tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jul 16 09:00:14 1998
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Re: pu' and past tense
- From: [email protected] (Alan Anderson)
- Subject: Re: pu' and past tense
- Date: Thu, 16 Jul 98 10:22:32 EST
ja' "Anthony Appleyard" <[email protected]>:
> When will TKD be properly revised to remove all uses of -pu' as simple past
>and explain properly the difference between aspect and tense??? As long as the
>text of TKD stands like it is, beginners will keep on wanting to use -pu' as
>simple past.
Yes, even with the {ghorgh tujchoHpu' bIQ} example in the appendix,
people still get confused because of bias from their native language.
Do you want all existing copies of TKD to be recalled and destroyed
because they aren't clear enough? The proper explanation is obvious
in the audiotapes. The lack of tense in Klingon is foreign enough to
most people that the explanation of the difference between tense and
aspect is a perennial task. Beginners and nonbeginners alike at times
think they need to indicate tense somehow, and wind up convincing
themselves that something that happened in the past is thus complete
and can be expressed with perfectives. When they misuse aspect
consistently, they are corrected by people who use it correctly.
If you still want a proper explanation of the difference between
aspect and tense, see the FAQ.
> There are real-world languages where the past tense gets confused with the
>perfect tense-qoq (= aspect):
Yes, there are many languages that tangle tense and aspect. However,
Klingon isn't one of them, because Klingon *doesn't* express tense in
the first place. There's nothing there to get confused.
> I saw a suggestion that in English also, the future tense "I will write" is
>distinct from the future aspect "I am going to write".
What in the world is "future aspect"? No wonder you keep getting
confused -- aspect is duration or degree of completion, not time of
occurrence. "I am going to write" might indicate a "not yet started"
aspect in English, or it might merely mean intent or affirmation.
-- ghunchu'wI'