tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jul 25 07:09:58 1996
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Re: My "Hello" to the list
- From: "Mark E. Shoulson" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: My "Hello" to the list
- Date: Thu, 25 Jul 1996 10:09:55 -0400 (EDT)
- In-reply-to: <[email protected]> (message from RobertDarke on Wed, 24 Jul 1996 14:36:41 -0700)
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>Date: Wed, 24 Jul 1996 14:36:41 -0700
>From: Robert Darke <[email protected]>
>Hi Mark,
>> batlh jumuv!
>'oH belwIj
>(errm, I think ... am I picking particularly hard things to say or is it
>just a hell of a lot more difficult that I first thought ...)
That'd probably be "belwIj 'oH"; like "tlhIngan maH" is we are Klingons.
But it's an English idiom anyway. Possibly better would be "jIbel jIH'e'"
(it is I who am pleased). Of course, it's not a very Klingon sentiment in
the first place.
>> KLBC stands for Klingon Language Beginners Something (Conference?) The
><snip>
>Thanks. I shall use it as and when I feel the need. :-) Who is the Beginners
>Grammarian ? I take it they're quite busy ! Would it be wrong to "use" a
>non-beginners grammarian or is it your own lookout to decide who to help and
>who to leave ?
Alan Anderson/ghunchu'wI' is the current Beginners' Grammarian (it's a
rotating post), and yes, he's awfully snowed under. It's my own business
when and if I feel like horning in on his jurisdiction. Rank hath its
privileges.
>> I'd have said "nuq 'oH Qu' Hoch'e'?" (what is everyone's task?) QaptaH and
>> vumtaH are both verbs. I don't remember exactly how you phrased it in your
>Hmm. I've really got to get out of this fixed OBJECT-VERB-SUBJECT syntax
>that's stuck in my head. I was really trying hard to get a verb to fit "job"
>nicely into the format and still say what I wanted.
Do *NOT* get that fixed syntax out of your head; it's one of the hardest
things to KEEP to in Klingon and it's important not to lose it.
Pronouns-as-verbs are unusual, and maybe they break that slightly, but stay
with it. Basically what we have here is "'oH" being used as a verb (see
section 6.3). The subject of the "verb" is "Qu' Hoch" (everyone's task),
and the "object" (in English, the predicate nominative) is "nuq"/what.
pronouns used as verbs draw an equality between their subjects and objects,
as in "puqpu' chaH qama'pu''e'"/the prisoners are children. So you're
drawing an equality between the task and the question-word "nuq" which asks
to be replaced by the correct noun: the noun which is "equal" to the task
(oof) and which explains what it is.
>A question though .. does it need the {'oH} or would {nuq Qu' Hoch'e'} be
>acceptable. I assume the {'e'} is needed too, although I wouldn't have
>thought to put it in.
They're both needed, see section 6.3. Klingon has no explicit verb "to
be", but it does use its pronouns and doesn't drop the copula like Russian
or Hebrew (in present tense, yes, I know, Doq).
>And what's with the English punctuation in the tlhIngan script ?
It's supported by some writings of Marc Okrand's, and moreover the Klingon
script we have now is presumably a scholarly convention for transcribing
the native writing system, for the convenience of Terran (particularly
English-speaking) scholars, so why not do what we can to help make the
language easier to read? We're not changing the language, or adding
anything that isn't there, just the way it's represented, to make our lives
easier.
>> tej HaDwI' qoj chaH'a' Hoch'e'? (hmm. chaH may well be wrong, since Hoch
>> should construe as a singular.)
>{chaH} seems fine to me. But I have some queries about this one. Firstly,
>should that be {joq} instead of {qoj} seeing as both {tej} and {HaDwI'} are
>nouns ? Why are they both singular when the intention is "scientists" ?
>(i.e. no {pu'}) I used QulwI'pu' for researchers. Is that wrong, given your
>comments about Hoch being singuar ?
As to "qoj" vs. "joq", the answer is simple yet subtle: I screwed up.
DopDaq qul yIchenmoH QobDI' ghu'. I use joq/qoj so rarely that I tend to
get them confused, even though they are similar in form to 'ej/je which I
do not confuse.
They are not singular, they just don't have a plural suffix. Re-read
section 3.3.2. Nouns without plural suffixes are not necessarily singular;
number is determined from context. You plainly understood what they should
have been, singular would not have made sense, so the context was obviously
sufficient. I *could* have used -pu'; I simply chose not to, since the
context was good enough.
>> tlhIngan Hol laDlaHchu''a' vay'? (HIja', wIlaDlaH jIH, latlhpu' je.)
>Ahah ! I was quite close with this one ! I actually wrote
>{tlhIngan Hol lulaDlaHchu'taH'a' vay'}
>But I realise now that the {taH} was completely wrong. Is my {lu} incorrect
>for the same reason as your concern about {chaH} above (i.e. vay' is a
>singular noun even though it refers to a group)
"vay'" likely even refers to a singular entity (someone, anyone, and
something are all singular in English). I'm still not sure about Hoch and
chaH; remember (section 3.3.2 again) that nouns that are inherently
plural contrue as singular nouns. So your "lu-" is wrong, yes. The -taH
isn't so much wrong as unnecessary and confusing.
>Phew. This is probably going to help my english grammar too :-)
Good! That's a big part of the point.
~mark
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