tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Oct 31 13:14:40 2009

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing

[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]

Re: intuition and grammar (was Re: Ditransitive reflexives)

Christopher Doty ([email protected]) 

Thanks!

But your example is actually reciprocal, not reflexive, and would be
rendered in Klingon by -chuq, no?

I do see the problem now, though, since you're using a verb with a
marker that specifies no object, but including an object...  One
solution that would seemingly fit within the confines of the grammar
outlined by Okrand would be to mark the "chocolate" with a topic
marker:

yuch'e' nobchuqpu'
"As for the chocolate, they gave (it) to each other"

Perhaps not exactly grammatically correct, but it certainly gets the
meaning across, and doesn't invent any new grammar...

Actually...  Okay, according to the addendum, the (6.8, Indirect
Objects), the recipient of an action is an oblique (marked with -vaD,
and not indicated on the verb).  Thus, in a ditransitive like the
above, the recipient ought not be marked on the verb.  It is the
givers and the chocolate that ought to be marked...  Which means the
ditransitive ought to be:

chaHvaD yuch lunobpu'

Which then, of course, is ambiguous between "They gave them chocolate"
and "They gave themselves chocolate."

Yes, starting to see the problem now....

Chris

On Sat, Oct 31, 2009 at 12:56, Tracy Canfield <[email protected]> wrote:
> I wouldn't say all the English examples are idiomatic - "They gave each
> other chocolate" is literal, and potentially a problem if you translate it
> with -vaD.
> I'll send Chris an off-list catch-up.
>
> 2009/10/31 Christopher Doty <[email protected]>
>
>> I missed the first part of this discussion because I just joined the
>> list (hello, btw!), but I'm not sure what the issue is here...  In
>> English, all of the examples of ditransitive reflexives are
>> essentially idiomatic (e.g., "I gave myself some time off" is really
>> "I took some time off").  Likewise, something like "I bought myself a
>> knife" is equal to "I bought a knife for myself," which would be
>> easily rendered in Klingon, I believe (my first attempt at a Klingon
>> sentence, please be nice!), as
>>
>> jIHvaD taj vIje'pu'
>>
>> The only place I can think of where a ditransitive wouldn't have a
>> non-literal meaning would be a slave buying one's self from one's
>> owner, a rather marginal situation...
>>
>> So, can I ask what the original question was regarding?  Namely, what
>> was trying to be said? (Feel free to email me directly if you don't
>> want to spam the list with repeat stuff...)
>>
>> Chris
>>
>> On Sat, Oct 31, 2009 at 12:10, Doq <[email protected]> wrote:
>> > A second issue is that if we change the language too much, we
>> > essentially create a dialect that someone else who studied Okrand's
>> > materials would not understand. The Klingon Institute was not created
>> > in order to create or foster non-standard dialects of the Klingon
>> > language.
>> >
>> > Doq
>> >
>> > On Oct 31, 2009, at 1:34 PM, ghunchu'wI' wrote:
>> >
>> >> ja'pu' lay'tel SIvten:
>> >>> It's safer to walk around a hole than to jump in. We don't know how
>> >>> deep the
>> >>> holes are, and they're difficult to illuminate.
>> >>
>> >> ja' [email protected]:
>> >>> Yes, but if there's a problem, we need to fix it.  It would only be
>> >>> the smart, right, and beneficial thing to do.  Fill the hole!
>> >>
>> >> It would be the presumptive and arrogant thing to do.
>> >>
>> >> We're just studying and using this language.  We lack the authority
>> >> to change or add to its grammar.  In the fantasy context of Klingon
>> >> being the language spoken by real Klingons, we don't have any
>> >> information on what to fill the holes with.  We do have information
>> >> telling us that some holes are true gaps in the language and not just
>> >> gaps in our knowledge.
>> >>
>> >> motlh qay'be' SengHey.  Sengbe'.  qaD neH.  Hol yItI'Qo'.  Hol
>> >> yIlo'qu'.
>> >>
>> >> -- ghunchu'wI'
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
>

Back to archive top level