tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Mar 31 15:01:59 2012
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Re: [Tlhingan-hol] To-Be-Constructions
I prefer {X 'oH pongwIj'e'}, for much the same reasons as others have explained (my name is the topic of the discussion), but canon seems to lean in the other direction. Looking at some examples (from memory, since klingonska.org/canon appears to be down):
Sojvetlh 'oH nuq'e'? ("What is that food?")
Dochvam nuq? ("What's this thing?")
yIH nuq? ("What is a tribble?")
In all of these cases, it seems that the thing you're being asked to describe in more detail is the object.
Going by these example, I'd judge that the best way to ask somebody their name would be {ponglIj nuq?} or {ponglIj 'oH nuq'e'?}
From this, it seems reasonable to extrapolate that "My name is loghaD" would be put as {pongwIj 'oH loghaD'e'.}
________________________________________
From: Philip Newton [[email protected]]
Sent: Saturday, March 31, 2012 22:24
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [Tlhingan-hol] To-Be-Constructions
On Sat, Mar 31, 2012 at 20:25, Lieven Litaer <[email protected]> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> without giving my own opinion, I ask all of you:
>
> Do you see any difference between
> {A 'oH B-'e'} and {B 'oH A-'e'} ?
Yes - a difference in topicness. Pretty much what SuStel said.
> Going one step further, how do you say "My name is X",
{X 'oH pongwIj'e'}
> and why do you not
> use the opposite word order of what was your first choice?
Because typically I want to answer the question "What is your name?"
and not "What is 'Philip Newton'?"
So I answer, effectively: "My name? It's 'Philip Newton'" rather than
"'Philip Newton'? That's my name."
If someone *did*, for some strange reason, ask {nuq 'oH «Philip
Newton»'e'?}, I would then probably answer, {pongwIj 'oH «Philip
Newton»'e'}.
In general, copulas aren't symmetric, I think, since it's fairly rare
that they're used to signifiy identity - more often, I think, they
signify something else, such as membership in a set ("Lions are
animals" is not the same as "Animals are lions") or quality ("Snow is
white" -- "White is snow" is unusual, and would probably be understood
as a poetic rearrangement of word order rather than having "White" as
the "subject"(?) of the copula).
Cheers,
Philip
--
Philip Newton <[email protected]>
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