[Tlhingan-hol] Time and Type 7 verb suffixes

[David Trimboli]

On 6/15/2012 5:26 AM, De'vID wrote:
> lojmIt tI'wI' nuv:
>  >> {wa'Hu' 'uQ vISop.}
>  >>
>  >> I don't believe that is a grammatical error, even though it describes
>  >> a single event that occurred in its entirety during the time span of
>  >> the time stamp. I honestly believe you are the only person in the
>  >> Universe who might claim that it is an error because it lacks
>  >> {-pu'}.
>
> I don't believe it's a *grammatical* error, but I don't think it means
> what you seem to think it means.
>
> Note that on TKD p.40 it says that verbs without a Type 7 suffix can be
> translated, when the context is appropriate, by the future tense.  But
> it says nothing about the past tense.  I think that if a verb without a
> Type 7 suffix can be translated into *either* future or past tense, MO
> would have said so here.  The fact that he omitted mentioning the past
> tense here is, I think, because an aspectless verb usually cannot refer
> to an event in the past (since past events are typically either
> completed or ongoing until the present).
>
> SuStel:
>  > It is not an error. It just doesn't mean exactly what you think it
> means. It means that eating dinner was happening at some time yesterday.
> It would not be used to tell a story like "Yesterday I sat at the table,
> ate dinner, and then got up." That story would require perfective
> suffixes on its verbs. But it could be used, say, to confirm that you
> didn't skip a meal yesterday.
>
> I concur with SuStel's interpretation of {wa'Hu' 'uQ vISop}.
>
> Since people generally eat dinner every day, I tried to think of an
> example with an activity that someone might do once every several days.
> So suppose someone has an exercise schedule that rotates between {yIt},
> {qet}, {Qal}, and {leS}.
>
> If he wanted to say, "I swam (a single, completed event) yesterday", he
> would say {wa'Hu' jIQalpu'} or {wa'Hu' jIQalta'}.  {wa'Hu' jIQal}
> *cannot* have that meaning, because it implies (per TKD p.40) that the
> action of swimming is neither completed nor continuous.
>
> OTOH, if he was asked which day of the exercise schedule yesterday was,
> he could say {wa'Hu' jIQal} "I swam yesterday" (i.e., it is a general
> statement of truth that I swam yesterday, without reference to a
> specific completed event).
>
> So both {wa'Hu' jIQal} and {wa'Hu' jIQalpu'} can be used to describe
> that he went swimming yesterday, but the suffix {-pu'} is not *optional*
> in that its presence or absence changes the meaning of what is said
> about the action.

DaQIjchu'ta'!

-- 
SuStel
http://www.trimboli.name/