Be--!
So it occured to me lately that no matter how hard I think, I cannot for the life of me create an imperative "be" in either of the non-English languages I have any facility with (Latin and Japanese.) Does anyone know?
What I mean by "imperative be" is commanding someone to be something; for example, "be quiet!"; "be an adult about this"; "be the change" (t-shirt slogan).
As close as I can figure for Japanese would be なって or なれ (natte or nare) even, but I'm wondering if works the same way (ie, with the same immediacy) as be! in English. Latin, I have no idea.
More broadly, are there any languages that definitively lack an imperative be? It's a funny question, but I bet there's one that just doesn't work like that, as it were.
What I mean by "imperative be" is commanding someone to be something; for example, "be quiet!"; "be an adult about this"; "be the change" (t-shirt slogan).
As close as I can figure for Japanese would be なって or なれ (natte or nare) even, but I'm wondering if works the same way (ie, with the same immediacy) as be! in English. Latin, I have no idea.
More broadly, are there any languages that definitively lack an imperative be? It's a funny question, but I bet there's one that just doesn't work like that, as it were.