<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 4/2/2021 3:23 AM, Lieven L. Litaer
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:14898149-60d6-2fc6-6907-dcefad592c4f@gmx.de">As a
spelling convention, {wab Do} "speed of sound" is written as two
<br>
words. When used as a measurement term ("Mach"), it's written as
one
<br>
word (wabDo). The pronunciation (and, for that matter, meaning) is
the
<br>
same. (qepHom 2016)
</blockquote>
<p>The difference is whether a Klingon would perceive something as a
single word or not.</p>
<p>In English we have the word <i>desktop.</i> As a noun, it refers
to the surface of a desk. You <i>can</i> talk about a <i>desk
top</i> as two separate words, describing the desk's top, but
the actual name of the surface is <i>desktop.</i></p>
<p>Now, English has rules about how to pronounce words that are
lexicalized compounds versus productive phrases. When someone
talks about the desk's top as <i>desk top,</i> the word <i>top</i>
will be stressed. When talking about the name of the surface, <i>desktop,</i>
the <i>desk</i> is stressed. This rule is regular in English:
descriptive and ad-hoc phrases tend to be stressed at the end;
fixed names tend to be stressed at the beginning. I once heard an
explanation of this that used a clip from a Seinfeld episode: the
characters were all talking about <i>Chinese FOOD</i><i>,</i> but
the expression has become fixed since then, and now we say <i>CHINESE
food.</i> We say <i>ICE cream,</i> not <i>ice CREAM.</i> This
feature of English lets us recognize lexicalized words just from
hearing them.<br>
</p>
<p>The point is that there is a difference between lexicalized
phrases and simply putting words together to describe a thing. In
English we note it with stress. In Klingon we note it by spelling
convention. Lexicalized phrases may be given to us as a single
word, in which case we are justified in using it that way. But we
cannot coin our own single words because that is equal to
declaring the word as something that you will find in the
dictionaries of Klingons. We don't have any of those to reference,
so we cannot make any such assertion.</p>
<p>(I find it very amusing that my spell-checker doesn't have <i>lexicalized
</i>in its database.)<br>
</p>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
SuStel
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://trimboli.name">http://trimboli.name</a></pre>
</body>
</html>