tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Aug 13 06:19:08 1999
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Re: Aspect
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Aspect
- Date: Fri, 13 Aug 1999 09:18:03 -0400 (Eastern Daylight Time)
- In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>
- Priority: NORMAL
On Fri, 13 Aug 1999 01:13:41 EDT [email protected] wrote:
> In a message dated 8/12/99 1:43:49 PM Eastern Daylight Time, [email protected]
> writes:
>
> << >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.
>
> I *really* doubt Okrand ever considered this business about "except on your
> birthday"; that's more of an in-joke among Klingonists. It doesn't sound
> like something any natural language-speaker would fuss about.
>
> ~mark
>
> >>
>
> SatlhIj, 'ach De'vam vISovbe'. Could someone elighten me as to this whole
> birthday thing?
>
> T'Lod
When Okrand provided canon explaining to us that, for example,
to give my age, I'd say: {loSmaH loS ben jIboghpu'} several
people got upset because of the use of the perfective. They
wanted to argue about it.
To calm them, I proposed that this works because, in the
interest of accuracy, if you go back 44 years before today, I
will at that point in time already be born, therefore the
perfective is appropriate.
I offered that as an extention to that idea, on your birthday,
you might not use the perfective, since on that day, you were
born (simple past). You had not yet been born (perfective).
Obviously, this is not a popular idea. Either nobody else likes
it, or those who do are silent while those who don't feel a need
to explicitly say they don't like it either as an independant
statement or to reinforce like-minded statements made by others.
Since others said to me at qep'a' and on this list that I speak
my opinion too strongly, I offer no further opinion on this.
charghwI'