tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Apr 19 19:04:05 1994
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Re: Doch Sar
Hu'tegh! nuq ja' [email protected] jay'?
=1. DochwI' Da [Okrand]. I agree with Nick, on the establishment of a Klingon
=Academy, if Okrand doesn't step out at least every three months and give us
=some new words and clarification on grammatical controversies.
and the crowd goes wild! ;)
=2. I don't think any one of us has a real grasp on the nature of Klingon's
=backward syntax.
Oh. I dunno. I do know that I was trying to teach myself Farsi the other
day (I've got an Iranian roommate in my office), and I had to stop myself
from putting my indirect objects first in the sentence!
=The fact that Klingons use OVS and tend to stick all other words in front of
=that structure does not mean that their brains are backwards.
It doesn't. It does mean that... oh, how do I put it: feeling at home with
Klingon, being able to talk to yourself in it, without having to do things
like put the -meH clause at the end of the sentence, then realise it doesn't
belong there and correct yourself --- is difficult. But I also think it comes
with time.
Speaking of Farsi: it distinguishes between & (a as in man) and a (a as
in British father), and I just realised I've been using the wrong a in
Klingon all this time. My Klingon a is central (a as in Australian father;
it's American too, isn't it?), but Klingon a is back. At least, now I'll
have to relisten to those tapes...
=4. Nick's wish for understanding the nature of the Klingon Sprachegefuehl is
=rather unrealistic, considering a definite lack of native speakers.
All I can say is, after 170 K of Klingon, I do have *some* sort of feel
about Klingon. charghwI' is probably quite right in saying it's just
*my* feel, but I think there is a common denominator to all possible
Sprachgefuehle that is more than our English substratum.
=A Sentence-As-Subject construction is a most reasonable wish. [...]
=In fact, a clause can do all the things that a nominal can do in Klingon,
=EXCEPT be a subject.
Yes; but I don't see how a SAS construction could be fitted into the language
at this late stage. In any case, I've given up on it, using ghu'vam as
a clausal anaphor almost exclusively these days; thus:
=An English phrase that Lloyd used in ST3 keeps coming to mind: "Who I am is
=not important; [the fact] that I have them is [important]." How to render
=this in Klingon?? There must be a way.
'Iv jIH [net yu'laH]. ram ghu'vetlh. potlh ghu'vam: chaH vIghaj.
=7. More on how badly Klingon needs an irrealis:
=In the phrase, {jIjaH vIneH}, what is really being said is "I go. That's what
=I want." If you don't want to mean that the action of going is really
=happening, you would have to use an irrealis. "I would go. That's what I
=want."
=That would severely change a lot of Klingon grammar. Oh well. So much for
=that wish.
Like I said, all you need is an adverb corresponding to chaq.
--
Nick.