tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Mar 25 08:58:57 1999

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing



[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]

Re: choH



: >: Do we have canon for [choH]?
: >: Is it transitive or intransitive? just want to be certain.
: >
: >It seems to be transitive:
: >
: >choH  "alter, change" (v) 
: >
: >	HIvHe yIchoHmoH! 
: >	Alter the attack course! ST5 
: >
: >	ghopDu' choHpu' Qe' 
: >	The restaurant has altered hands. 
: >	(A bad translation for "The restaurant has changed hands.") KGT
: >
: >choHwI'  "thing which alters (something)" (n)
: >
: >	HoS choHwI' 
: >	transtator ("thing which alters energy")
: >
: >	woj choHwI' 
: >	reactor ("thing which alters radiation")
: >
: >Voragh                       
: 
: It seems to be transitive except for that first one which uses a -moH.
: 
: DloraH

va!  I focused on the object {HIvHe} and completely overlooked that pesky
suffix.  DopDaq qul yIchenmoH QobDI' ghu'.

Perhaps in future I should just supply the requested citations sans
commentary, though I can't help wondering... 

Klaa's line in ST5 was pretty clear, but Okrand does seem to treat it as
transitive elsewhere.  At the risk of building another house of cards and
invoking the wrath of SuStel et al., one could speculate that in colloquial
or excited speech (such as during a battle), using {-moH} on the already
transitive {choH} adds an intensifying force, particularly in the
imperative.  In this case, Klaa may be stressing that he wanted his
helmsman to CHANGE the ship's course and *not* stay "steady on course".

An analogous example might be the use of double negatives in English.
Although purists and teachers whine that they are "ungrammatical" according
to prescriptivist "rules", and elementary textbooks for foreigners don't
mention them to avoid confusing novices, every native English speaker
understands perfectly what is meant even if s/he refrains from using them
in their own speech.  Thus from a descriptive point of view, double
negatives are perfectly grammatical, just not part of the careful, formal
English style affected by "high class" speakers.  For example in the
colloquial "I don't want no damn coffee!" the two negatives do not
"logically" cancel each other out as some pedants (or programmers!) insist,
but in fact add punch: "I DON'T want any coffee!", perhaps even hinting at
a subtext ("How many times do I have to tell you? Don't ask me again if you
know what's good for you!").

Okrand says in the introduction to TKD:

	Although a good many of the fine points are not covered, the sketch 
	will allow the student of Klingon to figure out what a Klingon is 
	saying and to respond in an intelligible, though somewhat brutish, 
	manner. Most Klingons will never know the difference.

I've long thought that a descriptive Klingonist grammarian - which after
all is the role Okrand likes to play as a "Federation linguist" - could
come up with some useful insights on those colloquial "fine points" using
as a representative sample of "native" speech Okrand's slips of the tongue
on the tapes, the "unusual" grammar sometimes found in his writings (such
as the SkyBox cards and newsgroup posts), as well as those actors he's
personally coached for the movies, tapes and CDs.  


-- 
Voragh                       
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons



Back to archive top level