On 10/25/2019 10:52 AM, Lieven L. Litaer wrote:
But regarding the word paqbaq, we have many words that are defined as "what a Klingon would call the thing when he sees it" so staying with that, we can argue that this is what a Klingon would call facebook, so I would include it in the dictionary, because ... honestly: why not?
This statement is not absolute, however. "What a Klingon would call the thing when he sees it" is not the same as "what a Klingon would necessarily call the thing when he sees it." It implies that the coinage is so obvious that everyone simply coins it the obvious way, but someone /might/ call it something different. *qabpaq* is one of those obvious coinages. Other names are not so obvious. How would a Klingon translate /Instagram?/ Maybe *SIbI'De'...* or *nomnaghbeQ...* or *DowIy...* If Okrand happened to call it *DowIy,* and he acknowledges that it's just "what a Klingon might call the thing," would that be more worthy of dictionary status than the others? It would be canonical, but should not necessarily be presented as /the/ way to translate it, which is what people will think if it's on the KLI's list. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name