tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Mar 22 14:49:41 1999

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Re: qama'



On Sun, 21 Mar 1999 01:55:59 -0800 (PST) Matt Johnson 
<[email protected]> wrote:

> In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.990320181651.6129A-
> [email protected]>, david joslyn <[email protected]>
> writes
> >On Sat, 20 Mar 1999, Matt Johnson wrote:
> >> I don't think you can say "mumblings" without a {-ghach} nominalizer,
> >> which it is generally wise to avoid. Perhaps something like ?{mu'meyDaj
> >> wIyajbe'laHbogh} -- his words which we couldn't understand. 
> >
> >Whoa, back the horse up there cowpoke! tlhIngan Hol has a nominalizer?
> >What is its order among the suffixes. How is it used? Can you give me
> >canon examples? And why was I not INFORMED of this fact?
> 
> -ghach is a nominalizer, and is VS9, but we tend to say that it also
> requires a VS7 for the word to make any sense. vb+ghach without VS7 is a
> "marked" usage, is very weird indeed, and not well-liked. TKD Addendum,
> p176 gives canon examples. However, as DloraH has said, you REALLY don't
> want to use it. I don't think I've /ever/ used a word with -ghach, and I
> intend it to stay that way. ;-)

Ummm. While I want to agree with the idea that you should likely 
avoid using {-ghach} whenever possible, there is nothing special 
about its relationship with a verb suffix Type 7. You seem to 
have a {yajHa'ghach}. Remember that Okrand created {ghach} so he 
could use the word {naDHa'ghach}. There's no Type 7 suffix 
there.

It is true that when we first began to understand that there had 
to be some sort of verb suffix on the root for {-ghach} to make 
any sense, everybody started using {-taH} as the generic mate to 
{-ghach} almost like it is the mate to {-vIS}, but Okrand has 
subsequently explained things better. Any verb suffix (in 
theory) can give the necessary meaning to {-ghach} in order to 
give it the specificity of meaning it needs.
 
> --
> qonwI'
> -- 
> Matt Johnson <mailto:[email protected]>

charghwI' 'utlh



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