tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Jun 25 14:42:04 1997

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Question words



jatlh peHruS:

> You appear to be saying that tlhIngan Hol question words may be used ONLY to
> ASK a question.  If you are correct, this is the first of 28 languages
> (admittedly the other 27 are Terran) I have studied (I'm nowhere near fluent
> in most of them) in which question words may not be used subordinately.
> 
> Let's use English:
> 
> Why are you going?   I don't why you are going.
> What are you cooking?  I see what you are cooking.
> How do you store tribbles?  The man knows how you store tribbles.
> 
> tlhIngan Hol is not Terran.  It is not like anything Terran.  Still, how can
> we presuppose that we cannot use question words this way?  I await your
> debate.

I admit, I don't have much.  Firstly, the mere fact that TKD never addresses 
anything like this says a lot.  It shows question words being used only in 
questions.  Not one whiff of a subordinate clause.

Secondly, my instincts turn me away from it.  It seems highly rhetorical to 
me, and I believe that Klingons do not speak in rhetoric.  A Sentence As 
Object is composed of two sentences, and using a Question as Object would 
require that one ask a question without necessarily expecting an answer.

Consider this question as object:

chay' qet ghaH 'e' vIlegh

I can imagine the Klingon being spoken to hearing {chay' qet ghaH} and take a 
breath to answer, only to be cut of by his companion's {'e' vIlegh}.

Thirdly, there's always a way to reword the idea.  {qetmeH mIwDaq vIlegh} or 
even qetlI'ghach vIlegh} would be perfectly legal.

-- 
SuStel
Beginners' Grammarian
Stardate 97481.0


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