[Tlhingan-hol] Time and Type 7 verb suffixes

[David Trimboli]

On 6/26/2012 11:10 AM, ghunchu'wI' 'utlh wrote:
>
> On Tue, Jun 26, 2012 at 9:59 AM, David Trimboli <david at trimboli.name> wrote:
>> This is where you're considering the {ghoS}ing of the dead Klingon to be an
>> inherently aspected action. Aspect is only what we express; it's not
>> inherent in objective reality.
>>
>> In this context, *all* of the following statements are true, but they all
>> say something a little different:
>>
>> ghoS tlhIngan SuvwI'
>> ghoSlI' tlhIngan SuvwI'
>> ghoStaH tlhIngan SuvwI'
>>
>> The first says a Klingon warrior is traveling a path. Maybe he meanders a
>> bit, maybe he gets lost, maybe he takes breaks from time to time, or maybe
>> he marches steadily on. This sentence merely states that travel on a path is
>> occurring.
>
> I think we're in complete agreement here. I thought you had said that
> a statement without a continuous aspect suffix can not apply to a
> continous action, but here you accept that such a statement indeed can
> be made if the action is continuous. That's exactly what I've been
> saying all along -- you *can* be talking about a continuous action
> even if you just say {ghoS}. It's just doesn't matter whether or not
> the action is continuous.

A continuous suffix doesn't mean an action is objectively continuous in 
time; it means you start to focus on the action in an ongoing state, it 
remains in that state while you focus on it, and it is still ongoing 
when you turn your attention elsewhere.

Lacking a continuous suffix means that the previous paragraph's 
description is explicitly untrue. You are not looking at an action, 
seeing it already happening, then turning away while it is still 
happening. It means something else, exactly what depending on context. 
The suffix is not optional: either it is present and means one thing, or 
it is not present and means something else.

I think the issue here is that some people are considering the 
continuous suffix as somehow describing an objective reality: if 
something object in motion, say, then it *must* be described with a 
continuous suffix. Those who claim the continuous suffix would be 
optional would say that you could leave it off and you'd still have a 
moving object.

But the suffixes don't get added based on the physical properties of an 
object. You use a type 7 suffix to focus on the manner in which an 
action occurs. If you want to focus on an action that is already 
ongoing, and leave that focus with the action still ongoing, you *must* 
use a continuous suffix. If you want to focus on an action that is 
completed when you focus on it, you *must* use a completion suffix. When 
you leave off a type 7 suffix, you're saying that when you focus on the 
action it is *not* already ongoing or *not* ongoing when you turn your 
attention elsewhere, and that it is *not* in a completed state and *not* 
started and finished as you focus on it. It is something else, which 
must be determined by context.

(And when I say "must" above, I mean "unless some other grammatical rule 
or meaning overrides the aspect." The rule is not absolute; it is 
"usual." It should be followed, unless you have a good reason not to.)

It's all about the focus of your mind's eye. Where I have a problem is 
where that focus is clearly and unambiguously on something continuous or 
completed, but the suffix is left off. If you say {wa'Hu' Qe'Daq jISop} 
and you are describing an actual event in which you participated, it's 
pretty clear that you really meant to say {wa'Hu' Qe'Daq jISoppu'}. The 
first sentence says eating happened at a restaurant, but it says it in 
the manner of a general truth: it is true that you ate at a restaurant 
yesterday. The second sentence talks about a concrete event: yesterday I 
had a complete meal at a restaurant. (It obviously doesn't mean I was 
eating since the day before and only finished yesterday.)

If I wanted to tell a story about something that happened during the 
meal, I could begin with {wa'Hu' Qe'Daq jISoptaH}. We're turning our 
mind's eye onto a moment of time in which I am already in the process of 
eating, and as the story unfolds, unless we're told otherwise, I will 
continue to eat. If we leave off the {-taH}, we have not turned the 
mind's eye to that continuous process at an actual event; we are still 
focused only on the *fact* that eating happened there, and are not 
putting the listener into the story. This would be wrong.

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