tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Jan 10 20:35:45 1996

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing

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

Re: cha'logh jImeQ

SuStel asked:
>"Does he still read this mailing list?"

charghwI' suggested:
>jabbI'IDghomvam laDtaH'a' pIn'a'?

I wrote:
>I think the suffix {-taH} does well
>to capture the meaning you want, though: {laDtaH'a' ghaH} should be
>fine.

Guido complains:
>I'm troubled by this solution. My reputation of criticism against nit-pickers
>may precede me, but this nit bothers me too much to just brush it back into
>the weeds. Twice the suggestion has arisen of using -taH to convey "continue
>to". -taH is more along the lines of "do continually", or better, "to be in
>the process of". I can fully understand why it would seem right to use -taH
>to say "I still/continue to read the mailing list." Altho, I must assert my
>understanding of it has always been of the connotation of "I am reading the
>mailing list", viz., a process or continual action, not an event that has
>occured in the past habitually and now recurs once more.

I agree with you completely.  Note that I said I thought that using {-taH}
"captures the meaning" of the original, not that it is a direct translation.
"Is he reading this group?" and "Does he still read this group?" do not say
exactly the same thing, but the answer to one can answer the other.

To finish the point, I suggest the following convoluted sentence:
{laDbe'choHbe'pu''a'?}  "Has he not changed to not read it?"
I'd say that {-choHbe'} comes close to the meaning of "still."

-- ghunchu'wI'               batlh Suvchugh vaj batlh SovchoH vaj

Back to archive top level