[tlhIngan Hol] thoughts on the perfective {-pu'}

[Iikka Hauhio]

> It is? It seems pretty clear to me that {neH} is an action and not a state (in the senses of these words as used in TKD). {vIneHpu'} is even used as an example for {-pu'}, right after it's explained that the suffix indicates that "an action is completed". (A verb expressing a state can be used as an adjective following a noun, whereas {neH} clearly can't.)

I'm not sayin gthat neH is a quality verb. I'm saying I think it's a stative verb. The English want is a so called stative verb.

jIvem, jISay'eghmoH, Soj vIneH, vaj jISop. yaH vIghoS.

Here vem, Say'moH, Sop and ghoS are actions that happen in an order: first I wake up, then I wash myself, then I eat, then I go to the duty station. But I don't think neH is an action. I don't first do a wanting-action and then eat. Wanting food is a state I have before eating, but I probably wanted to eat before washing myself too.

Same goes for quality verbs:

jIvem, jISay'eghmoH, jIghung, vaj jISop. yaH vIghoS.

Being hungry is a state I have before eating, not an action.

I do agree that these verbs aren't actions as such. But if we apply perfective to them, I think we can force them to describe events by compressing the state to a single point in the timeline. For example:

Hogh vorgh jIrop. Last week I was sick.
Hogh vorgh jIroppu'. Last week I had an illness.

I think by adding -pu', I can make it an event. In my opinion, this is useful and meaningful.

Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio

------- Original Message -------
On Wednesday, April 6th, 2022 at 02.46, De'vID <de.vid.jonpin at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, 5 Apr 2022 at 20:20, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq at protonmail.com> wrote:
>
>> SuStel:
>>
>>> for a quality, that's weird. Again, I'm not saying it's possible, but it's weird, and I'm still not aware of any evidence that Klingon does it
>>
>> I don't think it's weird. I've explained how such a word has a useful meaning. I think you too see how it could have a meaning, as you have multiple times described what it would mean, and I agree with your analysis. It seems the only reason you have to argue against this construct is that it is "weird" and doesn't fit to your personal model of how Klingon works.
>
> He wasn't just saying it was "weird" as a sort of personal feeling. He explained *how* it was weird: it treats a quality as an event (in the linguistic sense).
>
> TKD says that {-pu'} indicates that "an action is completed" and {-ta'} is used when "an activity was deliberately undertaken". Applying these to a state or quality is "weird" because actions or activities have a kind of internal structure or flow that a state or quality does not. An action is what something *does*, and putting {-pu'} on an action makes sense because it's saying that the action was completed (i.e., it expresses that the action is done). A state or quality is what something *is*, and putting {-pu'} on a state or quality doesn't make sense (is "weird"), because it's indicating that an action is completed when the verb doesn't express an action in the first place (i.e., it expresses that the quality is been? has been? I can't even describe what it would be doing).
>
> In {jIroppu'}, what is the "action" (in the linguistic sense) that's completed? It makes sense to say something like {rojchoHpu'} (because the {-choH} turns the verb into an action), but what would {roppu'} mean?
>
>>> I don't think you can answer it just by declaring a yes or a no as Iikka is doing.
>>
>> Please don't put words in my mouth. All I've said is that there is no intrinsic semantic distinction between a quality verb and a non-quality verb. There is a grammatical distinction: quality verbs can be used as "adjective attributes". That is the only canonical distinction there is between these two parts of speech.
>>
>> All I've said is that 1) using perfective on quality verbs is both meaningful and useful 2) it isn't forbidden and 3) the lack of evidence is not proof of ungrammaticality.
>
> Just because something isn't ungrammatical doesn't mean it makes sense. There's no explicit rule that prevents suffixes that apply only to actions from being attached to verbs which are non-actions, but the result doesn't make sense.
>
>> We cannot expect there to be a canonical sentence for every possible combination of words and suffixes, so just that there are not good data points doesn't mean anything. Instead, to support this kind of claim, one should find a sentence that should have a perfective suffix but doesn't, and argue that the lack of suffix is due to an unwritten rule.
>
> That seems like begging the question to me. If it doesn't make sense to ever put a perfective suffix on a non-action verb, as I believe, then there can never be a sentence with a non-action verb which "should have a perfective suffix but doesn't". The fact that no perfective suffix is found on a non-action verb in canon *is* evidence that the two normally don't go together, even if it doesn't prove that they can't.
>
>> One interesting canon sentence to consider is vIneHpu' I wanted them that uses -pu' on neH which is a verb describing a state.
>
> It is? It seems pretty clear to me that {neH} is an action and not a state (in the senses of these words as used in TKD). {vIneHpu'} is even used as an example for {-pu'}, right after it's explained that the suffix indicates that "an action is completed". (A verb expressing a state can be used as an adjective following a noun, whereas {neH} clearly can't.)
>
>> While not an "adjective" like rop, it isn't an "action" either. If words like neH and Sov can have the perfective aspect, why wouldn't quality verbs too?
>
> Because the meaning of {-pu'} makes sense on {neH} and {Sov} (which are both actions), and it doesn't seem to make sense on a verb of quality or state.
>
> --
>
> De'vID
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