tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Mar 19 16:48:34 2006
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Re: Cute/Adorable KLBC (again)
- From: "QeS 'utlh" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Cute/Adorable KLBC (again)
- Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2006 10:48:19 +1000
- Bcc:
ghItlhpu' Shane MiQogh, ja':
>Seems though that simple concepts in english to explain are rather
>lengthy to say in Klingon verses everything else in klingon that tends
>to be short without going into what in english would be dramatic
>terms to keep it that short... (i hope that makes sence...) In other
>words, it'd take a great deal of words on it's own just to say "hug"
>or "cute", or you could accept dramatic terms like "hold" or "mate"
>and "attractive".. If you catch my drift...
Conversely, Klingon has {Qe'vo' HoD jol} "he transported the captain out of
the restaurant". Four Klingon syllables versus thirteen in English.
Anyway, you're in the enviable position of speaking English as a first
language, which has a vocabulary of some hundreds of thousands of roots. No
other language - natural or artificial - even comes close. Okrand himself
put it best: there is no Klingon word for "hypochondria", but in English it
takes just one word.
You're getting so hung up on what it is that Klingon can't do that you
haven't even explored what it is it *can* do. To take your previous example:
> QIH (if augumented) To level or obliviate
> QIH (dimunitive) to stun
The suffix {-qu'} emphasises or intensifies the action given by a verb:
{qach QIHqu'} "he razed the building to the ground, he very much destroyed
the building". Conversely, the adverb {loQ} "slightly, a little bit" serves
this purpose just fine: {loQ qach QIH} "he slightly damaged the building, he
superficially damaged the building". No new words involved, and your idea is
communicated successfully.
>To be a bit blunt, 2 new adverbs (not suffixes for heaven's sake, but
>if they were, they'd be rovers) would make the Klingon language
>*ALOT* more flexable.
They might well do. But Ubykh lacks an adjective meaning "strong", Mandarin
doesn't have an obligatory plural, and English doesn't have a number
distinction in second person pronouns. Should any of these things be
changed? No. The languages are fine as they are, and every language has
strategies for dealing with these problems. Mandarin may add qualifiers to a
word, like "many", to show plural. Ubykh gets by with the circumlocution
"having strength". English has come up with "you all". Just because these
are longer than what may appear in other languages doesn't make them any
less valid.
Ultimately, learning Klingon is about formulating strategies for saying what
you want to say. How you do this is immaterial so long as you do it within
the rules - which, once you've learned for a while, are more flexible than
you think. No-one will care if your English "I love you" comes into Klingon
as {bangwI' SoH} "you are my love" or {qaparHa'qu'} "I very much un-hate
you". Language is about communicating ideas, not words.
QeS 'utlh
tlhIngan Hol yejHaD pabpo' / Grammarian of the Klingon Language Institute
not nItoj Hemey ngo' juppu' ngo' je
(Old roads and old friends will never deceive you)
- Ubykh Hol vIttlhegh
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