tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Jun 25 21:20:52 1997
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RE: KLBC: imperatives
- From: "David Trimboli" <[email protected]>
- Subject: RE: KLBC: imperatives
- Date: Thu, 26 Jun 97 02:15:55 UT
[email protected] on behalf of Mark E. Shoulson wrote:
> >Date: Sun, 22 Jun 1997 23:34:34 -0700 (PDT)
> >From: Alan Anderson <[email protected]>
> >
> >ja' SuStel:
> >>{pIch Daghaj wo'rIv}
> >>is direct address. It may be rewritten as {pIch Daghaj SoH wo'rIv}. It's
> >>still direct address. It's not apposition.
> >
> >jang ~mark:
> >>I'm inclined to agree with SuStel, but I'm not truly sure there's really a
> >>difference at all.
> >
> >There must be *some* difference; direct address can put the name of the
> >person being addressed at either the front or the back of the sentence.
> >{wo'rIv pIch Daghaj} or {wo'rIv pIch Daghaj SoH} are as valid as SuStel's
> >examples, and I doubt anyone would consider them apposition.
>
> But what's the semantic difference, I mean? OK, so if you view it as
> address we get a little more syntactic flexibility, but meaningwise I can't
> see a difference.
In this example, I agree that there is no difference. However, we can easily
conceive of a case where the difference between address and apposition is
important:
Haw'choH jagh, HoD.
Is it "The enemy begins to flee, captain," or is it "The enemy, the captain,
begins to flee"? Without context, it could be either.
(Heh . . . or is it "The enemy captain begins to flee"?)
--
SuStel
Beginners' Grammarian
Stardate 97484.2