tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jan 01 12:41:07 1998
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Re: KLBC -- jIlIHegh (extreme beginner)
- From: Falling <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: KLBC -- jIlIHegh (extreme beginner)
- Date: Thu, 1 Jan 1998 15:25:30 EST
- Organization: AOL (http://www.aol.com)
In a message dated 97-12-26 23:33:58 EST, you write:
> Welcome, notjISaH. Since you knew to put KLBC in your header,
> I'll assume you already know about Beginners' Grammarians and
> KLBC, etc.
Yeah, I've been receiving (and mostly not being able to read) the mailing list
for a couple of weeks.
> valqu'ba' loDnI'lIj.
valqu'bej 'ach QaQ meqwIj'e' Hon. pIj mutlhob <<qatlh Hol 'oghlu'pu'bogh
Daghoj DaneH?>> tlhIngan Hol vIlo'laHbe''e' Qub loDnI'wI'. jIQoch.
(He is certainly very intelligent, but he doubts that my reason is good.
(assuming {meq} to mean "rational thought" or something similar) He often
asks me "Why do you want to learn a language that someone has invented?" My
brother thinks that I won't be able to use the Klingon Language. I disagree.)
Wow, there is a lot of opportunity here for the oh-so-desirable English poetic
parallel structure...
> > ghomvamDaq jIchu'. DaHjaj jIHvaD TKD
> > nobpu' loDnI'wIj.
>
> All this is fine with one little comment.
> {-pu'} does not mean past tense. It means perfective aspect.
> Your English translation says, "...my brother gave me...".
> That's simple past tense. Klingon doesn't have tense, so past
> tense is simply figured out from context. You set the time
> context with {DaHjaj} and considering how well you've done up to
> this point, we'd have to assume it was earlier today that you
> got your TKD.
So it should simply be {DaHjaj jIHvaD TKD nob loDnI'wI'}? I didn't write the
verb that way because of what TKD said in the introduction to the Aspect
suffixes (4.2.7)... "The absence of a Type 7 suffix usually means that the
action is not completed and is not continuous." It seemed like the action was
completed, a discrete event. He gave it to me. The giving is over. Maybe
I'm still confusing the tense/aspect thing, or maybe I should simply translate
more carefully. I don't mean to question what you say here at
all...apparently it's pretty basic and accepted, etc....I just don't
understand what is meant by {nob} alone when there is a past-tense time frame
from the context.
vIghorpu' -- I had broken it. / I have broken it. / I will have broken it.
vIghor -- I broke it. / I break it. / I will break it.
???????
Sure, but...how does the non-completion part fit w/ {vIghor}?
(I've read the more recent, and very lengthy, posts on this topic, and I see
how it's obviously supposed to work...I just can't wrap my brain around how
it'd feel to a native speaker of Klingon to mark verbs with aspect instead of
tense...)
> As written in Klingon, it would translate: "Today, my brother
> has given me TKD," or "Today, my brother had given me TKD," or
> even "Today, my brother will have given me TKD." None of this
> matches what you apparently intended, so you probably want to
> omit {-pu'} here.
I translated that suffix as "gave" because some of the examples in TKD (4.2.7)
under {-pu'} are translated into simple past or
whatever..."wanted"..."told"...so i assumed it was acceptable. I should've
been more precise, under the circumstances. AND I need to get access to and
study a lot more canon, apparently...
> > tlhingan Hol ghojmeH vIqeqtaH.
>
> You probably want {jIqeqtaH} instead of {vIqeqtaH} unless you
> are implying "it" as the object. What you have is not wrong, but
> it does not match the English translation below. That would have
> required {jIqeqtaH}.
Hmmm...looks like I was too set on the English phrasing. I was thinking "I am
practicing it." as in "I am practicing Klingon." From what you wrote, I'm
assuming "it" representing "the language" is not a jarring indirect object for
{qeq} in Klingon, and the problem was just with my mismatched translation.
> While {ghojmeH} works here as is, it would be a little more
> precise to say {vIghojmeH}, since you really are the one person
> who will learn because you are practicing. {-meH} verbs are used
> without a prefix sometimes, but this setting is not a
> particularly good one for this. Again, what you have is not
> wrong. It would be better with {vI-}.
OK, I understand. Because of the {-meH} I guess I wasn't properly considering
the phrase as a whole.
> > jIwebeghpu'be' 'e' vItul.
>
> This is the worst mistake you've made so far. Realize that it is
> remarkable that you wrote this much for your first attempt and
> only made these minor errors. You should be proud.
mmm, cool, thanks for the encouragement...
> Your first mistake is an honest one. {-'egh} always begins with
> an apostrophe. There is a typo in TKD where it is left out and
> you probably learned it from that one instance.
Oh, boy!! Break out the red ink! :-)
> > wa'maH' Soch ben boghpu'.
>
> Except for forgetting the right prefix, this is perfect. Who was
> born seventeen years ago?
wa'maH' Soch ben jIboghpu'.
{ben} is a noun, but the entire "17 yrs. ago" phrase is adverbial or
something, not an object...or at least that's my reasoning for using {jI}.
> > Hello. (Is "nuqneH" an appropriate general greeting, or should it only
be
> > used in a context where the "what do you want?" thing makes more sense?)
>
> People fight over this here a lot. Some people will lecture you
> every time you use it in a setting where it would not be
> appropriate to say in English, "What do you want?"
LOL...soon after I sent this, a whole debate sprung up on the topic in another
mail!! Your examples were helpfully illustrative, so thanks a lot.
> Anyway, I think there is something about names on the FAQ you
> were supposed to have gotten when you joined the list. You might
> check at http://www.kli.org. I think there is a link to such
> things...
Qu'vatlh!!! jabbI'IDghom lIHbogh *FAQ*Hom'e' vIlaDpu'. *website* *FAQ*
vIlaDpu'be'. jeH jiHlaw'. poHvatlhDaq *website*Daq *FAQ* vInejpu'be'.
chotu'moHDI' vIlaD. Supvam vIlo'pu'chugh qay' jIH Quch law' jIH Quch puS.
translation:
AGGGHHHH!! (insert appropriate curse....if that's directed at a person besides
myself, I apologize, I meant it only as an exclamation.) I had read the
shortened FAQ which introduced the mailing list. I had not read the website's
FAQ. I appear to be absentminded. ( {jeH jiH} Hahaha!! I don't know about
the spoken language, but these transliterations are so very musical!!!) At
that time, I had not searched for a FAQ on the website. As soon as you caused
me to notice [it], I read it. If I had used this resource, I would have been
happier than I am happy.
OK, I admit that it all falls apart on that last phrase. Can I put suffixes
on verbs in that comparative formula?
Essentially, reading the FAQ first could've saved me the trouble of figuring
out how to introduce myself in the first place!! I apologize for the
redundant question(s); I'm sure that can get annoying.
A few more questions related to this passage:
--The construction {poHvatlhDaq} does not seem very probable from what I have
read. Can the locative suffix be used to mean "at" a time? Or would it maybe
have to be some complex "During the time before ____some specific
occurence___"?
--chotu'moH..... "you cause me to discover/notice (something)"? One of the
examples of the use of {-moH} in TKD 4.2.4 is {HIQoymoH}, and is translated as
"let me hear (something)". This is the reason I felt semi-comfortable using
the {cho-} prefix. However, the example I just cited is a command, so it
might not apply....or I could be reading the implications incorrectly.
Comment?
> Yes. Okrand tells us that if the indirect object is first or
> second person, this shortcut will work. Meanwhile, he said that
> a while back on MSN, so it is not in TKD.
Yeah, I picked that up in another KLBC post, but I wasn't sure enough to
actually use it...now I've seen several references to it.
> You got the overall grammar right. You just honestly misspelled
> one suffix and omitted another. You were VERY close to correct.
=) Hehe...somehow i doubt the old saying is gonna be appended to read
"...horseshoes, hand-grenades, and Klingon grammar..."
> ghojwI' jIH. *University of Richmond, VA*Daq
> De'wI'mey QeD yab joq vIHaDtaH.
...
...
...
> > I am a student. I am studying
> > computer science and/or psychology (QeD yab = "the mind's
science"???)
> > at the University of Richmond in VA.
>
> It would have been MUCH clearer had you repeated the word {QeD}.
I see...I just had "computers" {De'wI'mey} originally, but it does make more
sense to write the "science" part w/ that word too.
> And that would be {yab QeD}, not {QeD yab}.
Oops, that was a mistake; I was twisting the noun-noun stuff around in my head
a good bit.
> > I haven't really seen anything (I don't
> > think) saying that wI' can modify the whole thing together.
>
> It doesn't have to. {Sut Say'moHwI'} means either "clothing's
> washer" or "washer of clothing". The {-wI'} transforms the verb
> "to wash" into a noun "washer". Once it is a noun, it can be
> used in a noun-noun phrase with another noun.
Cool, this is pretty clear now. Regular N-N translation, sure. I think I had
the impression that something like this'd mean the washer of _a specific_
"clothing," possibly as in one load of laundry. I have a better feel for the
way those constructions can be used now.
The rest of the corrections made perfect sense, and there wasn't really
anything I could comment on...so i zapped'em...
vay'mey mughojmoHbejpu'.
(Heehee!! I just couldn't resist! That is supposed to read "You have
definitely taught me some stuff (somethings)." Interesting stuff, I might
add. Mainly though, I just wrote it in hopes of finding out if the Klingon
word {vay'} has the same pluralization oddities as the various English
translations, or if we can feel it as a regular Klingon noun, just pulling the
meaning from the English. Also, just to make sure: {ghojmoH} is actually
listed in the dictionary part of TKD, so if I happened to want to use a type 2
verb suffix with it, I should just treat it as an entire word, and NOT order
things around the {-moH}? )
> charghwI', taghwI' pabpo' ru'
> Temporary Beginner's Grammarian, December 20-30
>
Thanks again. :-) Hope '98 is interesting!
--notjISaH