tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jun 19 15:20:30 1997
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
KLBC: new words, once and for all
- From: [email protected]
- Subject: KLBC: new words, once and for all
- Date: Thu, 19 Jun 1997 18:19:59 -0400 (EDT)
I cannot cite everyone who had an opinion about coining new words into
tlhingan Hol -- among them, SuStel the good (and patient) adviser, peHruS,
[email protected], just for today's mail.
I feel I bear some responsibility in this discussion, just because I *love*
grammar (hadn't I been a mathematician, probably I'd have become a linguist)
and *love* even more to push it to and beyond its limits.
But it seems that many beginners in Klingon, especially those who don't have
English as their native language, experience the same difficulties : how can
I express an everyday's life simple fact with tlhingan Hol ? Everyday's life
is
for sure very different for Klingons and for Terrans -- not to mention
Klingons are supposed to have had first contact with Terrans in some far
future.
So there's no point in trying to speak about forks, horses, or 'ungHaSmey
(this
is a new word I just coined out ; I carefully checked in TKD it *doesn't*
mean
anything).
In the Introduction to TKD, MO explicitly says most of the vocabulary wasn't
mentioned, especially things such as animals, plants, native tools, etc.
TKD together with its Addendum and the Word List from KLI's FAQ contains
about 2,000 words. In everyday life, a average Terran uses less than half
this number (but understands many more). This is few compared to the 100,000
entries of a French dictionary or of the nearly 200,000 of an English one !
So, even if we don't speak daily about torpedoes or force shields, TKD
provides us with all and every universal roots from which we can derive
almost
any concept.
The only problem is how to derive. And beginners are tempted to do this in
the same way as their native language. French tends to use lengthy sentences
with many dependent clauses ; English less so ; tlhingan Hol as little as
possible. tlhingan Hol is a language that aims directly at the main points
and needn't bother with appositives (thank you, SuStel, it was precisely the
technical word I dared not use), subjunctives, would-be's and the like.
I would certainly think Klingons are rude people if I encountered one.
KLI's Grammarians are here to prevent us from "Terranizing" tlhingan Hol, and
this implies we do mistakes for them to correct us.
But KLI is not a sect, nor is Marc Okrand a guru. Some borderline derived
words will unavoidably creep in -- I would bet that Klingons have adopted
some
Terran words (phonetically Klingonized for sure) as they adopted the decimal
numeration.
To conclude : I do understand peHruS is getting bored with {chu'law' mu'mey}
(I mean "so-called new words" -- am I correct ?) but when you're new to a
language you're bound to creating barbarisms. Did you ever think about the
symmetric position ? a Klingon coming to Earth (sorry, {Terra'}) and seeing
us eat with forks ? Which word would he use to describe this odd (to him)
thing ?
I can just say : {tuvjaj Holtejpu'}...
Qapla' -- HdW