Hi, I asked this question a couple of days ago, sorry for asking again. I understood that explicit pronouns are used in order to clarify a sentence when it is ambiguous or difficult to understand. If we want to add some emphasis, we can use the pronoun with the suffix *-'e'*. But in the Duolingo course notes about pronouns and also at the Klingon Wiki (http://klingon.wiki/En/Pronoun) we can read that pronouns can actually be used in order to add some emphasis when the sentence is not ambiguous and therefore pronouns are not required. Now I'm a bit confused. Thank you for your help!
Am 11.10.2020 um 14:32 schrieb Luis Chaparro Caballero:
[...] we can read that pronouns can actually be used in order to add some emphasis when the sentence is not ambiguous and therefore pronouns are not required. Now I'm a bit confused.
I don't know if you know those languages, but for instance, this also happens in French: You can say without ambiguity "Tu manges" - "you eat", but for amphasis, you might also add a pronoun "toi" (you) and get "Toi, tu manges...". This is what happens with {jISop} and {jISop jIH}. Your name seems a bit Spanish, so maybe looking at that language also helps. If I remember correctly, you don't use any pronouns in Spanish ("Aprendo español") but you COULD for emphasis: "Yo aprendo español" Does this help? -- Lieven L. Litaer aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany" http://www.tlhInganHol.com http://klingon.wiki/En/Pronoun
Hi, thank you for your quick answer. Lieven L. Litaer:
Your name seems a bit Spanish, so maybe looking at that language also helps. If I remember correctly, you don't use any pronouns in Spanish ("Aprendo español") but you COULD for emphasis: "Yo aprendo español"
Yes, I'm from Spain and you are right about the use of personal pronouns in Spanish. I pointed at it when I asked this question in this thread: http://lists.kli.org/pipermail/tlhingan-hol-kli.org/2020-September/015788.ht... But there - at least I interpreted it so - I understood this comparison wasn't right. SuStel:
HIq vItlhutlh jIH I drink the liquor. In case anyone isn't sure who does the drinking, I make it clear that it's me.
I'm probably confused, since I'm a beginner and I hope I'm not annoying you with my questions. If so, I'm sorry, maybe that's not the right forum for me. But in the thread I mention above, you told me there is no semantic difference between *yaS vIlegh* and *yaS vIlegh jIH*, so I cannot understand your new example properly. Regarding what you told me in September I would have expected: *HIq vItlhutlh jIH'e'*. Adding only *jIH* without *-'e'* sounds for me similar to that use of Spanish I spoke about in that thread (and Lieven L. Litaer mentions here). In Duolingo we find this example: *jIqet jIH 'ach bIyIt SoH* (translated: "*I* run but *you* walk.") Thank you for your patience!
On 10/11/2020 9:45 AM, Luis Chaparro Caballero wrote:
SuStel:
HIq vItlhutlh jIH I drink the liquor. In case anyone isn't sure who does the drinking, I make it clear that it's me. I'm probably confused, since I'm a beginner and I hope I'm not annoying you with my questions. If so, I'm sorry, maybe that's not the right forum for me. But in the thread I mention above, you told me there is no semantic difference between*yaS vIlegh* and*yaS vIlegh jIH*, so I cannot understand your new example properly. Regarding what you told me in September I would have expected:*HIq vItlhutlh jIH'e'*. Adding only *jIH* without *-'e'* sounds for me similar to that use of Spanish I spoke about in that thread (and Lieven L. Litaer mentions here). In Duolingo we find this example: *jIqet jIH 'ach bIyIt SoH* (translated: "*I* run but *you* walk.")
A semantic difference between sentences is where the sentences mean something different. *HIq vItlhutlh jIH* means exactly the same thing as *HIq vItlhutlh;* I'm just adding the *jIH* to make especially sure you understood. If I had said *HIq vItlhutlh jIH'e',* it would have meant something slightly different: I, and not someone else, drink the liquor. There is no "and not someone else" element in *HIq vItlhutlh jIH.* That's the semantic difference. Do not hold up Duolingo as an example of necessarily correct Klingon. It gets a lot of things wrong. Its translation in this case is poor, though not strictly wrong. It doesn't explain what those asterisks around the words actually MEAN. The sentence *jIqet jIH 'ach bIyIt SoH* means /I run but you walk./ Including the pronouns does not automatically mean you're stressing them; it means you're being more clear than the minimum you need to be. It means exactly the same as *jIqet 'ach bIyIt. *If the sentence were *jIqet jIH'e' 'ach bIyIt SoH'e',* that would mean something different: /I (not someone else) run, but you (not someone else) walk./ Using explicit pronouns just means you're using extra clarity. Using *-'e'* means you're making the noun exclusive. Being extra clear doesn't change the meaning of the sentence; using *-'e'* does. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
Am 11.10.2020 um 15:45 schrieb Luis Chaparro Caballero:
I'm probably confused, since I'm a beginner and I hope I'm not annoying you with my questions.
Don't bother about that. This is exactly the perfect forum for this kind of questions. :-)
you told me there is no semantic difference between *yaS vIlegh* and *yaS vIlegh jIH*
I did not follow the entire thread, but TKD clearly explains how it works: <<< Pronouns may be used as nouns, but only for emphasis or added clarity. They are not required. Thus, the following sets of sentences are all grammatically correct. {yaS vIlegh jIH} "I see the officers." {yaS vIlegh}
Taking this literally, adding the suffix {-'e'} even adds more emphasis. It is used with the pronoun jIH, because it cannot be attached to a verb. -- Lieven L. Litaer aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany" http://www.tlhInganHol.com http://klingon.wiki/En/Emphasis
On 10/11/2020 10:10 AM, Lieven L. Litaer wrote:
<<< Pronouns may be used as nouns, but only for emphasis or added clarity. They are not required. Thus, the following sets of sentences are all grammatically correct.
{yaS vIlegh jIH} "I see the officers." {yaS vIlegh}
Taking this literally, adding the suffix {-'e'} even adds more emphasis. It is used with the pronoun jIH, because it cannot be attached to a verb.
The suffix *-'e'* does more than add even more emphasis. It adds focus. It makes the noun to which it is attached exclusive. Notice the examples in TKD (correcting for forgotten prefix): *jIlujpu' jIH*/I have failed. /*jIlujpu' jIH'e'*/I, and only I, have failed./ *De' vItlhapnISpu'*/I needed to get the information. /*De''e' vItlhapnISpu'*/I needed to get the INFORMATION. It was the information (and not something else) that I needed./ Notice that *jIlujpu' jIH* does not exhibit any kind of emphasis. There are also examples of explicit pronouns in section 6.1: *puq vIlegh jIH*/I see the child. /*jIH mulegh puq*/The child sees me. / Okrand goes on to say that explicit pronouns can "as here, be used for emphasis." The emphasis of the above two sentences is merely the emphasis of making it clear to the reader which pronoun is the correct subject or object. There is no semantic significance to including the pronouns on these sentences. *puq vIlegh jIH*//doesn't mean /*I* see the child,/ with some kind of emphasis on the /I./ It means simply /I see the child,/ and I'm making it quite explicit what the subject of the sentence is. In other words, explicit pronouns don't MEAN anything special in the sentence. They are just used when you want to be as clear as possible. Maybe to disambiguate. Maybe because your audience isn't very good at Klingon yet. Maybe because you're speaking very slowly and carefully to get someone's attention. In an interview with Lawrence Schoen in 1995, Lawrence pointed out that Okrand's use of *-'e'* was focus, not topic, despite what it says in TKD, and Okrand accepted this correction. http://klingonska.org/canon/1995-06-holqed-04-2-a.txt The trouble is just that Okrand used the vague word /emphasis/ for multiple different phenomena without explanation. The examples given, however, make the difference clear. *-'e'* on a subject or object give the noun grammatical focus. Plain explicit pronouns only provide clarity without changing the meaning of the sentence. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
This thread already has excellent responses. My intent is to add a slightly different detail. What we’re really talking about here is redundancy. Redundancy is a normal part of any language. It’s built into the grammar of most languages, any time that you have different words that “agree” grammatically, you have redundancy. One of the primary functions of redundancy is that it allows you to miss a word or two from a sentence because someone is muttering or there is background noise or your attention had not yet become focused on listening or… whatever. The point is that we don’t always year every syllable of what someone says to us, but we usually can understand them anyway because of the redundancy of syntactic and/or semantic elements in the sentence. Klingon is spare with redundancy. If there’s a single thing about Klingon that marks it as highly unusual among natural languages, it has less redundancy than most, as evidenced by the commonly omitted plural suffix on nouns whenever there is other grammatical evidence that the noun is plural. Most languages don’t do that. And so, {HIq vItlhutlh} has only one redundant element. {HIq} is a third person noun and {vI-} points to a third person object, and {HIq} appears in the position of a noun that, without a Type 5 suffix, is expected to be the object of the verb. So, {HIq} is redundantly identified as the object of the verb by both its position and by the verb prefix. When we make it {HIq vItlhutlh jIH}, we are merely adding a redundant reference to the subject of the sentence. We didn’t need it to get the meaning, unless someone slammed a door or coughed during {vI-}, but just in case you didn’t hear {jI-}, we have {jIH}. I’m simply making sure you got the message that I drank the alcoholic beverage. If I make it {HIq vItlhutlh jIH’e’}, I’m not merely making the first person singular subject of the sentence redundantly stated for clarity, I’m pointing out to you that the whole reason I uttered this sentence was to point out that *I* drank the alcoholic beverage. The important element of the sentence is the subject. It’s not just a syntactic redundancy for clarity, it’s a semantic emphasis. {HIq vItlhutlh} and {HIq vItlhutlh jIH} mean the same thing, but {HIq vItlhutlh jIH’e’} means something slightly different. It’s the same subject. It’s the same object. It’s the same verb, but in terms of meaning, the subject now means something different than it did in the other two versions of the sentence. Now, it’s not merely the person speaking. It is both the person speaking AND it is the focus of the sentence. Does that clarify the difference? charghwI’ vaghnerya’ngan rInpa’ bomnIS be’’a’ pI’.
On Oct 11, 2020, at 9:45 AM, Luis Chaparro Caballero <luis.chaparro@web.de> wrote:
Hi, thank you for your quick answer.
Lieven L. Litaer:
Your name seems a bit Spanish, so maybe looking at that language also helps. If I remember correctly, you don't use any pronouns in Spanish ("Aprendo español") but you COULD for emphasis: "Yo aprendo español"
Yes, I'm from Spain and you are right about the use of personal pronouns in Spanish. I pointed at it when I asked this question in this thread: http://lists.kli.org/pipermail/tlhingan-hol-kli.org/2020-September/015788.ht...
But there - at least I interpreted it so - I understood this comparison wasn't right.
SuStel:
HIq vItlhutlh jIH I drink the liquor. In case anyone isn't sure who does the drinking, I make it clear that it's me.
I'm probably confused, since I'm a beginner and I hope I'm not annoying you with my questions. If so, I'm sorry, maybe that's not the right forum for me. But in the thread I mention above, you told me there is no semantic difference between *yaS vIlegh* and *yaS vIlegh jIH*, so I cannot understand your new example properly. Regarding what you told me in September I would have expected: *HIq vItlhutlh jIH'e'*. Adding only *jIH* without *-'e'* sounds for me similar to that use of Spanish I spoke about in that thread (and Lieven L. Litaer mentions here). In Duolingo we find this example: *jIqet jIH 'ach bIyIt SoH* (translated: "*I* run but *you* walk.")
Thank you for your patience! _______________________________________________ tlhIngan-Hol mailing list tlhIngan-Hol@lists.kli.org http://lists.kli.org/listinfo.cgi/tlhingan-hol-kli.org
Lieven L. Litaer:
Don't bother about that. This is exactly the perfect forum for this kind of questions. :-)
I see! Thanks to all of you for taking the time to answer my questions so thoroughly. I undestand now much better how explicit pronouns, redundancy and emphasis work in Klingon. I have only two last questions which, from an English point of view, probably don't make much sense, however as a Spanish native speaker they could help me to understand better. Suppose you are discussing how you can go somewhere and I want to give you the information that I have a car and I want to help. Is it right if I say: *puH Duj vIghaj*? *puH Duj vIghaj jIH* would only make sense if I want to be extra clear, right? And if someone asks: *puH Duj ghaj 'Iv?*, which one would be the "normal" or "usual" answer in Klingon? Once again, *vIghaj jIH* would only be used if we want to be very clear or we want to be sure people understand us, right? So maybe *vIghaj* or simply *jIH*? Thank you!
On 10/12/2020 1:41 PM, Luis Chaparro Caballero wrote:
Suppose you are discussing how you can go somewhere and I want to give you the information that I have a car and I want to help. Is it right if I say: *puH Duj vIghaj*? *puH Duj vIghaj jIH* would only make sense if I want to be extra clear, right?
And if someone asks: *puH Duj ghaj 'Iv?*, which one would be the "normal" or "usual" answer in Klingon? Once again, *vIghaj jIH* would only be used if we want to be very clear or we want to be sure people understand us, right? So maybe *vIghaj* or simply *jIH*?
*puH Duj vIghaj* and *puH Duj vIghaj jIH* are both perfectly acceptable. You are not forbidden from using an explicit pronoun whenever you want. If you did it all the time, Klingons would probably think you're speaking in a funny way, but that's all. If you do it one time for no reason, I don't think any of them would even notice. The answer to *puH Duj ghaj 'Iv* could be *puH Duj vIghaj, puH Duj vIghaj jIH,* or *puH Duj vIghaj jIH'e',* depending on what you want to emphasize. If you just want to state the fact without any embellishment, you might say *puH Duj vIghaj.* If you want to stress the *jIH, *kind of like raising your hand to be noticed, you might say *puH Duj vIghaj jIH* and say the *jIH* extra loudly. ("Ooh! Ooh! *I* have a car!" You're not excluding someone else from having a car. And you'd have to say the *jIH* loudly. Just saying *jIH* without stressing it isn't enough.) If you want to say that YOU have the car, not somebody else, you'd say *puH Duj vIghaj jIH'e'.* -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
SuStel:
If you want to stress the jIH, kind of like raising your hand to be noticed, you might say puH Duj vIghaj jIH and say the jIH extra loudly. ("Ooh! Ooh! *I* have a car!" You're not excluding someone else from having a car. And you'd have to say the jIH loudly. Just saying jIH without stressing it isn't enough.)
Because if I don't stress the *jIH* or say it extra loudly, the sentence *puH Duj vIghaj jIH* would only be an extra clear version of *puH Duj vIghaj* (if I want to be extra sure people understand me), but it wouldn't make the effect of attracting attention, right?
The answer to puH Duj ghaj 'Iv could be puH Duj vIghaj, puH Duj vIghaj jIH, or puH Duj vIghaj jIH'e', depending on what you want to emphasize.
Is it also acceptable if I answer without explicit object? *vIghaj* *vIghaj jIH* *vIghaj jIH'e'* And what about answering only with a pronoun? Is it allowed in Klingon? *jIH* *jIH'e'*
On 10/13/2020 10:32 AM, Luis Chaparro Caballero wrote:
SuStel:
If you want to stress the jIH, kind of like raising your hand to be noticed, you might say puH Duj vIghaj jIH and say the jIH extra loudly. ("Ooh! Ooh!*I* have a car!" You're not excluding someone else from having a car. And you'd have to say the jIH loudly. Just saying jIH without stressing it isn't enough.) Because if I don't stress the*jIH* or say it extra loudly, the sentence*puH Duj vIghaj jIH* would only be an extra clear version of*puH Duj vIghaj* (if I want to be extra sure people understand me), but it wouldn't make the effect of attracting attention, right?
It attracts attention because you're being extra clear. What it doesn't do is add focus to the pronoun. It doesn't say "I and nobody else" the way *jIH'e'* does. If you happen to include an explicit pronoun where you didn't have to, nobody is going to stop you and ask, "Why did you emphasize the pronoun like that?" You just said a pronoun. No big deal.
The answer to puH Duj ghaj 'Iv could be puH Duj vIghaj, puH Duj vIghaj jIH, or puH Duj vIghaj jIH'e', depending on what you want to emphasize. Is it also acceptable if I answer without explicit object? *vIghaj* *vIghaj jIH* *vIghaj jIH'e'*
And what about answering only with a pronoun? Is it allowed in Klingon? *jIH* *jIH'e'*
Sure. I wasn't trying to list all possible responses, just illustrate the difference between an elided pronoun, an explicit pronoun, and a pronoun with *-'e'.* -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
Gesendet: Dienstag, 13. Oktober 2020 um 16:50 Uhr Von: "SuStel" <sustel@trimboli.name> An: tlhingan-hol@lists.kli.org Betreff: Re: [tlhIngan Hol] Explicit pronouns again On 10/13/2020 10:32 AM, Luis Chaparro Caballero wrote: SuStel:
If you want to stress the jIH, kind of like raising your hand to be noticed, you might say puH Duj vIghaj jIH and say the jIH extra loudly. ("Ooh! Ooh! *I* have a car!" You're not excluding someone else from having a car. And you'd have to say the jIH loudly. Just saying jIH without stressing it isn't enough.) Because if I don't stress the *jIH* or say it extra loudly, the sentence *puH Duj vIghaj jIH* would only be an extra clear version of *puH Duj vIghaj* (if I want to be extra sure people understand me), but it wouldn't make the effect of attracting attention, right? It attracts attention because you're being extra clear. What it doesn't do is add focus to the pronoun. It doesn't say "I and nobody else" the way jIH'e' does. If you happen to include an explicit pronoun where you didn't have to, nobody is going to stop you and ask, "Why did you emphasize the pronoun like that?" You just said a pronoun. No big deal. Ok. I was just trying to understand why you said "Just saying jIH without stressing it isn't enough". I understood "isn't enough for attracting attention". If I don't stress it, it is "only" a redundant pronoun or an extra clear sentence. Maybe I'm missing your point, sorry.
On 10/13/2020 10:57 AM, Luis Chaparro Caballero wrote:
If you want to stress the jIH, kind of like raising your hand to be noticed, you might say puH Duj vIghaj jIH and say the jIH extra loudly. ("Ooh! Ooh!*I* have a car!" You're not excluding someone else from having a car. And you'd have to say the jIH loudly. Just saying jIH without stressing it isn't enough.) Because if I don't stress the*jIH* or say it extra loudly, the sentence*puH Duj vIghaj jIH* would only be an extra clear version of*puH Duj vIghaj* (if I want to be extra sure people understand me), but it wouldn't make the effect of attracting attention, right? It attracts attention because you're being extra clear. What it doesn't do is add focus to the pronoun. It doesn't say "I and nobody else" the way jIH'e' does. If you happen to include an explicit pronoun where you didn't have to, nobody is going to stop you and ask, "Why did you emphasize the pronoun like that?" You just said a pronoun. No big deal.
Ok. I was just trying to understand why you said "Just saying jIH without stressing it isn't enough". I understood "isn't enough for attracting attention". If I don't stress it, it is "only" a redundant pronoun or an extra clear sentence. Maybe I'm missing your point, sorry.
I think you've got it. It all comes down to what "emphasis" means: you can't take for granted that you know this. Okrand uses it to mean different things in different places. In the case of explicit pronouns, it means clarity. In the case of *-'e',* it means focus. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
SuStel:
I think you've got it. It all comes down to what "emphasis" means: you can't take for granted that you know this. Okrand uses it to mean different things in different places. In the case of explicit pronouns, it means clarity. In the case of -'e', it means focus.
Thank you! It was a really instructive thread for me.
On 10/11/2020 8:32 AM, Luis Chaparro Caballero wrote:
I asked this question a couple of days ago, sorry for asking again. I understood that explicit pronouns are used in order to clarify a sentence when it is ambiguous or difficult to understand. If we want to add some emphasis, we can use the pronoun with the suffix *-'e'*. But in the Duolingo course notes about pronouns and also at the Klingon Wiki (http://klingon.wiki/En/Pronoun) we can read that pronouns can actually be used in order to add some emphasis when the sentence is not ambiguous and therefore pronouns are not required. Now I'm a bit confused.
"Emphasis" means a couple of different things. It can mean making your voice louder or clearer so someone can better hear it. It can mean speaking more slowly so nothing is missed. It can mean making it clear that the word you're saying means what you want it to mean and not something else. There are a couple of different ways in which Klingon allows emphasis. If you include a pronoun where you're not required to use that pronoun, the emphasis you're employing is making your sentence clearer. Someone might have missed your verb prefix, or the subject or object of your sentence might be ambiguous, so stating the pronoun outright clarifies things. You can also add verbal stress to a pronoun; you can't add verbal stress to a pronoun you don't say. Examples: *HIq vItlhutlh jIH* /I drink the liquor./ In case anyone isn't sure who does the drinking, I make it clear that it's me. *Dujvetlh ra' HoDvetlh. ghaH vIghoS. */That captain commands that ship. I go to him/her. /Without the *ghaH,* it would be unclear whether I go to the ship or the captain. If you use *-'e'* on a subject or object, the emphasis is that you're making the point that the word you used is exclusively correct. It's the thing you said, not something else. Examples: *veQDuj'e' ra' HoD */The captain commands the GARBAGE SCOW//(not some other ship)/. *munuQ puq'e' */The CHILD (not someone else) annoys me./ -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
participants (4)
-
Lieven L. Litaer -
Luis Chaparro Caballero -
SuStel -
Will Martin