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Re: Relative clauses

From:Carsten Becker <carbeck@...>
Date:Thursday, June 29, 2006, 18:19
Hi,

From: "caeruleancentaur" <caeruleancentaur@...>
Sent: Wednesday, June 28, 2006 3:47 AM

> "Have you seen which book he is reading?" > I believe that in that sentence "which" is a relative > adjective.
IME we called that a 'question pronoun'. 'Which' refers not to a quality of the head word, so it cannot be an adjective according to the definition I learned at school. As for relative sentences, Ayeri is -- as usual -- quite boring in fact since it behaves quite similar to English and/or German ... Some things sound more awkward than others, though, although they do not sound necessarily awkward in English. I'm trying to translate now sentences that Philip Newton has said were difficult to translate into Klingon. Maybe that will reveal some problems regarding aesthetics I have: "I know where you are going" 1a. Le koronayang yanōn sileyea saravāng. (awkward?) = I-know place to which you-go 1b. Koronayang siea saravāng. (Not perfect, but probably OK) = I-know where you-go 1c. ?? "The ship in which I fled" 2a. Besonreng kong sirengea madanguayang (awkward?) = ship inside_of which I-fled 2b. Adabesonreng, madanguayang kong arạea. (OK) = that-ship, I-fled inside-of it No, I don't really like either double case marking on relative pronouns (1a, 2a) nor using things like _kong sirengea_ (= inside_of REL.AGT.LOC) for some reason. 1b also seems not pleasing to me since you mark a relative pronoun that has no head for locative. Note the difference between _sea_ (also written _sya_) and _siea_ (also written _siya_) -- the first implies that the relative pronoun refers to an earlier locative object, while the second just marks the relative pronoun for locative, where the relative pronoun refers back to the NP that came last*, but in the case of 1b there is only a VP -- if you count _-ayang_ (1s.AGT) into the VP, although it is just an attached NP more or less, but closely related to the VP _koron_ (know). Seems to be a dilemma, for me at least -- I guess I should canonify double marked relative pronouns and dummy relative pronouns, althóugh I don't like them. Thanks for still reading my ramblings, Carsten *) Although I haven't known it by then, this works like PERL's '$_' variable now that I think about it. -- "Miranayam kepauarạ naranoaris." (Kalvin nay Hobbes) Venena, Rayam 9, 2315 ya 17:58:06 pd

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Roger Mills <rfmilly@...>