Re: Locating a Sentence's Action in Time Saul Epstein Mon, 5 Oct 1998 10:27:46 -0500 Quotes from: Rob Zook Date: Sunday, October 04, 1998 2:12 PM >At 11:06 AM 10/4/98 -0500, Saul Epstein wrote: > >>And I >>adapted the original infixes for the purpose just to have this >>revised system better anchored in the original. I tried to match them >>as well as I could, given the fact that I'm trying to describe >>different things. I can see where that would be confusing. > >Well, yes, since I thought you wanted to keep things as close to the >original ZC as possible. This was as close as I felt I could get, given what I was trying to do. >I thing both you and I look at my first catagory then, albeit from >opposite ends. In which case, I don't think the meaning of -zo- needs >to change at all, since it seems to correspond to what you mean by >incomplete initial and what I called (from things you previously >wrote about aspects) imperfect initial. Mm-hmm. About the terminology: I've decided the traditional just gets in the way of people understanding, unless they happen to be familiar with it already. So I'm developing new terminology that I hope seems better motivated. >>I do think these are two different things. Perhaps we can call the >>one Concurrence and the other Phase? > >I don't suppose it really matters what we call them as long as the >word points to the underlying concepts adequately. Exactly. The word "aspect" in grammatical contexts is perfectly clear to me, but I realized rather suddenly a short time ago that it doesn't really match broader usage. I think that's enough of a problem to consider abandoning the term in favor of something that might be clearer. >>> Let's look at the situation were I write an invitation to some >>> one, I could just say: >>> >>> lihe th'k'tvehi vdik'wawjehi >>> "I wrote the invitation" >> >>I think with vdi-, as I intended it, would mean >>"invited one." would still be "the/an invitation" or "to >>invite" or "inviting" (as an adjective). > >OK, I wasn't sure about that. So >would mean "I wrote the invitation" or "in past I write the invitation". Yup. >>> Now lets allow that act of writing some duration. What if I >>> say that sentance after I begin writing the invitation but >>> before the process of writing has ended: >>> >>> lihe th'k'tvezohi vdik'wawjehi >>> "I wrote the invitation (and am still writing it)" >> >>As I meant it to operate, this sentence would mean, roughly "I have >>written the invitation," possibly implying "I am even now signing my >>name at the bottom," or some such. In other words, the action does >>not continue significantly beyond the moment of speech. > >Why truncate the original meaning of -zo-? Because the meaning you meant is covered by what I'd now call continuous concurrence: action begins before the tense and not ended within the tense (at least "so far," in the case of the present). If you think that matches -zo- better, that's what we can use for it. >>> Surak lihe owkja 'Ankh'khehe >>> "Surak in past he exist before, during and after the time of >>> the past WAR" >>> (gloss) "Surak existed around the time of the past WAR" >>> >>> The temporal aspect changes the object from a plain old entity >>> to a temporal location. >> >>This could just as easily be >> >> lihe ow'ticuxoi 'ankh'he surak >> past he-living war-in Surak >> "Surak was living during the War." > >Hmmm but without something indicating the tense of 'ankh it could >just as easily mean "Surak was living inside the War", or "in the >midsts of the War". The -he partical by itself seems really, really >indefinite. I'm not exactly sure what you mean, but if you mean that it can't be told that the War occured in the past, that's implied by . If his action of living during the War is a past action, the War during which he was living must also be past. If you mean it can't be told what the nature of the action's location is, that's what I saw as the role of the "relationship specifiers" you mentioned a while back. (E,g., -he is location in general, but there are lots of extra words analogous to prepositions that specify kinds of location. Maybe Phase serves much the same purpose? So, ?) >>> lihe th'prala Spokhi th'kahscuwanhe >>> "I spoke to Spock during my kahswan" >>> >>> more literally: >>> "in past I speak to Spock located during my kahs'wan" >> >>This may just be an unfortunate example, but I think the "during" is >>implied. > >Well, it probably would not make any sense using the new meaning you >assigned to -cu-. I probably should have come up with a new partical >which mean "some point inbetween the begining an the end of the >event", i,e. "during". No, that's probably OK, after all. I cede -cu-, and if it's all right to understand Phase as serving a roughly prepositional function, your sentence suddenly makes perfect sense... >>> lihe th'prashila Spokhi th'kahscuwanhe >>> "I began my speech to Spock during my kahswan" >>> >>> or more literally: >>> "in past my begin speak to Spock located during my kahs'wan" >> >>That actually works as I meant, if -shi- is incomplete (final) >>concurrence. "I began (or was about) to speak..." > >But that's not quite what I meant, as the beginning refers to >a point in time within the action, not to the interval of the >action. I don't think the difference is "real" for Vulcan. If my speculation that means both "I speak" and "my speech" is correct, then lihe th'pra-INITIAL-la spokhi th'kah-cu-swan-he past 1S-[speech|to speak]-INIT Spock-ACC 1S-Kahswan-DUR-LOC "My speech-initiation to Spock (was) during my Kahswan." OR "I began-to-speak to Spock during my Kahswan." >Those Phases, or what I called event aspects, refer to specific >point instances (with one exception) inside the action or the temporal >lifetime of an entity: Yes. That's partly why I felt no pressing need to include it in my original post, which was about something else. ;-) >>I don't think these are incompatible, I'd just like to >>distinguish them better. We could assign all but -zo- to the >>Phase category, including -cu-, and use others for Concurrence: >> >> -zo- final (was "incomplete (initial)") >> -fu- complete >> -dhe- continuous >> -go- initial (was "incomplete (final)") >> -n~a- indeterminate > >Make -zo- an initial indeterminate, a new partical for final, and >perhaps a final indeterminate partical and then it sounds grand. Mm, let's see. -dhe- final concurrence action's end adjoins or intersects tense's beginning -fu- complete concurrence action occurs entirely within tense -zo- continuous concurrence action begins before tense and ends after (or sometimes after speech-moment if present tense) -go- initial concurrence action's beginning intersects or adjoins tense's end (or sometimes speech-moment if present tense) -n~a- indeterminate concurrence action occurs within tense but with unstated beginning or ending In other words, Final locates the end of an action within a tense without determining the beginning of the action. Initial locates the beginning of an action within a tense without determining the end of the action. Complete and Continuous locate the beginning and end of an action, within or beyond a tense respectively. Indeterminate locates the action but neither beginning nor end. It may be that this should be the "default" concurrence. -- from Saul Epstein locus*planetkc,com - www,planetkc,com/locus "lihe ow'phafur the's'hi the's'cha' surakri'; the's'pharka the's'hi surakecha'." -- K'dvarin Urswhl'at