tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Jun 01 17:36:37 2009

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Re: -vaD

Doq ([email protected])



The question we have to ask was when Okrand chose to use the word  
"beneficiary" in TKD, was he writing it for linguists or for laymen?  
There is a lot in TKD that comes closer to layman's terms than  
linguists.

Doq

On Jun 1, 2009, at 8:26 PM, ghunchu'wI' wrote:

> On Jun 1, 2009, at 7:25 AM, Doq wrote:
>
>> I can't ignore Okrand's use of the word "beneficiary".
>
> You don't need to ignore it, but perhaps you should modify your
> understanding of it as a colloquial term that must involve the
> betterment of what it applies to.
>
> As a grammatical term, "beneficiary" merely indicates a recipient
> (usually of an object or of information).  The usual grammatical term
> for the idea is "indirect object".  In case-marking languages, it
> gets the dative case.  In English, it usually is preceded by the
> preposition "to" or "for", or can stand alone if it comes before the
> direct object.  In Klingon, it gets the Type 5 noun suffix {-vaD}.
>
> A Klingon sentence's "beneficiary" doesn't obviously have to end up
> improved by the sentence.  {qama'vaD QIghpej lo' 'avwI') seems
> grammatically fine to me.
>
> -- ghunchu'wI'
>
>
>







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