tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Jul 30 19:16:19 1995
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Re: }}} Dialects (was: Klingon paintball)
- From: Chris Nielsen <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: }}} Dialects (was: Klingon paintball)
- Date: Mon, 31 Jul 1995 11:16:19 +1200 (NZST)
On Sun, 30 Jul 1995, Alan Anderson wrote:
> I wrote:
> > By the way, it's common practice here to simply drop in a word or two in
> > English when the dictionary fails. An untranslatable food name isn't
> > always cause for another Klingon word.
>
> Chris Nielsen writes:
> > Ahhhh! I presume this would be true for the 'mirror' discussion too...
>
> True. If I were describing in Klingon an event which involved a mirror, I
> would probably just use the English word. However, since a "specular
> reflector which allows one to see oneself" is probably a universal concept
> and not specific to a particular culture, I would expect to be able to
> describe a mirror succinctly in any language. It's still possible that the
> Klingon word for "mirror" is based on an idiom that we don't use; {bIqHey}
> or {'otlh beghqoq}.
>
Yes, and it's also possible that because Klingons are so ugly they don't
want to look at themselves and therefore do not have a word for mirror...
Otherwise, English has no problem with combining words when it can't
think of anything original - for example, aircraft, automobile, etc
Chris