tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Aug 12 05:55:06 1999
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Re: Aspect
- From: "David Trimboli" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Aspect
- Date: Tue, 10 Aug 1999 20:52:06 -0400
From: [email protected] <[email protected]>
>In a message dated 8/3/1999 9:57:53 PM US Mountain Standard Time,
>[email protected] writes:
>
>If everyone accepts ONLY TKD 4..7, fine! But I am getting a lot of flak
from
>people saying that there are several attachments to what TKD says. I see
>posts stating that aspect used in a dependent clause establish that the
>dependent clause was "complete" before the main clause. I see posts
stating
>that storytellers must use perfective only if the event was complete prior
to
>the beginning of the story. This extra baggage has been rampant since the
>discussions regarding Klingon aspect began.
Whatever anyone else says, I suggest the following:
(1) Do not use tense in your sentences. At all. Use time contexts.
(2) When an action is completed, use {-pu'} or {-ta'}. When an action is
continuous, use {-taH} or {-lI'}. Don't bother to worry about whether it
happened before the speaker spoke, or after the time of the sentence, or
whatever.
I used to worry about these things too, then I suddenly realized that much
of the Klingon aspect suffixes we've gotten examples of don't worry so much
about one segment's relation in time to another, but whether an action is
completed.
This explains to me why we get things like {ben 'ar bIboghpu'} from Okrand.
I don't care WHEN it was completed. The action was completed (you're here,
aren't you?), so it got a {-pu'}. I really don't believe Okrand was
interested in the "it's true every day except your birthday" idea. That
seems much like relying on a technicality, something rather un-Klingon in my
mind.
Also consider that skybox card that gave a Stardate and a a perfective
aspect. I don't have the original here, but I can reproduce the grammar.
HovpoH Hut Hut jav pagh chorgh vI' jav mu'tlheghvam vIghItlhpu'.
I wrote this sentence on Stardate 99608.6.
It says more than simply that I wrote it, actually. It says that on
Stardate 99608.6 I wrote this sentence, and the writing was completed. This
is a bit different than the writing being completed as of that Stardate.
SuStel
Stardate 99608.6