tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Feb 24 12:46:43 2007

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Re: Topic (was: Re: Dilbert Comic in Klingon for February 9, 2007)

Doq ([email protected])



On Feb 24, 2007, at 11:02 AM, Agnieszka Solska wrote:

> Doq:
>
>> It also suggests that perhaps  we can use {-'e'} on a time stamp  
>> so that we
>> can be less frequently  forced to use the {qaStaHvIS} device. In  
>> other
>> words:
>>
>> wa'ben qatoy'taH. "A year ago, I was serving you."
>> wa'ben'e' qatoy'taH. I have served you for the past year.
>
> Based on the description of {–'e'} in TKD plus the canon
> examples of its use, {wa'ben'e' qatoy'taH} can still be
> interpreted as "It was a year ago that I was serving you,"
> the implication being that it was not, say, a month ago,
> (with -'e' marking focus, rather than topic).

Has anyone noticed that we tend to use {qaStaHvIS wa'ben} to mean  
"While last year happened", but technically, this can still be  
interpreted as "While the moment that occurred a year ago happened".  
There is no way to disambiguate the moment that occurred a year ago  
vs. all time between that moment and now. Technically, we have no  
word for the latter meaning. We just pretend like we do when we use  
{qaStaHvIS wa'ben}.

My point is, if we pretend that we are talking about the entire span  
of a year with {qaStaHvIS}, which we made up without any canon or  
approval from Okrand, then why not use the {qIbDaq SuvwI''e' SoH Dun  
law' Hoch Dun puS} canon example to express the idea that using {'e'}  
as topic and not focus, it can set the boundaries for an otherwise  
infinite statement so that {wa'ben'e' qatoy'taH} would generally be  
interpreted as "I have served you for the past year."?

Please point out why the use of {-'e'} is inferior to the use of  
{qaStaHvIS}, since the former has some canon backing it and the  
latter doesn't.

>> The whole issue is that {wa'ben} (or {wa' ben}, (...)
>> can point to the moment that occurred a year ago, or it can point  
>> to the
>> duration
>
> Hmm, I've always thought that such words as {ben/nem},
> {wen/waQ} cannot be used to indicate duration. Afer all,
> the expressions used in their English glosses are
> "years ago/from now", "months ago/from now," not
> "for the period of ...  years/months". Besides,
> we do have words like {DIS} or {jar}, which refer
> to *periods* of time. That is why, to indicate
> duration in "I have served you for the past year"
> I would use {qaStaHvIS} (BTW I fail to see the merits
> of trying to use it less frequetly) and say either
>
>    {qaStaHvIS wa' DIS qatoy'taH} or
>    {qatoy'taH qaStaHvIS wa' DIS}

Well, there is the small matter of not knowing whether you are  
talking about last year, next year, or a period one year long that  
occurred fifty years ago or will occur fifty years from now. {DIS}  
has no time stamp. It is only a duration.

> To be really emphatic I might add an otherwise
> redundant (poH):
>
>    qatoy'taH qaStaHvIS wa' DIS poH.

Eeeew.

> Naturally, since Klingon doesn't mark tense these sentences would  
> also mean
> "I served you for one one year"  or "I will be serving you for one  
> year".
>
> To me, the "topic" interpretation of {wa'ben'e'} in {wa'ben'e'  
> qatoy'taH}
> would only be "As for last year, I was serving you".

Even in English, that can be interpreted to refer to the entire time- 
span between the moment that occurred a year ago and now. I think  
that we are putting an elephant under a microscope. I doubt that  
Okrand really expected {wa'ben} to be exclusively interpreted to  
refer to one moment a year ago. I think he likes words to be more  
generally useful than that, if sometimes that makes them a little  
vague or ambiguous, since natural languages tend to be more vague and  
ambiguous rather than limiting words to precise meaning. I suspect  
that when we use {wa'ben} as a time stamp, it tends to mean "some  
vague unit of time that occurred about a year ago" and when it is  
used as a noun, it will tend to refer to the year between then and now.

In English, when I say "Last year, I visited my sister," I don't  
generally mean that I visited her for the whole year. In fact, it  
might have been for an hour or for a couple weeks. The statement  
isn't very clear about the duration of the visit. But if I say, "I  
wish I had last year to live over again," I do tend to mean the  
entire year because I'm using the term as a noun instead of as a time  
stamp.

I strongly suspect that this is what Okrand meant with his definition  
for {ben}. Witness the term for hundred-year-old wine. He's not  
referring to wine that was made and drunk a century ago. He's talking  
about wine that has been around for a hundred years. He's using {ben}  
as a noun when he refers to hundred year old wine, though he's using  
it as a time stamp with {bogh} to refer to the age of a person. He  
doesn't mean that the person's mother was in labor for the entire  
duration of the person's age.

Does anyone else think this makes sense? Do you see a difference  
between {ben} as a time stamp vs. {ben} as a noun?

You put {-'e'} on nouns. You don't put them on time stamps. If you  
put them on a word that could be interpreted as a time stamp, I don't  
think it is a stretch to expect that word to be used as a noun,  
rather than as a time stamp. That's the root of my interest in using  
{-'e'} to bound time words that relate to "now", like {ben, leS,  
Hu',} etc..

> Obviously, not being a native-speaker of English, I might be wrong
> in my interpretation of the English words "ago/from now".
> If this is the case I will welcome being put right.
>
> 'ISqu'

Doq






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