tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Oct 14 22:10:15 1998
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names and "to be" again (was Re: KLBC)
ja' charghwI':
>I've heard people say both, "My name is Alan," and "Alan is my
>name." Meanwhile, adding the indefinite article as you have done
>in "My name is an 'Alan'," is no different from adding it to the
>other word order forming: "An 'Alan' is my name."
I add it to the object because the preponderance of examples given to us
add an article to the object in the English translation of a pronoun-as-
"to be" sentence. With very few exceptions, all of them seem to work well
if one translates the pronoun-as-verb using "is a/an", and most of those
exceptions work well if it's translated using "is the". (A Type 4 noun
suffix on the object would override the article, of course, the way it
does in any translation of a noun.)
>I certainly accept your argument to remind people which is
>subject and which is object, but in this instance, the term "my
>name" and "Alan" are interchangeable. I can imagine two people
>in a noisy room:
>
>"What is your name?"
>"Alan is my name."
>"Your name is what?"
>"My name is Alan."
It's actually this very interchangability that bothers me most. I do
not want to accept the pronoun-as-verb usage as indicating equality.
English "be" does that, but I am not convinced Klingon {'oH} does.
>None of this sounds wrong to me. Similarly, neither {pongwIj 'oH
>*Alan*'e'} and {*Alan* 'oH pongwIj'e'} sound wrong.
They only sound "wrong" to me because I automatically want to translate
them with an indefinite article on the object. I quickly supress that
urge and I understand the intent perfectly, but I am not convinced that
it is correct.
>It's not like I want to cause a flame war or launch a major
>protest. I just want it to be clear that while *SOME* of us
>think this is a big deal, this new person should recognize that
>*SOME* of us don't.
Making known my viewpoint on this is one of my missions, that's all.
-- ghunchu'wI'