tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Jan 30 20:59:19 2013

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Re: [Tlhingan-hol] 'ar again

Rohan Fenwick - QeS 'utlh ([email protected])



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ghItlhpu' Voragh, jatlh:<br><div>&gt; {'ar} "how many" expects a number as an answer:<br><br>Or simply a quantifying noun phrase? Hoch, HochHom, bID, 'op, X puS, X law', etc.? To the question {nIn 'ar wIghaj} "how much fuel do we have left?" (PK, CK), I would expect that {nIn Hoch natlhlu'pu'} "all the fuel has been consumed" (KGT) would be a perfectly acceptable and valid answer.<br><br>jang De'vID, jatlh:<br>&gt; That's a very helpful way of looking at it. {Hol 'ar DajatlhlaH?} "How<br>&gt; many/much language(s) do you speak -- and I expect a number for an<br>&gt; answer?" It seems fairly obvious the question is intended to ask the<br>&gt; number of languages rather than the number (numeric percentage?) of<br>&gt; one language<br><br>The obviousness comes from context and expectation, not from any particular requirements of the grammar or semantics.<br><br>jang je SuStel, jatlh:<br>&gt; I don't think {'ar} ever means "what portion?". With countable nouns it <br>&gt; means "how many?", and with non-countable nouns it means "what amount?".<br><br>I know of absolutely no evidence to support a grammatical distinction between countable and non-countable nouns in Klingon.<br><br>(poD vay')<br><br>taH:<br>&gt; bIQ 'ar<br>&gt; how much water?<br>&gt; (unless you're talking about water served in cups, in which case the <br>&gt; translation would be "how many waters?", but the distinction is an <br>&gt; English one, not a Klingon one)<br><br>So if it works in this direction (a -count noun is treatable as +count noun), why do you contend it doesn't work in the other direction?<br><br>&gt; Since {Hol} is a countable noun, the correct translation would be<br>&gt; <br>&gt; Hol 'ar<br>&gt; how many languages?<br>&gt; <br>&gt; The translation would not be "how much of a particular language?", <br>&gt; though I could see a metaphorical "sea of language" {Hol bIQ'a'} leading <br>&gt; to the phrase {Hol 'ar} "how much (of the sea of) language?".<br><br>This argument fails for me in that it imposes the English +/-count distinction onto Klingon where no evidence for such a distinction exists. I don't understand why a Hol bIQ'a' should be treated any differently from a Hol alone, and I'd contend that {Hol 'ar Dajatlh} can mean either "how many languages do you speak?" or "how much of the language(s) do you speak?", although of course context dictates that usually the first meaning will be the most appropriate. The following exchange (which is a little contrived, but I don't think especially so) is fine for me:<br><br>A: 'anDorya' Hol DaSov'a'?<br>B: HIja', vIjatlhchu'.<br>A: loQ Holvetlh vIjatlh je jIH.<br>B: Holvetlh 'ar Dajatlh?<br>A: 'op mu'mey neH. pab vIyajchu'be'.<br><br>To use another countable example, what about {chab 'ar DaSop}? Would you deny that "How much (of the) pie did you eat?" and "How many pies did you eat?" are equally valid renditions? I admit there are some times when the context doesn't perfectly disambiguate, but that's language for you. We deal with it for wej and neH all the time.<br><br>QeS<br></div> 		 	   		  </div></body>
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