[86588] in tlhIngan-Hol
Re: Articles
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (ghunchu'wI')
Sat Sep 26 12:30:50 2009
In-Reply-To: <606963C8-6E4B-4D4C-8E8E-290BCD612F98@embarqmail.com>
From: "ghunchu'wI'" <qunchuy@alcaco.net>
Date: Sat, 26 Sep 2009 12:28:54 -0400
To: tlhingan-hol@kli.org
Errors-to: tlhingan-hol-bounce@kli.org
Reply-to: tlhingan-hol@kli.org
On Sep 26, 2009, at 12:03 AM, Doq wrote:
> English has definite (the) and indefinite (a, an) articles. Many
> languages don't. Of the polyglots out there that speak other languages
> that lack articles, is there any common way to differentiate between
> "I see an enemy," and "I see the enemy" besides the ubiquitous
> linguistic band-aid of "context"?
In languages which do not distinguish between "an enemy" and "the
enemy", the question does not arise. :)
Definite articles presuppose the existence of what is being
mentioned. In Klingon, one might do that using a type 4 noun
suffix. I see indefinite articles emphasizing the idea of
categorization rather than identification. I don't know a simple way
to do that in Klingon.
-- ghunchu'wI'
