[2863] in tlhIngan-Hol
augmentative/diminutive
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Sat Jan 29 12:01:34 1994
Reply-To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@klingon.East.Sun.COM>
From: dls9@aol.com
To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@klingon.East.Sun.COM>
Date: Sat, 29 Jan 94 11:58:31 EST
Ok, so now that I brought up the question of where is a tlhingan word for
"short," some of you have gone off about how {-Hom} could be used to denote
smallness or shortness.
I had always thought a bit differently about Klingon augmentatives and
diminutives. Instead of thinking in terms of "big"/"small", (a useful
convention, albeit one that imesho distorts the true meaning), I think of
them as denoters of magnified/diminished _meaning_ of a word, not its size.
To bring this idea home, look up "slave" in TKD's addendum. It's
{toy'wI''a'}. To our common notion of {-'a'} this should mean "large
servant." But instead of magnifying the _size_ of the servant, it magnifies
the _semantic value_-- one step beyond a servant, a para-servant.
Not to say we should translate {-'a'} as "para-".
{chay' tujang}
ghaytan HujwI' vIDalaw' neH
***jabbI'ID pItlh***
Guido#1, Leader of All Guidos
