tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Mar 30 06:54:43 2014
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Re: [Tlhingan-hol] The Legend of Gorath part 4, with credits
One probably expects me to wholeheartedly disagree, since I just finished arguing that the glosses should include prepositions indicating unusual direct objects, but my actual position is a bit softer. I accept SuStel's argument as valid and well thought out. Yes, Okrand himself has stretched words beyond their glosses in this regard.
I see this not so much a black-and-white, absolutist boundary as a spectrum of greys and sometimes colors. Still, I think it is good to favor the more pristine translation if one is available, especially for new Klingon speakers because I do see a very slippery slope, where one who finds no reason to pause before assigning any direct object to any verb, has every incentive to be lazy in translation and suddenly, it becomes incredibly easy to translate ANYTHING into Klingon, and incredibly difficult to understand much of the resulting Klingon text.
Our purpose here is not to collect a huge volume of vetted encoding of stock English phrases. Our purpose is to work with Klingon as a language and develop skill at what should be equal challenges to bring meaning between Klingon and any other language in either direction. If one direction is easy and the other is difficult, then we are probably performing our mission poorly.
When something doesn't quite fit right, you can find it acceptable and move on, or you can work harder to make something that fits better. When someone presents something that doesn't quite fit right and asks for my approval, I'm disinclined to offer it, since I don't want to lubricate the slippery slope to easy translation into opaque Klingon text.
Sent from my iPad
> On Mar 27, 2014, at 11:03 AM, "SuStel" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> From: "Robyn Stewart" <[email protected]>
>> Qov> We haven't seen this use of ja' in canon. I'd be more comfortable if
>> you made it <targh chon DaDeltaHvIS> or something like that. ja' is glossed
>> as tell, report, not tell about.
>
> But "report" does mean "tell about," and Kruge does say, in English,
> "Report status." I am convinced this would be correctly translated,
> clipped, as {Dotlh ja'}.
>
> As time goes on I am less and less convinced that the dictionary glosses
> are meant to show us appropriate objects. They add extra words to
> clarify the sense of the word. For instance, {loS} "wait (for)," as
> opposed to "wait (on)." Unfortunately, this means that it's profoundly
> unclear what object is appropriate for a verb, if any. This is
> demonstrated with {qIm}, which the dictionary tells us means "pay
> attention," but which Marc's usage tells us can be used as {X qIm} "pay
> attention to X."
>
> I think it comes down to this: Klingons will use an object whenever the
> subject performs the verb on the object, regardless of our English
> gloss, and as long as it's clear what it meant. Thus, my past objections
> to phrases like {qep'a' vIjeS} should be dropped. But *{QongDaq vIQong}
> is still unacceptable, because it is unclear that when you sleep you are
> doing something TO the bed (especially Klingon beds).
>
> --
> SuStel
> http://www.trimboli.name/
>
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