This has probably been asked many times before, but I’m going to ask… How does one negate an adverbial like {reH} or {tlhoy}? While writing closed captions for a video I recently recorded [1], I realized that I apparently tried to do this by negating the verb, but I have no idea if that actually works. The two examples where it came up were: {reH qaSbe'} {tlhoy nI'be' HaSta tavam 'e' vItul} The intended meanings were “It didn’t always happen” and “I hope this visual record is not too long”, respectively, but upon review, it seems like out of context (maybe even in context) they mean “it always didn’t happen” and “I hope this visual record is too not long”, respectively. So… what would have been the right way to say those things? Or is this another thing we don’t know yet? [1] https://youtu.be/-fig0BJloKA - I know there are a lot of mistakes in it, but I recorded it completely on the fly and in one take. reH latlh qabDaa qul tuj law' Hoch tuj puS. I was inspired by DeSDu', who made this great video: https://youtu.be/terzWQPPkf0
On Mon, 25 Feb 2019 at 03:13, Daniel Dadap <daniel@dadap.net> wrote:
{reH qaSbe'} {tlhoy nI'be' HaSta tavam 'e' vItul}
The intended meanings were “It didn’t always happen” and “I hope this visual record is not too long”, respectively, but upon review, it seems like out of context (maybe even in context) they mean “it always didn’t happen” and “I hope this visual record is too not long”, respectively.
There's one canon sentence which might indicate that {-be'} applied to a verb with an adverbial negates the adverbial: {Hoch DaSopbe'chugh batlh bIHeghbe'.} "Eat everything or you will die without honor." (Power Klingon) But the grammar was never explained, and it's only one example, and arguably the meaning doesn't change whether the verb or the adverbial is negated ("one does not die with honour" is the same as "one dies without honour", if you assume everyone dies, so the statement is true for all mortals at least). Possibly relevant: {nom yIghoSqu'!} "Maximum speed!" (Star Trek V) Here, the rover {-qu'} is attached to {ghoS}, but the emphasis is actually being placed on {nom}. Perhaps {-be'} and {-qu'} act on the adverbial under certain circumstances, such as when the verb has no other suffixes except the rover (or maybe at most a type 9 suffix), but that would be speculation. -- De'vID
On Feb 24, 2019, at 23:06, De'vID <de.vid.jonpin@gmail.com> wrote:
There's one canon sentence which might indicate that {-be'} applied to a verb with an adverbial negates the adverbial: {Hoch DaSopbe'chugh batlh bIHeghbe'.} "Eat everything or you will die without honor." (Power Klingon)
But the grammar was never explained, and it's only one example, and arguably the meaning doesn't change whether the verb or the adverbial is negated ("one does not die with honour" is the same as "one dies without honour", if you assume everyone dies, so the statement is true for all mortals at least).
Hmm, interesting. If I had been asked to translate that sentence from English to Klingon, I might have written it as {batlhHa' bIHegh}, but that would mean “you will die dishonorably”, which could be subtly different from “you will die without honor.”
Possibly relevant: {nom yIghoSqu'!} "Maximum speed!" (Star Trek V)
Here, the rover {-qu'} is attached to {ghoS}, but the emphasis is actually being placed on {nom}.
“Maximum speed” could also just be a loose translation for “really go fast!”, though. Anyway, yeah, the evidence you presented os certainly not sufficient to suggest that one can negate or emphasize an adverbial by negating or emphasizing its verb. I was thinking about how I might recast the sentences {reH qaSbe'} and {tlhoy nI'be' HaSta tavam 'e' vItul} to avoid touching upon unresolved issues of grammar, and I’m not sure I found a satisfactory solution. I briefly considered {-Ha'} on the adverbial but {reHHa'} and {thoyHa'} both seemed off for reasons I couldn’t quite pin down. In context, both sentences were corrections to times I misspoke: I initially said {reH vInIHtaH} and {tlhoy nI' HaSta tavam}, respectively, and wanted to correct my meaning. For the first one, the intended corrected meaning was {pIj} instead of {reH}, so it should have been fine to just say {pIj}, but for the second one I’m still not sure what would have been better. It was part of an SAO and {tlhoy nI' HaSta tavam 'e' vItulbe'} comes close enough to the meaning that I intended that I think it would have been fine if I had said that, but I’d be interested to hear suggestions from others on how that might be recasted.
You are working really hard to avoid using the adverbial word {rut}... charghwI’ vaghnerya’ngan rInpa’ bomnIS be’’a’ pI’.
On Feb 24, 2019, at 9:13 PM, Daniel Dadap <daniel@dadap.net> wrote:
This has probably been asked many times before, but I’m going to ask…
How does one negate an adverbial like {reH} or {tlhoy}?
While writing closed captions for a video I recently recorded [1], I realized that I apparently tried to do this by negating the verb, but I have no idea if that actually works. The two examples where it came up were:
{reH qaSbe'} {tlhoy nI'be' HaSta tavam 'e' vItul}
The intended meanings were “It didn’t always happen” and “I hope this visual record is not too long”, respectively, but upon review, it seems like out of context (maybe even in context) they mean “it always didn’t happen” and “I hope this visual record is too not long”, respectively.
So… what would have been the right way to say those things? Or is this another thing we don’t know yet?
[1] https://youtu.be/-fig0BJloKA <https://youtu.be/-fig0BJloKA> - I know there are a lot of mistakes in it, but I recorded it completely on the fly and in one take. reH latlh qabDaa qul tuj law' Hoch tuj puS. I was inspired by DeSDu', who made this great video: https://youtu.be/terzWQPPkf0 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=terzWQPPkf0>_______________________________________________ tlhIngan-Hol mailing list tlhIngan-Hol@lists.kli.org http://lists.kli.org/listinfo.cgi/tlhingan-hol-kli.org
On Feb 25, 2019, at 08:34, mayqel qunen'oS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:
Can you repeat the intended meaning, for which you would like to hear suggestions ?
{reH qaSbe'} Intended meaning - “it didn’t always happen” {tlhoy nI'be' HaSta tavam 'e' vItul} Intended meaning - “I hope this visual record isn’t too long”
On Feb 25, 2019, at 13:04, Will Martin <willmartin2@mac.com> wrote:
You are working really hard to avoid using the adverbial word {rut}...
Not at all. My recast with {pIj}, which I used mere seconds after the original gaffe with {reH}, conveys the meaning I intended *for this particular utterance* better than {rut}, but I have no problems with {rut}. The problem is that I had already said {reH} even though I didn’t actually mean it. So to backtrack and explain that I didn’t actually mean {reH}, in the moment I said {reH qaSbe'}, then issued a corrected sentence using {pIj} instead. I don’t advocate saying {reH qaSbe'} in general; it’s just what I happened to say, and I’m aware that it stands on shaky ground. If I had written down what I was going to say before I said it, I certainly wouldn’t have said {reH} to begin with, so the problem wouldn’t be there at all. This isn’t about me not wanting to use a perfectly good word that exists; it’s about me making an error during extemporaneous speech, realizing the error immediately, but not being sure how best to correct it during the same instant of extemporaneous speech, and then being curious after the fact about how to negate adverbs more generally. If you watch the video you’ll hear me groan and then hem and haw for a while right after I say {reH}. (I hem and haw a lot during the video, which would have happened less, or not at all, if I had done any sort of preparation for it whatsoever, but I didn’t want to spend more than ten minutes making it.) Also, I still haven’t thought of a satisfactory solution to the second sentence which I ended up rendering as {tlhoy nI'be' HaSta tavam 'e' vItul}. Maybe since what I’m really hoping is that it isn’t perceived as too long, {tlhoy nI' HaSta tavam 'e' boHarbe' 'e' vItul} would have been the way to go.
De'nIl:
{reH qaSbe'}
Intended meaning - “it didn’t always
happen”
This is a tough one. The only thing that comes to mind is: {motlh qaS; rut qaSbe' 'a qub wanI'vam} "usually it happened; occasionally it didn't happen, but this occurence was rare" De'nIl:
{tlhoy nI'be' HaSta tavam 'e' vItul}
Intended meaning - “I hope this visual
record isn’t too long”
Perhaps I would write: {nI'qu'be' HaSta tavam; 'e' vItul} or {poH nI'qu' HaSta ta 'oHbe'; 'e' vItul} "it isn't a visual record of too much time, that I hope" or {poH nI'qu' poQbe' HaSta tavam; 'e' vItul} "this visual record doesn't require too much time, that I hope" ~ channgan qIj
participants (4)
-
Daniel Dadap -
De'vID -
mayqel qunen'oS -
Will Martin