[Tlhingan-hol] Time and Type 7 verb suffixes

[ghunchu'wI' 'utlh]

On Thu, Jun 7, 2012 at 12:54 PM, David Trimboli <david at trimboli.name> wrote:
> On 6/7/2012 11:54 AM, lojmIt tI'wI'nuv wrote:
> > I'm not going to quote TKD. Just read it.
>
> Gee whiz, I didn't think to actually *read* the book that I've been
> quoting over and over! What a good idea!

I'd suggest putting the emphasis on "just" rather than on "read". If
you can find anything in it that would lead the reader to conclude
that {-pu'} and {-ta'} refer to a whole event from start to finish,
you might be justified in your quest to get us to see what you do.
However, if you have to invoke definitions from sources that aren't
talking about Klingon grammar, I have no problem dismissing that view
as irrelevant. Not necessarily wrong, and certainly not worthy of
ridicule, but completely irrelevant to a useful understanding of what
Type 7 verb suffixes represent.

> Since I'm quoting the evidence and you still can't find it, I don't see any
> reason to continue to try to convince you. You don't want to even examine
> the evidence.

I too don't see the evidence in TKD that you claim is there. You've
quoted the words "aspect" and "perfective" as if they alone support
you, but it's the interpretation of those words that is at the core of
the ongoing disagreement.

You say that you used to be part of the group misusing Klingon
perfective. I know you're pretty good about reading for comprehension,
so I assume you arrived at your earlier understanding based on what
TKD actually says and not what you wanted it to say. It apparently
wasn't until you started reading other sources not related to Klingon
grammar that you changed your mind about what TKD means. You now have
undeniably superior knowledge about aspect in general, and I well
understand the need to share such knowledge and to correct others'
misunderstandings. But I have come to my understanding of Klingon
aspect by studying The Klingon Dictionary, I do not believe I am
misunderstanding what it says, and I do not accept that definitions
from outside TKD necessarily override how TKD describes the meanings
of aspect suffixes.

I think TKD means what it says when it tells us "The language does,
however, indicate aspect: whether an action is completed or not yet
completed, and whether an action is a single event or a continuing
one." I do not think it means more than what it says. The perfective
suffixes {-pu'} and {-ta'} say an action is completed. The continuous
suffixes {-taH} and {-lI'} say an action is continuing. There is
nothing in TKD to suggest that Klingon perfective has anything to do
with the commencement of an action. Is it your position that Klingon
perfective means that an action is a whole event with a defined
beginning and end included within the meaning? The contrasting
descriptions "is completed" and "not yet completed" do not hint at a
requirement to include the beginning, and nothing else I see in TKD
supports that position either.

> You do not understand what "perfective" means, so you choose to ignore it.

I won't speak for others, but I make a distinction between what
"perfective" means in grammar textbooks and what TKD says it means
when describing Klingon grammar. I make a similar distinction between
the TKD term "adverbial" which describes a category of individual
words, and the textbook term which I think (after an admittedly brief
study of things like Wikipedia) describes phrases, calling the
individual words "adverbs". There are other words used in TKD that
have meanings outside Klingon, but when those meanings are not what
I'd consider common knowledge I don't rely on them to inform my use of
Klingon. If you want to call that "ignoring" the other meaning, I will
not stop you.

-- ghunchu'wI'