tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Sep 19 11:28:31 1995
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Re: }} Q: -Ha' (was Re: 'Smoking' etc.)
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: }} Q: -Ha' (was Re: 'Smoking' etc.)
- Date: Tue, 19 Sep 1995 11:28:31 -0400 (EDT)
According to Marc Ruehlaender:
...
> I'd like to slip in a question here:
> when I joined this list about a year ago, I've been
> told, -Ha' simply means "opposite action/state",
> although Okrand consistently describes it as either
> doing s.th. wrongly (mis-) or as involving a change.
> ("there is a change of state", "undo", "de-", "dis-",
> "turn of luck"). I've been told then, that this is
> not how it was meant (and examples from the appendix
> support this). However, if this is so, what - if any
> at all - is the difference between, e.g.,
>
> DaSmey Say' and DaSmey lamHa' ?
>
> If all I had on -Ha' was 4.3. I'd translate them as
>
> clean boots cleaned boots
> (boots that [are] turn[ed] undirty)
Considering that to say something is clean is very near saying
that it is the polar opposite of dirty, I see the two
statements as being very close to equivalent, as indeed "clean
boots" and "cleaned boots" are both clean boots. Still, DaSmey
Say' could be DaSmey chu', and so they have never been dirtied.
Simply, their cleanliness is referenced without any statement,
positive or negative, about whether or not they have ever been
dirty.
Meanwhile, DaSmey lamHa' makes a specific reference to their
state of being dirty and strongly negates it. It is not that
they are merely not dirty. They are the opposite of dirty. In
particular, since the original verb is stative, there is no
process to be mismanaged. It would not be sensible to refer to
the process of being dirty to have been imperfectly executed,
so instead, we lean towards a more forceful kind of negative
than a mere {lanbe'}.
There is an implication that the shoes were dirty and have been
remarkably well cleaned, but I see it more as the difference
between the two similar English sentences:
Wow! Those shoes are really CLEAN!
Wow! Those shoes have absolutely NO dirt on them AT ALL!
The surprise noted in the second sentence might subtlely imply
that the shoes were known to have had dirt on them or would
somehow one would reasonably expect them to have a little dirt
on them for some reason. The first sentence merely admires the
cleanliness.
> (I'm not sure what aspect -Ha' should imply with this usage...)
>
> On a related issue, charghwI' recently used yuvHa'
> to mean "pull". To me, it sounds like "push wrongly"
> because in order to "unpush" s.th. you might as well
> be pushing it back from the opposite side.
This is one of those prepositional things. "Push" can be
interpreted either as the sensory experience of pressing with
the hands, or it can be more objectively seen as exerting force
away from the actor. In the former sense, "push" is a
completely unrelated action because the sensations are totally
different. Meanwhile, in the latter sense, "pull" is simply to
"unpush", or to apply pressure toward the actor.
If you were to define the polar opposite of push, you would
probably choose "pull" rather than "to screw up the process of
pushing". Meanwhile, if you were to define the polar opposite
of "understand" you would probably choose "misunderstand"
rather than some abstract sense of removing the process of
understanding. This is the sense in which a polar opposite
becomes a badly executed positive action.
Okay, lets look at our canon {-Ha'} and {-be'} words:
belHa' "displeased" polar opposite of bel.
You can be in many states regarding pleasure, such that to be
not pleased is not as stong a statement as to be displeased, so
"displeased" needs a suffix to set it apart from merely not
being pleased.
ghomHa' "scatter, disperse" polar opposite of ghom.
There are many states of being grouped, so to actively ungroup
requires a different suffix than merely not being grouped.
jotHa' "be uneasy" polar opposite of jot.
Again, there are many states of calmness...
jubbe' "be immortal" not jub.
You are either mortal, or you are not. There is no need to mark
those who are the opposite of mortal, rather than merely not
being mortal.
lobHa' "disobey" is polar opposite of lob. There are many
degrees of obedience.
naDHa' "discommend, disapprove" the CLASSIC {-Ha'} verb that
created the {-ghach} suffix. There are many states of approval
and this is the polar opposite.
parHa'. Again, there are many degrees of disliking. This is the
polar opposite.
qImHa'. There are many degrees. Polar.
QeyHa'. Note: this does not mean to screw up being tight. Note
also that if you want this to mean to change state to be loose,
you must use QeyHa'moH, so {-Ha'} does not necessarily imply a
change of state. It just means polar opposite. There is a
difference between merely being not tight and being loose. It
is a matter of degree, which is generally the difference
between {-be'} and {-Ha'}.
Qochbe'. While this one surprises me some, I could only explain
it by either taking the mortality view that either you agree
with me or you don't and there is no middle ground, or that
there is another verb {QochHa'} which would mean that you and I
are of one mind: a state beyond simple agreement. I suspect the
former is the case and that this is a cultural statement about
the Klingon attitude.
QuchHa'. Many states. Polar.
I'm not touching roSHa'moH.
tuQHa'moH. You can dress someone, not dress them or undress
them.
voqHa'. Many states. Polar.
yajHa'. Polar.
yepHa'. Polar.
yuDHa'. Polar.
I probably missed some. This is a visual scan through a printed
dictionary, not a computer aided search. The point is that the
canon is very consistent in the difference between {-be'} and
{-Ha'}. Consider how significant the number 3 is to Klingons.
Instead of a two state description of the world
(positive-negative) they have a three state perspective
(positive - not positive - negative). I think that Okrand's
verbal description of the meaning of {-Ha'} was not nearly as
clear as the accumulation of his examples.
It is not that I like trying to rewrite Okrand's language. It
is that I try to use it and after doing that long enough,
certain patterns become evident in what is effective and what
is not.
For example, using any noun as a verb and any verb as a noun is
not effective. It results in what easily becomes a high
likelihood of many confusing sentences. Having some words which
work both ways is easily tolerable, so long as we know what
these words are as a limited list. To open the gates and let
any word be used both ways really would make the language so
easy to write and so hard to read that the literature would
quickly fill with impenetrable garbage and the language would
become useless. I, for one, would lose interest in it.
> My worries are, that most people probably only have TKD
> (not the grammarians on this list) to refer to, if they
> are to translate s.th. and the description of -Ha' seems
> quite unambiguous to me.
If we discount anything resolved by those actively using the
language, who very much respect preserving the language as much
as possible in Okrand's intended form, simply because Okrand
didn't spell it out clearly enough in the published book, then
it becomes less of a language than a mystical religion. We are
here to demystify this expressive language while preserving
Okrand's true intent even more than his human attempt at
describing it has succeeded to do so.
By your logic, we should stop publishing HolQeD and stop asking
Okrand to clarify anything, since any revisions he offers are
not in TKD.
> bIjangchugh bIjangmo' qathlo'
>
> Marc "Dochlangan"
charghwI'
--
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