tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Mar 20 19:19:45 1996
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The transitivity question
- From: [email protected] (Alan Anderson)
- Subject: The transitivity question
- Date: Wed, 20 Mar 1996 22:21:25 -0500
charghwI' writes:
[we had been talking about the object(s) of "feed"]
>Similarly, the "care (about)" meaning of {SaH} goes through a
>similar twist going between English and Klingon. In English,
>"care" is intransitive. We need a preposition to attach an
>object to this verb. What we take to be a preposition is
>implied in the meaning of the Klingon verb. {DujwIj vISaHba'.}
>"I obviously care about my ship." That which is an indirect
>object in English is a direct object in Klingon.
*This* example is slippery. I'm not sure how to deal with English's
habit of using prepositions to let otherwise intransitive verbs have
an object. Is "my ship" really an indirect object in the English
sentence, or is something else going on? A normally transitive verb
like "eat" can easily be used intransitively with an unspecified object,
both in English and in Klingon, but things get a little weird when one
tries to go in the other direction.
>This is why I feel less than rock certain of transitivity in
>Klingon in general until Okrand gives us some better
>guidelines. I am definitely NOT in the camp of those who feel
>certain that ALL Klingon verbs can be used transitively and we
>should just bend the definitions in TKD to make the translation
>make sense. Meanwhile, I am ALSO not in the camp of those who
>would dictate this attitude to be clearly WRONG.
Hmm. How do you avoid rejecting a proposed transitive {ba'} or
{pum}? I'm not sure I even want to get into a discussion about
the possibility of transitive stative verbs.
-- ghunchu'wI' batlh Suvchugh vaj batlh SovchoH vaj