Re: A question and introduction

On Sat, Jun 15, 2002 at 10:39:27PM -0400, Roger Mills wrote:
[snip]
> This is somewhat similar to Indonesian, with two negatives _tidak_ for
> verbs, adj., sentences; and _bukan_ for nouns and pronouns, most often in
> statements like "X is not (a) Y"--
According to what I perceive of Malay, the cousin of Indonesian, _tidak_
is best understood as "did not", and _bukan_ as "not".

> 1a. saya tidak melihat gadis itu "I didn't see that girl"
> 1b.saya tidak melihat gadis-gadis "I didn't see (any) girls"
If you use _bukan_, you get a different shade of meaning:
        saya bukan melihat gadis itu
        "I wasn't looking at that girl." ("It's not her I was looking at").

> 2a.Pak Sihombing bukan dokter "Mr. S. is not a doctor"
> 2b.Ia pendeta, bukan guru "he is a priest, not a teacher"
> 2c. Siapa tahu menjawab? Bukan saya.  "Who knows the answer? Not me."
>
> You can't use bukan in 1a/b without changing the meaning; you can't use
> tidak in 2a/b/c at all. (though possible 2c...saya tidak tahu "I don't know
> (it)" )
Indeed.

[snip]
> It gets more complicated, and  is very difficult for a westerner to remember
> the proper usage.
Well, like I said, the easiest way to remember it is to think of _tidak_
as "did not", and _bukan_ as "is not".

> Even more difficult is the use in writing of both "tidaklah..."and
> "bukanlah..." which are fronted, and produce sort-of cleft sentences, "It
> isn't that...., It is not the case that...".  It's one bit of Indonesian
> grammar that did not find its way into Kash.......
Hmm, that seems to be peculiarly Indonesian. Malay also has these
constructs, but they are rare.


T

--
All men are mortal. Socrates is mortal. Therefore all men are Socrates.