[tlhIngan Hol] XQeD -> Xtej

Steven Boozer sboozer at uchicago.edu
Fri Jul 26 09:22:24 PDT 2019


As far as I know, the only Okrandian {tejpu’} are:

Hovtej                  astronomer
mI' tej                  mathematician
quntej                  historian
yuQtej                  geographer
'otlhtej                 someone who studies quantum mechanics.

… while there are many more official {QeDmey}:

HolQeD                linguistics
Hov leng QeD     “Treknology”
HovQeD               astronomy
HuchQeD            economics
nughQeD            sociology
porghQeD           the scientific study of bodily functions
DI'ruj QeD           metaphysics
HapQeD              physics
no'QeD                genealogy
rayQeD                genetics
roSqa'QeD          archaeology
tamlerQeD          chemistry
yuQQeD              geography
'otlhQeD             quantum mechanics,  quantum theory

So no, I see nothing wrong with deriving *{Xtej} from a known {XQeD}, or vice versa.  I do it myself regularly in my own dictionary but I always mark them with asterisks to show their non-official status.

I’ve even added completely non-Okrandian sciences invented by myself or others on the mailing list – e.g. *{De'QeD} “cybernetics” and *{De'tej} “cyberneticist” – though I wouldn’t recommend doing it for the boQwI’ database since it is used extensively by others.

In fact, I just thought of a new one:  *{QeDQeD} for the history (i.e. study) of science, which would make someone who specializes in this field a *{QeDtej}!

--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons



From: tlhIngan-Hol <tlhingan-hol-bounces at lists.kli.org> On Behalf Of De'vID
On Thu, 25 Jul 2019 at 16:16, nIqolay Q <niqolay0 at gmail.com<mailto:niqolay0 at gmail.com>> wrote:
ghaytan mu' qID meqna' 'oHbe' meqvetlh'e'. Dochmey loS roSqa'tejpu' 'e' vIrIch neH vIneH.

Your use of {roSqa'tej} reminded me of something.

At the 2014 Saarbrücken {qepHom'a'} (and possibly on other occasions), Okrand made a remark along the lines that, generally, if there's a {QeD}, there's a corresponding {tej}. Sometimes he explicitly reveals a {tej} for a {QeD}, but sometimes he doesn't.

Do people who maintain lexicons for themselves generally add the corresponding {tej} when a {QeD} is revealed, for consistency and convenience? I'm in the unusual position* that I maintain a lexicon (the {boQwI'} database) which is used mostly by other people, so if I have an entry for "quantum physicist" (because Okrand revealed {'otlhQeD} and {'otlhtej} together), and an entry for {HapQeD} "physics" but *not* a corresponding entry for {Haptej} "physicist", it looks inconsistent.

"Physicist", "chemist", and "genealogist" are common enough words, and their Klingon etymology obvious enough, that I'm going to add entries for them. However, I'm hesitant to add "archaeologist" or "geneticist" since the {QeD} isn't attached to a known word in {roSqa'QeD} or {rayQeD}. Or would people accept {roSqa'tej} and {raytej} as legitimate "dictionary words" under the {XQeD} -> {Xtej} rule-of-thumb?

(In the other direction: Is there anyone who would *not* accept {Haptej} for "physicist", simply because Okrand didn't *explicitly* write it out somewhere, despite the fact that Okrand explained the rule for deriving it, and explicitly revealed the pair {'otlhQeD}-{'otlhtej} for a *specific* type of physicist?)

I'm on the fence about  {DI'ruj tej}, which would be something like "metaphysicist" or "metaphysician", because it's kind of an obscure word in English. Should I add an entry for it?

--
De'vID
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