tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Nov 29 01:33:55 2011
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: [Tlhingan-hol] Loose Klingon
jatlhpu' SuStel:<br><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">> The semantic roles of subjects and objects in Klingon seem to change<br>
> all the time. I can {mev}, I can {mev} you, making you you {mev}.<br></div></blockquote><div> </div><div>tlhob De'vID, jatlh:</div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">> Where has {mev} been used in the sense of {mevmoH}?<br></div></blockquote><div class="gmail_quote"><br></div>QeS 'utlh:<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">
</div>bIjatlh 'e' yImev. yItlhutlh!<br>
Stop talking! Drink! (TKW p.87)<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Interesting. Intuitively, when I scan the sentence I don't immediately think of {mev} as taking {'e'} as the object here, but of course it actually is. Instead, I see {yImev} "(you) stop!" and I understand it as a command to the listener, and only then does my brain attach the {bIjatlh 'e'} "... talking" part. </div>
<div><br></div>QeS 'utlh:<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
To be honest I don't see these verbs as that much of a problem. Lots of<br>
languages have small and select groups of these kinds of "ambitransitive"<br>
verbs. English, for instance: burn, break, drown, choke, scatter, fly,<br>
boil, fry... Ubykh has them too, so they're not an English-only thing.<br>
They're a little frustrating, but they're absolutely typical of natural<br>
Terran languages and I'm not surprised to see a few such verbs appearing<br>
in Klingon. Whether Marc's doing them deliberately or not is, of course,<br>
another story, but I don't have a problem with them and I think there's<br>
no reason for us to start wondering about the looseness of argument<br>
structure of *all* Klingon verbs as a result.<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Another one that I just thought of is {So'}. I'm pretty sure I've seen it used both transitively and intransitively, though I'm not sure if that was in canon. But I agree, I don't see a problem with a few words having this property, and there's no reason to believe that it generalises to other verbs.</div>
<div> </div><div>De'vID:</div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">> I can't think of any examples where the semantic roles of subjects and<br>
> objects have changed. We recently learned that {vergh} is transitive<br>
> (someone docks something), when some people have assumed it was<br>
> intransitive (the ship docks).<br>
<br></div></blockquote><div>QeS 'utlh: </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;"><div class="im">
</div>{meQ} "burn" is one, which we have attested with an object, with a non-<br>
agent subject, and as an adjectival.</blockquote><div><br></div><div>Can you list the canon examples? {meQtaHbogh qachDaq Suv qoH neH} has it with a subject, which canon sentences use it with an object or as an adjectival?</div>
<div><br></div></div>-- <br>De'vID<br>
_______________________________________________
Tlhingan-hol mailing list
[email protected]
http://stodi.digitalkingdom.org/mailman/listinfo/tlhingan-hol