tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Mar 12 06:48:08 1996

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Re: KLBC-Double-object verbs



> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: KLBC-double-object verbs
> 
> [introductory material snipped]
> > ghaHDaq paq vInob
> 
I knew this wasn't possible; after all, the "to" in English in this 
situation is not a locative.

> 
> ghaHvaD paq vInob.
> 
> I don't merely give the book to the location where he is
> standing. I give it for his benefit. The giving of the book is
> intended to benefit the recipient. This is a little alien to
> English grammar, but then, Klingon is often intentionally a bit
> alien.
Exactly.  And what we're really hunting for, in any translation, is the 
deep structure / meaning of the sentence, not the surface structure.

> paq HInob.
> 
> At first glance, this looks like a mistake. {HI-} is the
> imperative, meaning the subject is "you" and the object is
> "me", but the object is clearly the book. Meanwhile, this is
> how you say, "Give me the book," rather than how to say "Give
> the book to me".
Ok, this makes sense; and after all, "Give me the book" and "Give the 
book to me" are really the same anyway.

> 
> Meanwhile, besides looking weird, this particular alternate
> grammatical construction does not work at all when the person
> of the direct and indirect object are the same, as in your
> example, "I give him the book." The disagreement of the verb's
> prefix with its object is the thing that wakes you up to know
> the difference between {jIHvaD paq yInob,} and {paq HInob.}
> Meanwhile, there is no difference between {paq vInob,} and {paq
> vInob,} and if the indirect object is explicit (it is a noun
> instead of just something or someone indicated by the verb's
> prefix), then there is no way to fit that explicit object in
> this shorthand format.
Exactly, and that's where I ran into the problem.  I'm currently 
researching theta-roles and case-marking in Klingon (finishing up my 
thesis), and couldn't figure out where words would even go in a sentence 
in order to analyze them!  Any syntacticians who want jump into this, 
either on the list or privately?

> 
> If this seems confusing, just use {-vaD} and don't worry about
> it. It works in more cases and more people will understand it.
> 
> charghwI'
> -- 
> 
>  \___
>  o_/ \
>  <\__,\
>   ">   | Get a grip.
>    `   |
> 
Many thanks, charghwI'; you've gotten me started.  I still look forward 
to hearing from the BG, then from anyone else who wants to get into 
structural details.  

Teresa
P.S. - I've got to unsub from DIGEST if I'm going to keep posting; 
snipping out all the other messages in order to reply to one using PINE 
is a royal pain!


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