[tlhIngan Hol] using {-lu'} in conjunction with {-ghach}

[Will Martin]

Great discussion.

If I were to guess at what {vanglu’ghach} could mean, based on the way {-ghach} works with other suffixes and on what you are rightly pointing out about what {-lu’} does to a verb, I’d probably come up with “the anonymity of action”, which is not a particularly meaningful noun, from my perspective. I suggest it less because I think that such an interpretation of {vanglu’gach} is useful than I do to illustrate why {vanglu’ghach} is almost certainly not a useful addition to Klingon vocabulary.

Maybe one could stretch one’s imagination to illustrate an example where the inability to identify one who does a thing is the focus of meaning one needs a noun for, but it would be a long stretch, and we’ve gone decades without needing that word. We can probably go decades more before such a need arises.

Similarly, I’d interpret {leghlu’wI’} as one who anonymously sees. In other words, an unidentifiable seer, like {ja’lu’wI’} might be the narrator of a story, as viewed from the reality of the story itself. “Where is that voice coming from?”

Or maybe Klingon has the perfect word to describe the source of those voices in my head...

See how weird this gets?

Nominalizing a verb with {-lu’}? I agree that it’s probably a bad idea. 

charghwI’ vaghnerya’ngan

rInpa’ bomnIS be’’a’ pI’.




> On Jan 16, 2020, at 10:26 AM, SuStel <sustel at trimboli.name> wrote:
> 
> On 1/16/2020 10:07 AM, Hugh Son puqloD wrote:
>>> On Jan 16, 2020, at 08:59, mayqel qunen'oS <mihkoun at gmail.com> <mailto:mihkoun at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>> This whole matter *feels* to me like, combining {-lu'} with {-wI'}, thus writing something like {leghlu'wI'}, which I don't *feel* as something actually making sense.
>> I’ve heard arguments that something like {leghlu'wI'} *could* mean something like “one that is seen” (i.e., the {-lu'} “flips” {-wI'} so that the formed noun is the object of the verb rather than the subject, much in the way that {-lu'} “flips” prefixes), and I can sort of see the train of thought that leads there, but I am unconvinced that it actually works that way and I am nearly certain it’s not supported by canon.
> It isn't.
> 
> And this analysis relies on the idea that -lu' "flips" the subject of the verb to the object, when it does no such thing. -lu' simply means the subject is indefinite instead of definite. The object remains the same. The prefix "flipping" is simply an acknowledgement that, since there is no subject, the first and only argument to the verb to consider is the object.
> 
> jIH mulegh HoD The captain sees me is a sentence with a definite subject.
> 
> jIH vIleghlu' Someone indefinite sees me describes the same situation with an indefinite subject. There is no "flipping."
> 
> English passive voice "flips" the object to the subject, but this is completely different from Klingon -lu'. The grammar of a translation does not govern the grammar of the original.
> 
> -- 
> SuStel
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