[Tlhingan-hol] Aspect, etc

[Will Martin]

Thank you for your patience. I haven’t been this bone-headed about Klingon grammar since Qanqor struggled to teach me that “be” verbs acted like verbs when placed before subjects, but acted like adjectives when placed after nouns.

I think you have convinced me, though I would be presumptive to assume that I fully grok what I’ve been convinced of. I THINK I got it.

I’m disappointed in myself for speaking the language this long without grasping this particular grammatical issue. I thought that usage had tended to make vague whether the completion occurred within or previous to the time environment established by context or time stamp, so I created a model that accepted that observation.

I can only see, over time, whether I have fashioned a sufficiently effective new model to use the perfective properly.

pItlh
lojmIt tI'wI'nuv



> On Dec 3, 2015, at 10:18 PM, SuStel <sustel at trimboli.name> wrote:
> 
> On 12/3/2015 9:09 PM, Alan Anderson wrote:
> 
>> Two of the paq'batlh examples describe what I read as ongoing
>> actions. You even pointed that out in the {bot} passage:
>>> ...we're not talking about the beginning and the end of the
>>> blocking; we're talking about the blocking happening and continuing
>>> the story with the blocking still going on. We're just describing
>>> the FACT of the blocking.
>> 
>> Though "the blocking [is] still going on", you explain the lack of a
>> {-taH} suffix by saying that the story is "just describing the FACT
>> of the blocking." I do not see a distinction between that and
>> "doesn't need the aspect suffix because that's not what the focus is
>> on."
> 
> I'm sorry I have been unable to get you to understand the distinction.
> 
> The concepts one expresses through language are not equal to reality. When one breaks up an idea, as paq'batlh breaks up Kahless and Morath's run from their house to Gre'thor, each sentence is only expressing a portion of the concept. If you look at the middle of the run and want to describe that, a continuous aspect would be most appropriate. But the story doesn't look at the middle. It looks at the beginning and it looks at the end separately. When looking at the beginning it is not continuous--it has an abrupt start. At no point are you actually looking at the middle of the run in a sentence, so at no point is the continuous aspect appropriate. At no point are you talking about running when the running ends, so the perfective suffix is not appropriate.
> 
> The blocking of the run is also broken up conceptually. I don't think it's mentioned again, but it definitely starts abruptly and continues from there. Again, when looking at that as a single piece, which the sentence does, it is not continuous; it has a starting point. At no point does any sentence talk about the middle of the blocking, nor does any sentence talk about the completion of the blocking, so we don't see those suffixes.
> 
> There IS a difference.
> 
>>> Remember, perfective is not just "completed," it's "completed and
>>> viewing the action as a whole, without visualizing how it behaves
>>> over time."
>> 
>> That might be what "perfective" means in general linguistic usage.
>> But the part of the definition after "completed" is not how TKD
>> defines {-pu'}.
> 
> If Okrand didn't mean "aspect" and "perfective" then he shouldn't have said "aspect" and "perfective" many times and used {-pu'} and {-ta'} in sentences that have aspect and are perfective.
> 
> He was writing a grammar for laymen, not linguists. He wasn't giving an exact definition, but he DID use the correct term. His explanation is correct, but simplistic.
> 
> His definition also doesn't say anything about time contexts, but we've traditionally had no problem telling people on this list it means an action occurs before the time context.
> 
>> I can think of only a single example that makes more
>> sense with your interpretation than with the TKD-only one: {X ben
>> jIboghpu'} for "I am X years old." Nothing else I know of hints at a
>> "viewing the action as a whole" meaning for {-pu'}
> 
> Sigh. Examples coming up.
> 
>   SutlhtaHvIS chaH DIHIvpu'
>   while they were negotiating we attacked them (TKD)
> 
> It would not make sense to say that we had already attacked them while we were negotiating, or that we completed attacking them while we they were negotiating (if we started to attack them they'd stop negotiating before we could complete the attack). The attack is viewed as an atomic whole. We're not looking at the start of the attack or the middle of the attack or the end of the attack. We're not talking about attacks in general or any kind of habit we have for attacking. The attack happened and was completed.
> 
>   yaS qIppu' 'e' vIlegh
>   I saw him/her hit the officers (TKD)
> 
> I didn't see that he HAD hit the officers or that he has hit officers in the past or that he started to hit the officers. There was a hit or multiple hits, it or they were enacted and completed, and it or they are treated as an atomic whole that I saw.
> 
>   ghorgh Haw'pu' yaS
>   when did the officer flee? (TKD)
> 
> This is not asking when it was true that the officer had already fled or when the officer started to flee. This is asking when that atomic unit of fleeing took place.
> 
> QI'tomerDaq Heghpu' Hoch
> everyone died at Khitomer (TKW)
> 
> It's not saying that at Khitomer everyone had already died. It's saying that at Khitomer everyone died, full stop. They were at Khitomer, then dying happened and was completed, all in one concept.
> 
>> Generic "pure" perfective is a dot without internal structure? Fine,
>> I'll accept that. But I think there is adequate evidence that
>> Klingon perfective does not match such an ideal definition.
> 
> So do I! But "usually" the definition holds. It's perfective, but in paq'batlh (and only in paq'batlh) there are also elements of perfect tense.
> 
> -- 
> SuStel
> http://www.trimboli.name/
> 
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