tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun May 13 19:09:48 2001
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: *Paramount* chaw'
>> One does not paint eyebrows on the Mona Lisa, run _Finnegan's
>> Wake_ through a spelling checker, or glue earrings on Michelangelo's David.
ja' QIS:
>Sure we do. A town in Florida a week or so ago made a shopkeeper put a
>"loincloth" on a copy of David outside his store because it was deemed
>indecent.
Doghqu' vengvetlh. 'ach choHpu'be' Hewvetlh. So'lu'pu' neH.
>Mona Lisa sells macaroni and her mug graces every box.
nuqjatlh?! ghorgh qaS wanI'vam QIp jay'? chay' "Mona Lisa" wIvlu'?
>And
>industrious souls in our midst have claimed Shakespeare as their own,
>reworking it in this very language.
Dughchu' mughwI'pu'vetlh. mu' qID choq. qech choq. mu'mey 'oghbe'
Shakespeare; mu'mey lo' neH. vaj choHchugh mu'mey, choHnISbe' lut.
>Nothing is sacred, including
>Okrand.
chaq bIlugh. 'ach quvnISqu' Hol 'oghwI' 'e' vIqap. ghaH wIvuv 'e'
wImevDI', HolDaj naQ wIvuvHa'. <ghaH vIrur 'ej jIle' je> ja'DI' vay',
latlh yer DoQ.
> If the fellow in question invents a good word that I find useful, I
>may indeed use it. However, If the new word is unnecessary or
>unacceptable I would dump it in a heartbeat.
yapbe' 'e' wIv 'Iv? lajlu'be' 'e' wIv 'Iv? DawIv'a' SoH?
va, 'Iv SoH? qatlh le' vuDlIj'e'?
>For example, I cannot
>bring myself to use the impossibly corny (but Okrandian) chang'eng for
>pair, and rewrite my sentences as necessary to avoid it.
wejpuH. qID mu' Dalo'Qo', ghaytan mu'tlheghmeylIj law' DalISnIS.
>This leads me to a question I've never considered before and don't
>remember reading about. Is tlhIngan meant to be only a historical
>language? Or is it meant to be used?
Hol 'oghtaHvIS Okrand, lulo' tlhInganpu' 'e' Hechba' ghaH. tlhIngan
mu'ghom qontaHvIS ('ej ghertaHvIS), tlhIngan Hol lo'laH Hoch 'e' chuplaw'.
DaHjaj, tlhIngan Hol lo' Hoch net tungHa'.
'ach tlhIngan Hol choHmoH vay net tungbej.
>When Worf wants to discuss his
>more Terran experiences with a fellow Klingon, do they revert to English
>and admit that tlhIngan "has no word for that particular concept?"
He certainly has no qualms about doing it in the other direction. I very
much doubt that he'd invent a word for "prune" when singing the praises of
its juice.
>Undoubtedly, ancient Klingon WAS unspoiled by weak and inferior Terran
>concepts, as Okrand has laid it out. But as Klingons and humans began
>to interact more and more, don't you think the Klingons delighted in
>insulting and disparaging human ideas and other such flaws? At first
>they may have borrowed words, but surely the purists would have
>protested the corruption of their language and proposed new Klingon
>words instead.
Klingon culture values straightforwardness and accuracy. Creating words
just because the ones that already exist aren't "native" is counter to
those goals. The existence of the word {qa'vIn} (and, to a lesser extent,
{qajunpaQ}) provides evidence that "purism" is not a primary driving force.
If it were, we'd find the lexicon riddled with purely Klingon words for
uniquely Terran objects.
>Indeed the French today are doing just this, rebelling
>against the influx of English words like pizza, blue jeans, and computer
>and inventing their own.
According to the magazine article I read last year on this topic, the
French *people* in general have no such aversion to saying "le weekend".
It's the academics who are attempting to force invented -- and usually
unwanted -- words on the population.
>One final note, we were all encouraged a few months ago on this list to
>adopt a Klingon name if we so desired, even if it did not conform to
>tlhIngan Hol spelling conventions or even its alphabet. We didn't have
>to clear it with Okrand first. (Nor, I'm sure, would he want us to.)
Right. It's been apparent from the beginning of TNG that personal names
are not subject to the rigors of grammar and phonology that define the
Klingon language, and the transliteration of the names of the two Captains
of the Enterprise makes it completely official. That's to be expected;
with rare exceptions, names aren't words that bend to translation.
>And if a name is not a word, I'll eat mine.
pongvetlhDaq ghevI' DaneH'a'?
Look up {mara}, {qoreQ}, {valQIS}, {qor}, or {torgh} in the dictionary.
Heck, look up {wo'rIv}. You won't find them listed as words; they're only
names. (Of course, you're cheating; your name *is* the same as a word
found in the dictionary.)
-- ghunchu'wI' 'utlh