tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Dec 03 13:13:56 1995
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Re: hello.
- From: [email protected] (Alan Anderson)
- Subject: Re: hello.
- Date: Sun, 3 Dec 1995 16:14:23 -0500
Tim Browne writes:
>Well, I don't have any grammatical questions as of yet, but I do have a
>few vocabulary questions. I got my first copy of The Book [tm] back in
>the days of Star Trek III.
Is this still the copy you are using, or have you obtained the 1992
edition with the Addendum? Many useful words are found in the back
of the "new" TKD.
>I figured the best way to learn the language
>was to translate already written works, and I figured the best works to
>do so would be the Star Trek novels.
I think you're mistaken, on both counts. The best way I know of to learn
the language is to USE it. Translating INTO tlhIngan Hol isn't something
you should do without someone checking your work constantly; translating
FROM Hol will give you practice with both vocabulary AND correct grammar.
The only things I believe you should be writing in tlhIngan Hol are your
own words and thoughts. Beware of the temptation to grab others' words
and translate them; such activity often merely distracts from your studies.
And Star Trek novels are a poor choice of source material in any case.
They are rarely written from the point of view of an honorable warrior.
You'll find that a lot of the trouble in translating any existing body
of words is that often "a Klingon wouldn't say that!" It's possible to
mangle the grammar enough to translate almost any given sentence, but
it's usally better to choose a different sentence in the first place.
>Looking through the dictoionary, I
>found words for phaser, photon torpedo, transporter, etc. Then I looked
>up logic. What the...? There's no word for *logic*?
There aren't words for "egg" or "wheel" or "violin" or "curtain" either.
Exact words aren't that important. The IDEAS are important. What does
"logic" mean to you? If you couldn't use the word "logic", what would
you say instead?
>How do they expect
>you to do a translation of Star Trek fiction, and yet *not* have
>something that Spock says every other word?
"They" -- and we -- DON'T expect you to translate Star Trek fiction.
(If you want to CREATE Star Trek fiction, that would be wonderful.)
>They even have a word for
>Denebian Slime Devil, something which only occurs in one place in one
>episode, and yet they don't have one of the most common words in all of
>Star Trek. Go figure.
Marc Okrand said that when he created the language, he included words for
all the things that Klingons talked about on the TV series -- tribbles,
for instance. But "logic"? Klingonsp refer to speak of "honor".
>So, any ideas? Someone in alt.startrek.klingon
>suggested something which translated as "proven", but that doesn't really
>fit. After all, logic is what tells us that the world is flat, but it's
>been proven otherwise.
So logic is the set of rules we use to determine what we know? The rules
of knowledge? {Sov chut}?
>Something else I just found out today is a
>complete lack of a word for Stardate, which, IMHO, is even more
>unforgiveable than a lack of a word for logic. D'OH! Start saying those
>replacement proverbs now, Marc.
"The Klingon Dictionary" concerns itself with the Klingon language. It
does not concern itself with Star Trek. There are people who speak the
language who are not Star Trek fans.
>Completely unrelated to Star Trek: how
>would I translate "big ugly pink thing" into Klingon?
Some might say {*Kirk}. :-)
Seriously, if you wanted to say anything, you'd do it by putting the
correct words in the right order! "Thing" is {Doch}. "Big", "ugly"
and "pink" are adjectives in English, but they are verbs in Klingon.
A verb can be used like an adjective by putting it after the noun it
modifies. "Pink" has no direct translation, but I think "red/orange"
and "light/bright" together get the idea across.
So I'd suggest {Doch tIn moH Doq wov}.
-- ghunchu'wI' batlh Suvchugh vaj batlh SovchoH vaj