tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Jul 09 11:54:17 2000

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RE: Deixis and direction



jIH:
>...Instead of beginning with syntactic terms like
>"direct object" and trying to deduce rules for placing nouns to fit the
>slots those terms create, I'm convinced that one should instead focus on
>the semantic terms of "actor" and "recipient" and the like.

charghwI':
>So, what is a subject if not an actor? What is a recipient if not a direct
>object? Changing the terms is not bringing about a benefit in any way that
>is obvious to me.

The benefit is that one can deal with the real-world relationships between
concepts without simultaneously worrying about exactly how the verb treats
those relationships syntactically.  The verbs {thlhob} and {ghel} seem to
describe pretty much the same concept; their difference is in how they
represent that concept syntactically.  {ja'} and {jatlh} are a favorite
example lately -- in the case of someone merely speaking to another, the
ideas are identical but the syntax is not.  There are many pairs of words
that refer to extremely similar ideas but do it subtly different ways once
the idea is expressed.  There are even some widely different expressions
for essentially identical ideas, where the disparate syntax is not due to
any real difference in meaning.

ghaHmo' jIghoj / mughojmoH ghaH.

In both of these cases, "I" am the recipient of the learning, and "he/she"
is the agent.  However, Klingon grammar and vocabulary places the recipient
of the learning as the subject of the verb {ghoj}, and the grammar
surrounding the suffix {-moH} changes things around in sometimes magical
and mysterious ways.  Trying to deal with the semantic roles at the same
time as the syntactic representations is, in my opinion, the primary cause
of the kind of complexity you seem to believe exists in the Klingon
language.

-- ghunchu'wI' 'utlh




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