Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/5/84; site rochester.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!rochester!gary From: gary@rochester.UUCP (Gary Cottrell) Newsgroups: net.ai,net.nlang Subject: Natural Language Deficiencies in Hopi. Message-ID: <2479@rochester.UUCP> Date: Tue, 23-Oct-84 16:52:08 EDT Article-I.D.: rocheste.2479 Posted: Tue Oct 23 16:52:08 1984 Date-Received: Wed, 24-Oct-84 19:04:58 EDT References: <12582@sri-arpa.UUCP> <12300003@uicsl.UUCP> <194@oliveb.UUCP> <619@gloria.UUCP> <801@aplvax.UUCP> Organization: U. of Rochester, CS Dept. Lines: 13 > <> > It is well-known that the Hopi (American Indian) language only has a > present tense, there are no past or future tenses for their verbs. > Surely this is a language deficiency. The same is true of AMSLAN (AMerican Sign LANguage), but whether you are talking about the past or future is clearly communicated by setting up the context in advance. For example, one might say "Yesterday, I see Bill.", which is perfectly grammatical in AMSLAN. I'll bet there's something similar in Hopi. gary cottrell (allegra or seismo)!rochester!gary (UUCP) gary@rochester (ARPA)