tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Apr 27 00:34:59 1997
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RE: KLBC: Practicing with questions
- From: "David Trimboli" <[email protected]>
- Subject: RE: KLBC: Practicing with questions
- Date: Fri, 25 Apr 97 21:54:20 UT
[email protected] on behalf of [email protected] wrote:
> In a message dated 97-04-21 20:31:57 EDT, SuStel writes:
>
> << No, that's worse. For example, {paq nuq} means "what is the book?" It
> shouldn't also mean "the book's what" or "which book." {nuq} is a question
> word, not a pronoun.
> >>
>
> bIlughbe' SuStel
>
> "What is the book?" wIjatlhmeH {nuq 'oH paqvetlh'e'} wIjatlhnIS
>
> "Which book" 'oSba' {paq nuq}
***Bzzzzt!*** Sorry, thank you for playing.
On the MSN Marc Okrand forum, Okrand himself told us that "<noun> nuq" means
"what is <noun>." For example, {yIH nuq} "what is a tribble?"
> This refers to "what book of a set of books (plural)." Although TKD has not
> established how we say "which book," this discussion list has determined
this
> usage to be proper.
"Why don't you tell him about his great consolation prize!"
*YOU* may have determined this, but the e-mail list has done no such thing.
> We have two ways to expand tlhIngan Hol: wait for Marc
> Okrand to produce everything before we use it and, by sticking strictly to
> the rules and logic of the language, produce new sentences from the existing
> language.
WHY DO YOU WANT TO EXPAND KLINGON?!? Learn to use it fluently first. If
you'd be willing to walk up to a Klingon and tell him "Your language is wrong.
Here's how you *should* be saying it," then you'd be either very brave or
very foolish.
> {nuq} already exists. We are merely using it in a logical manner,
> but a different manner than explicitly discussed already in TKD.
That logic you refer to is not the only valid argument, and it is not borne
out in canon. You *may* be right, but there's no good reason for me to
believe so.
> The
> publication of Hamlet, although not canon, followed much discussion of the
> topnotch Klingonists on this listserv; and, NOUN + nuq appears to have
become
> the preferable way of translating "which NOUN."
Heh . . . I have bad news for you: *I'm* the editor for the next Shakespearean
restoration, "Much Ado About Nothing," and you ain't gonna find this
construction in it! (At least, not that I caught. Still, it's very likely
that Okrand's new book will invalidate a lot of the grammar in it.) Kinda
puts a damper on the call to Shakespeare . . .
--
SuStel
Beginners' Grammarian
Stardate 97316.7