[tlhIngan Hol] using {ngan} as a suffix {ngan} as the suffix {-ngan}

[De'vID]

On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 at 11:54, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq at protonmail.com> wrote:

> De'vID:
>
> I've addressed usage and meaning, and grammatically I've pointed out that
> the first noun in a noun-noun construction can take a suffix, but the first
> component of a compound noun cannot. I think {rop yaH} means something very
> different from {ropyaH}. If I told someone to go to {roplIj yaH}, I might
> be telling them to go to a leper colony and not an infirmary.
>
>
> That same applies to *'Iw HIq*. If I say *'IwwIj HIq*, I would think it
> refers to my blood alcohol level, not to bloodwine. So it doesn't explain
> how *ropyaH* and *'Iw HIq *are different.
>

I think that if you're looking for a simple rule which is consistently
followed throughout all of canon, you won't find it. But I also think that
there are general principles which, while not explicitly spelled out, are
mostly adhered to, with a few exceptions dictated by circumstances (or
perhaps due to carelessness).

It appears to me that *generally* speaking, compound nouns (without spaces)
have meanings which are not completely derivable from the components,
whereas the meanings of noun-noun constructions are quite straightforward,
as I illustrated with examples previously. Of course you can find
exceptions, but in thinking about the exceptions that come to mind, even
those can mostly be explained as following some unstated general principles.

I can tell you how {rop yaH} and {ropyaH} are different: the first is just
a noun-noun construction meaning "disease duty station", "duty station of
disease". Without further context, it might refer to a place that sick
people go to, or a place where diseases are studied, and so on. But
{ropyaH} is a compound noun with a fixed meaning: an infirmary, a place
which is run by a doctor and/or nurses and where the sick or injured go to
receive medical care. The compounding narrows down the meaning of the
noun-noun construction.

There are other {yaH}s that we know of: {jonSeH yaH}, {much yaH}, {Qu'
vu'wI' yaH}, and maybe {yo'SeH yaHnIv}. I think a concept like {jonSeH}
"engine control" is specific enough that it's completely clear what a
{jonSeH yaH} is. In contrast to {rop} "disease", what you can do at a duty
station for {jonSeH} "engine control" is much more constrained. {yo'SeH
yaHnIv} follows the same logic, and in addition a similar argument can be
made that a {yaHnIv} is not just a {yaH nIv}. And a {much yaH} is just a
duty station where presentations and performances take place. Any kind of
thing which might be labelled a {much} can be done there. Now, if Klingons
had stage plays and places where only stage plays take place, perhaps a
lexicalised compound *{muchyaH} would be appropriate. The compounding (and
the removal of the space) tells us that the thing referred to isn't just a
{much yaH} any more, but a specific type of {much yaH} whose meaning is
something different than the components directly suggest.

{Qu' vu'wI' yaH} is a noun-noun (or noun-noun-noun) construction: mission
manager duty station. Arguably, this one could've been compounded, because
perhaps a "Mission Ops" is more than simply a mission manager's duty
station. But I think this example points to a conflicting principle at
play: compound nouns tend not to be composed of components which are
themselves noun-noun constructions. {Qu' vu'wI'} is a clear noun-noun
construction: a mission manager, and nothing more. Perhaps the combination
of {Qu' vu'wI'} and {yaH} *should* have been compounded (by the principle
that the compound has a meaning different than just the noun-noun
construction alone), but this conflicts with the existing space in {Qu'
vu'wI'}. You'd have to write it as {Qu' vu'wI'yaH}, which is confusing
because it's a compound of {Qu' vu'wI'} and {yaH}, but looks like a
noun-noun made of {Qu'} and {vu'wI' yaH}.

There is another example of this in {Hov leng QeD}. The other sciences are
all {XQeD}, with the only other exception being {DI'ruj QeD} "metaphysics".
In the qepHom 2019 booklet, Okrand says that {Hov leng QeD} is a made-up
word that doesn't come from Klingon culture. But I think a part of the
reason it's a noun-noun construction and not a compound is that {Hov leng}
is already a noun-noun construction, and so you'd have the same problem as
trying to compound {Qu' vu'wI'} with {yaH}: you'd end up with {Hov
lengQeD}, which just doesn't look good and might be parsed incorrectly.
It's not explained why {DI'ruj QeD} is an exception, but it was explicitly
noted as an exception, so we know it's not an error or oversight. Perhaps
Klingons think of "metaphysics" as nothing more or other than the science
of reality. But with the other science compounds, the meaning is different
than merely putting the components together. {HapQeD} "physics", for
example, is not simply the study of {Hap} "matter", but also forces,
fields, and their interactions. I don't know how broad {mI'QeD}
"mathematics" is to Klingons, but if it includes things like geometry and
abstract algebra (and we have no reason to think it doesn't), then it isn't
the science of just numbers. (There's an old joke that professional
mathematicians are "bad at math (i.e., arithmetic).) The qepHom 2019
booklet suggests (but does not actually confirm) that {mI' tej} (with a
space) is an error.

I think this principle of not forming compounds when one of the components
would itself be a noun-noun construction is, indirectly, the reason for
{'Iw HIq}. The names of other alcoholic drinks include {cha'vatlh ben HIq}
and {pubtaHbogh ghargh HIq}. Could Okrand have just named the other {HIq}
drinks {romuluSHIq}, {Sorya'HIq}, {'IwHIq}, and {HIqqIj} (the last after
the pattern of {yaHnIv})? Sure. But I think he kept the {HIq} names as
noun-noun compounds for consistency across the board. If he had compounded
{pubtaHboghgharghHIq}, people would be asking whether it's okay to form
compounds from verbs. If he had compounded {'IwHIq} but not {cha'vatlh ben
HIq}, people would be complaining that it's not consistent. He chose a
convention that {HIq} names are noun-noun constructions, despite being
lexicalised. Sure, this leads to potential ambiguities and edge cases like
{'IwwIj HIq}, but that's the nature of language.

As for words like {SochleS}, again, I think consistency is the key
principle. The dictionary contains the words {wa'Hu'}, {wa'leS}, {cha'Hu'},
and {cha'leS}. Even though {Hu'} and {leS} aren't stated to form compounds
with numbers, it would just look weird to write {wa'leS} and {cha'leS} but
{wej leS} and {Soch leS}. So when people write these without a space, it's
not completely arbitrary. OTOH, Okrand has written {ben} with a space after
the number, and that's the convention that's generally followed for {ben}
and {nem}. You may argue that this is inconsistent with how {Hu'} and {leS}
are treated, and that's true. Okrand may have been arbitrary initially when
he chose to write {XHu'} but {X ben}, but others are not being arbitrary in
following that convention. I think nobody would complain if you wrote {Soch
leS} as two words because there's no confusion that it means the same thing
as {SochleS}, and same for {loSmaHben} if you want. The problem with making
up a word like {ta'puq} (outside of the special dispensation given by
Okrand for Lieven's translation work) is that the reader is left to wonder
if the resulting word isn't just the sum of its parts. Is a {ta'puq} any
{puq} of a {ta'}? If one's parent ascends the throne, does one
automatically become a {ta'puq}, or does one have to undergo a ceremony?
Does a {ta'puq} even have to be the {puq} of a {ta'}, or is it just a title
(like the monarch of Liechtenstein, who is a prince but not the son of a
king)? Okrand sidestepped those questions by stating that it's just the
word for the character in the story, but doesn't establish anything about
native Klingon words for rulers.

You asked why it's {DIvI'may'Duj} for the Federation but {tlhIngan may'Duj}
for the Klingons. I'm reminded about the Swiss complaint that a very
specific "Swiss cheese" (Emmentaler) is referred to outside of Switzerland
as "Swiss cheese", but when I go to a Swiss grocery store, I see one type
of tea labeled as "Chinese tea". It's obvious that there are different
kinds of Klingon battle cruisers, but all Federation battle cruisers are
kind of just the same thing and who cares how they are different from one
another?

So we don't know the exact rules that make compound nouns different from
noun-noun constructions, but we have *some* ideas of general principles:
- a compound noun generally means something different than just the sum of
its components ({ropyaH} != {rop yaH}, {mI'QeD} != {mI' QeD}).
- a compound where one of the components is itself a noun-noun construction
is to be avoided ({DIvI'may'Duj} is okay because {may'Duj} is itself a
compound; {Qu'vu'wI'yaH} is not okay because {Qu' vu'wI'} is a noun-noun
construction).
- a class of things should be named the same way subject to the above (if
several {HIq} are named by noun-noun constructions, then it's preferable to
write {'Iw HIq} rather than {'IwHIq}).

You can nitpick or find counterexamples to the above general principles,
but they're not hard-and-fast rules. But I think you will find that Okrand
almost always follows these principles. And long-time members of the list
follow an additional principle, which is to follow precedent if it exists
(so names of new alcoholic drinks are {X HIq}, days ago are {XHu'}, but
years ago are {X ben}). The initial reason for the *precedent* set by
Okrand may have been completely arbitrary. If he had initially written {wa'
leS} in the dictionary, we'd be writing {Soch leS} today. But the
convention of following what's been established with how spaces are used in
writing is not arbitrary, once the precedent had been set.


> But you raised the point of pronunciation, and I think there's a
> difference there, too. Okrand wrote that the pronunciation of {wab Do}
> "speed of sound" and {wabDo} "Mach number" are the same. But I think that
> the *stress* is different. In {wab Do}, both words have equal stress. In
> {wabDo}, the {Do} is stressed and the {wab} is not. In {tera'ngan}, the
> {ra'} is stressed but not the {ngan}. In {tera' ngan}, both the {ra'} and
> {ngan} are stressed. So the presence or absence of a space serves a
> purpose, which is to reflect the stress in speaking.
>
>
> This is finally a concrete difference between "compound nouns" and
> "noun-noun constructions"! If there really is a difference in
> pronunciation, then it is certainly justified to write the words
> differently. It seems that Okrand doesn't think the difference is too
> important given how he has talked about this to you and Lieven, but there
> should be a difference if we follow TKD's pronunciation guide.
>

Okrand seems to follow the "robustness principle" (aka Postel's law) when
it comes to Klingon produced by others. I don't doubt that he would have no
problem accepting {'IwHIq} written by someone else, but he does seem to
follow a set of unspoken principles himself when creating new compounds or
noun-noun constructions (but perhaps not always successfully). If he
didn't, there would've been nothing to note about the difference between
{wab Do} and {wabDo}.


> Pronunciation is currently the only difference I can think of, but it is
> enough to justify the current punctuation. While I disagree much with the
> Okrandian notation, at least this aspect is not completely arbitrary.
>

See TKD section 1.3 on stress: "In a noun, the stressed syllable is usually
the syllable right before the first noun suffix, or the final syllable if
there is no suffix. If, however, a syllable ending in {'} is present, it is
usually stressed instead. If there are two syllables in a row {'} both
ending in {'}, both are equally stressed."

Just say the following sentences to yourself: {tera'ngan jIH}, {tera' ngan
jIH}. I don't know about you, but while I pronounce the words the same in
both sentences, I stress them differently. There's a slight pause between
{tera'} and {ngan} in the latter, and the standalone {ngan} is stressed
whereas the ending of {tera'ngan} is not. The spaces and {'} tell me where
to place the stress when I'm reading a Klingon sentence aloud.

-- 
De'vID
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.kli.org/pipermail/tlhingan-hol-kli.org/attachments/20220127/28e33664/attachment-0007.htm>