[tlhIngan Hol] expressing "the nerve of this guy"

[SuStel]

On 7/14/2021 8:16 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:
> While the greek/english meaning of "nerve" is a negative one (i.e
> "nerve" isn't a desired thing for someone to exhibit in his actions),

I don't know about Greek, but in English, this idiomatic sense of 
/nerve/ is neutral, not negative. It's the context that colors it.

/You've got some nerve showing your face around here again!/ (Negative)
/He tried to work up the nerve to call her for a date./ (Positive)


> it seems that in the klingon way of thinking it*is*  something
> actually admired. So, I come across a situation described by the
> irritating (for me) argument of "what a klingon would actually
> do/say/think".

This is not a "what would a Klingon actually do/say/think" argument. 
This is a "what does this word connote" argument. There are definite 
cultural traits of Klingons that we are told about, some of which are 
generally admired by Klingons and some of which are generally disdained 
by them, and certain words refer to those traits.

I'm not exactly sure how everyone has decided that Klingons view 
*qajunpaQ* as necessarily positive. We're told it fairly clearly about 
*butlh* in TKW. But for *qajunpaQ* it seems to me to be pretty much an 
exact correspondence to the idiomatic sense of /nerve,/ neutral without 
context. The only special connotation we're told about *qajunpaQ* is 
that it implies a surprising or reckless kind of courage that the 
neutral *toDuj* does not.

-- 
SuStel
http://trimboli.name

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