in the ship that I hit"
This is the sentence I would prefer to disallow because the
relative clause still lacks what I would consider a valid head
noun. I'll spare everyone my explaining this again.
> (2) {DujDaq ghaH vIqIpbogh vIlegh} = "I saw the ship in which I hit him"
Nope. I see this only as "In the ship, I see him whom I hit."
The ship is not the direct object of anything because it is a
locative. the head noun is {ghaH}, which is also the direct
object of the verb {legh} and {DujDaq} is the locative for that
same main verb.
> If Klingon word order was flexible enough to put the {DujDaq} after its
> verb, (2) would become {vIqIp DujDaq 'oH vIlegh}, and {'oH} would start to
> look a bit like an English relative pronoun, and the construction would be
> clearer with the {'oH} next to its antecedent.
Actually, that just looks like two sentences. {vIqIp. DujDaq
'oH vIlegh.}
> An English multi-nested relative clause constructions can be clear because
> every antecedent can be brought to the end of its clause, whether by varying
> the S-V-O order to O-S-V (e.g. "the man <who I saw>"), or to O-V-S by putting
> the verb in the passive, and so every clause can be completed before starting
> the next clause. This would not be so in Klingon. (How illegal is {vIqIp
> DujDaq} in that order, anyway? Its meaning is clear.)
To a non-Klingon speaker it is clear, sort of like, "Red the
car is," is quite clear in English, though it is ungrammatical.
Just because the words lack an alternative function does not
mean that there is no expected order for them.
charghwI'
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