tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Apr 25 10:43:24 2002

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing



[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]

Re: apposition with pronouns



From: "Sangqar (Sean Healy)" <[email protected]>

> There was recently a thread titled "majaH torgh" which got me thinking.
How
> would we do apposition with pronouns?
>
> vIjaH jIH Sangqar
> I, Sangqar, go.

Sure, why not?  It would be intoned in a particular way; don't think this is
a magic apposition formula.  /jIjaH jIH!  SuStel!/

> Or would it be permissible to leave out the pronoun?
>
> vIjaH Sangqar

Oy vey.  mu'tlheghvetlh vIlajbe'bejqu' jIH'e'.

> Some might say that Sangqar is not a first-person subject

Me!  I say that!

> - but If I'm the
> one speaking, it is, because it's me.

No, "I" is a first-person subject.  /Sangqar/ is a name, and can be used as
a third-person noun of any kind.  Just because it happens to be YOUR name is
irrelevant.

I can legitimately say, "SuStel goes to the Great Hall," but I can't say,
"SuStel go to the Great Hall."  The latter is wrong, it's baby-talk, spoken
by those who haven't yet figured out how to use pronouns and verb
conjugations.  But if my name COULD be used as a first-person subject, I
COULD say "SuStel go to the Great Hall."  I can't, so it isn't.

> But this would sound extremely weird
> in Finnish (in which the subject pronoun is more frequently dropped than
> used, like Klingon), so I suspect the first is the better choice.

Remember, what sounds weird in Finnish has no bearing on what sounds weird
in Klingon.

> Of course, this would probably never be used in spoken Klingon,

I disagree.  See my first paragraph.  In fact, I think it would be used in
spoken Klingon far more than in written Klingon, assuming Klingons have
different written and spoken forms.

SuStel
Stardate 2315.2


Back to archive top level