tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Apr 27 11:05:01 1994
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Re: Ahem....
Hu'tegh! nuq ja' [email protected] jay'?
=[] Klingon verbs do something Russian ones cannot do: They
=can have a null aspect.
Point taken. For all we know, Klingon might still do wierd things here, but
I don't think it's profitable to speculate any further on so little
information.
=I'll do this in DIvI' Hol, because otherwise you'll get swamped with bizarre
=neologisms or vague compounds. I honestly can't bring myself to believe that
={'enterpIrayS} completely obeys Klingon phonology.
Oh, you're right. Drat. Hagh qoH, etc. My apologies. I guess I'd say
'enterpIrayIS, then. In which case 'entepray' makes a lot more sense.
You're right about Wechsler's article, too.
=But I for one refuse to believe, after repeatedly listening to
=this, among other lines from the film, that Klaa muttered any sound even near
={S} on the end of his word for "Enterprise". But that's beside the point.
Well, as I said, *I* would have put the S at the end of the word; I remember
being startled that Klaa didn't, but given that Okrand was actually following
his phonotactics here, that's fair.
=I would like to point out that I also heard him say {qIrq}, which flat-out
=sends jatpab down the tubes when it comes to foreign words.
Yes. That was the other thing that startled me. Nonetheless, "qIrq" is
the form I used in my _Much Ado_. (Yes, I mentioned James T Kirk in a
Shakespeare translation. Where I did so is left as an exercise to the
reader.)
=Anyways, I'm not a linguist, but am rapidly in the
=process of becoming one. I've learned so much about linguistics itself just
=by being involved with tlhIngan Hol.
In fact, I think that the main concrete benefit people can get by being
Klingonists is getting a better appreciation of linguistics --- and of
other cultures. The last one is critical. Klingons, after all, weren't modelled
on aliens, of whom we have no knowledge --- they are modelled on other
peoples on earth. I was reading a book on Iran the other day, and it
was explaining the Iranian concepts of honour. One version of this is gheirat,
the honour that makes you look out for your family. In the '60s, Khomeini
condemned his audience at a speech for accepting a military agreement between
the Shah and the U.S. as having no gheirat. Them's fighting words. Saying
that a Klingon is quvHa' is no less fighting words. As is always the case
with Trek, Klingon lore comes into its own as an allegory for what is
happening on Earth today, and if we don't profit by its lessons to perhaps
demonise our enemies a bit less, we are missing the point.
=Aaaahhhhhhhh... I always feel a hint of masochistic exhiliration surging thru
=my corporeum after reading massive amounts of Klingon text. Qapla'!
qay'be'. jIQuchpu' jIH, mu'ghomwIj vIlo'nISbe'mo', jabI'IDwIj 'ay' wa'DIch
vIghItlhtaHvIS. Do'Ha': 'ay' cha'DIch vIghItlhchoHDI', mu'ghom vIlo'nISpu'.
'ach Sengbe'. reH murIH, Hol vIlo'taHvIS.
=Nick finally has his sig. back. yay!
teHbej. jIyay'. ;)
=ghItlh 'o': "suffix" DamughmeH <'o'moHaq> yIlo'Qo' nIchyon
=<mojaq>'e' yIlo'
I *knew* there was a distinct word for suffix. I must have accidentally
deleted the word from my online mu'ghom.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Nick Nicholas. The Nonce and Future Linguist. University of Melbourne.
[email protected]
"Henry Squirrel was thirsty. He walked over to the river bank where his good
friend Bill Bird was sitting. Henry slipped and fell in the river. Gravity
drowned." --- TALE-SPIN Story Generator, James Meehan, Yale AI Lab, 1975.