tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Jan 30 23:48:36 1995
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Re: KLBC: QutneS ghIth: Part 3
- From: Marc Ruehlaender <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: KLBC: QutneS ghIth: Part 3
- Date: Tue, 31 Jan 95 8:50:35 MEZ
- In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>; from "Mark E. Shoulson" at Jan 30, 95 7:40 pm
- Mailer: Elm [revision: 66.25]
> >> "nuq bonejneS SoH juplI' je?"
>
> >Interesting point here. The {bo-} seems to address both people
> >together in the second person, but {SoH juplI' je} addresses
> >them individually, one in the second person and one in the
> >third. Does anyone with more experience with languages with
> >distinct singular vs. plural second person pronouns want to
> >shed light on this?
>
> Well. It's an interesting one, I'd say. The simple answer, and the one
> I'm inclined to follow in Klingon, is that this is correct usage. After
> all, "tlhIH" is "those plural addressed", and often considered in many
> languages to be "you and another" (cf. Cherokee, charghwI'). I can see how
> you're saying it's different from "maH" being "jIH SoSwI' je", since "maH"
> need not have the same sense of all the members being first person as you
> might expect tlhIH to be all second person (man, I'm explaining this really
> poorly. It's a tough concept, and it keeps shifting when I think about
> it). Whatever. I'm inclined to buy it as is.
>
> ~mark
>
Now, German - my native language - does distinguish
the two pronouns (at least if you drop the -neS).
The concept seems quite clear to me:
You have a subject, which is composed of several
nouns joined by a noun conjunction.
The verb prefix reflects the grammatical subject,
so it must be plural.
In English you'd surely say
What WERE me and my mum looking for?
Not: *What WAS me and my mum looking for?
The same goes for second person.
So I'm inclined to think, there's no other way,
though I'm not a linguist, and may be proven wrong.
Marc 'Doychlangan'
--
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Marc Ruehlaender [email protected]
Universitaet des Saarlandes, Saarbruecken, Germany
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