using {ngan} as a suffix {ngan} as the suffix {-ngan}
Perhaps this is a ridiculous question, but since {-ngan} isn't listed in the official klingon suffixes, then how are we able to write {'elaDya'ngan} unless we have the specific word {'elaDya'ngan} in Ca'Non? -- Dana'an https://sacredtextsinklingon.wordpress.com/ Ζεὺς ἦν, Ζεὺς ἐστίν, Ζεὺς ἔσσεται· ὦ μεγάλε Ζεῦ
It all comes down to punctuation being unimportant, as I have said in several other threads this month. 'elaDya'ngan is same as 'elaDya' ngan, a noun-noun construction meaning "inhabitant of Greece". For arbitrary reasons, people write spaces between some words and not between other words. Spaces are as unimportant as are commas, periods, and so on. You can use them if you want. There are reasons to not write spaces sometimes. For example, a compound word might be so established that Klingons do not perceive it as a noun-noun construct anymore, but as a whole new lemma. It is unknown which words are like this. Compounds that have verbs, like yejquv, SeHjan must certainly be written without a space as they aren't be noun-noun constructs, but for noun+noun words it gets more difficult to say. Consider the word DIvI'may'Duj, for example, written without spaces. In canon sources, ship types are usually written with space, for example tlhIngan may'Duj, a Klingon battle cruiser. Why did Okrand use a space when talking about the Federation, but not when talking about the Klingons? I'm not sure there is any rule or good reason for it. He might have simply thought that it looked better without a space. Some people are firmly against writing words together without spaces because they think it is same as "inventing new words". This is not true, it is just a matter of convention how to punctuate the Okrandian notation and has nothing to do with inventing words. In reality, people write noun-noun constructs together all the time without spaces, for example SochleS, SuwomIyngan, mI'tej, ta'puq, etc. etc. Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Wednesday, January 26th, 2022 at 14.36, mayqel qunen'oS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:
Perhaps this is a ridiculous question, but since {-ngan} isn't listed in the official klingon suffixes, then how are we able to write {'elaDya'ngan} unless we have the specific word {'elaDya'ngan} in Ca'Non?
--
Dana'an https://sacredtextsinklingon.wordpress.com/ Ζεὺς ἦν, Ζεὺς ἐστίν, Ζεὺς ἔσσεται· ὦ μεγάλε Ζεῦ
On 1/26/2022 7:52 AM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
*'elaDya'ngan *is same as *'elaDya' ngan*, a noun-noun construction meaning "inhabitant of Greece". For arbitrary reasons, people write spaces between some words and not between other words. Spaces are as unimportant as are commas, periods, and so on. You can use them if you want.
As per my previous message, I disagree. According to what Okrand said, *'elaDya'ngan* means a member of the people of Greece, a Greek, while *'elaDya' ngan* means an inhabitant of Greece whether they're Greek or not.
Some people are firmly against writing words together without spaces because they think it is same as "inventing new words". This is not true, it is just a matter of convention how to punctuate the Okrandian notation and has nothing to do with inventing words. In reality, people write noun-noun constructs together all the time without spaces, for example *SochleS*, *SuwomIyngan*, *mI'tej*, *ta'puq*, etc. etc.
yesusingspacesandotherkindsofpunctuationareaconventionbutsomeconventionsaremoreimportantthanothers On this list, the convention is to not forge new compound nouns where there is no precedent for doing so. Numbers attached to *leS, Hu',* and so on are attested in canon, as are nouns with *-ngan.* We have been given *mI' tej* (with a space) by Okrand, and people who attach *tej* or *QeD* to words are at least following an apparent pattern, even though it goes against our convention. (And you can do what you like if your compound is a proper noun.) Lieven was given special dispensation to write *ta'puq* and told specifically that it wasn't actually a canonical word. ("Maltz agreed that whatever it is, it's the word for this guy in the story and does not establish how it fits in with (native) Klingon words for rulers or government officials or the like." You wouldn't need a special note like that if you could freely form compounds like this.) Clearly, there is SOME process that turns noun-noun constructions into compound nouns. And just as clearly, that process is NOT "shove nouns together freely." Without more data on this, and we have very little, we do not create new compounds ourselves. It is the convention of this list, and most places you find Klingonists, that you use spaces to separate all lexemes (including their affixes) from each other. That includes nouns in a noun-noun relationship. If you want to create a compound noun, you'll have to convince everyone either that your compound is canonical or that there is sufficient evidence to show that creating a lexeme is warranted. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
On 1/26/2022 7:52 AM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
Some people are firmly against writing words together without spaces because they think it is same as "inventing new words". Am 26.01.2022 um 15:20 schrieb SuStel: On this list, the convention is to not forge new compound nouns
I know about that convention, and I also follow it because I see that it's useful. But nevertheless, I talk to Marc Okrand about this, and he wondered why this convention existed. He said that TKD tells us how make compound nouns, so wondered why we don't. I don't want to change anyone's mind, but... "just sayin'."
it goes against our convention. (And you can do what you like if your compound is a proper noun.) Lieven was given special dispensation to
As a side note, I chose for that word because it had already appeared in The Klingon Hamlet (which does use several compound nouns as well, by the way). You wouldn't need
a special note like that if you could freely form compounds like this.)
Well, that quote also is not a proof. It just means what it says: that the word {ta'puq} maybe doese not mean what I want it to mean, it does not mean "prince" because I use it that way. But it DOES mean {ta'puq} whatever a Klingon thinks it means, and it is a valid word. Is it canon? No. Is it wrong? No. So depending on how you see and interpret this, it is okay to make your own compounds. Okrand never said you should not. It's our own convention. -- Lieven L. Litaer aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany" http://www.tlhInganHol.com
Usually, when I read a compound word which would normally be two separate ones, I become confused thinking that it's a new word which I don't know. So, in things that I write, I avoid omitting the gap between noun-noun constructions. -- Dana'an https://sacredtextsinklingon.wordpress.com/ Ζεὺς ἦν, Ζεὺς ἐστίν, Ζεὺς ἔσσεται· ὦ μεγάλε Ζεῦ
On 1/26/2022 11:05 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:
Usually, when I read a compound word which would normally be two separate ones, I become confused thinking that it's a new word which I don't know.
So, in things that I write, I avoid omitting the gap between noun-noun constructions.
And that's why the convention exists. Not because it's "canonical," not because it's a rule of Klingon grammar, but because it helps us recognize the difference between a lexicalized word and a phrase that we made up ourselves. Okrand doesn't have to figure out which words are lexicalized and which aren't; we do. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
yesusingspacesandotherkindsofpunctuationareaconventionbutsomeconventionsaremoreimportantthanothers On this list, the convention is to not forge new compound nouns where there is no precedent for doing so.
As you example shows, using spaces to separate words is important when using latin alphabet (not with all alphabets, but with latin). BUT the rules of which words are written together and which are not varies. I think the Klingon model is heavily inspired by English. English has two kinds of compound words, words like "post office" written with space and words like "mailbox" written without a space. It is quite arbitrary. In languages like Finnish and German, all compound words are written together without a space, and people don't see any difference between lexicalized and non-lexicalized compounds. Why does there have to be a distinction? Is it important to use punctuation to mark this distinction? The rules Okrand use are not clear. There are compounds written with a space that appear in Okrand's dictionaries (for example "tuq Degh" in KGT). If that is not lexicalized, why is it listed in a dictionary? Clearly spaces are not, for example, used to differentiate between canon compounds and non-canon compounds, as "tuq Degh" is a canon compound that has a space. If there is no linguistic reason to write some compounds with space and some without, I'd prefer to write all of them in the same way. One way might be to wrote possessive noun-noun constructions with a space and all other without. That would at least be useful for the reader. Remember that the Okrandian notation is a romanization. It is a tool for us, not for Klingons. Even if Klingons do have two classes of compound words, we don't know rules for that and therefore have no reason to support that feature in our writing system. Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Wednesday, January 26th, 2022 at 18.10, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 11:05 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:
Usually, when I read a compound word which would normally be two
separate ones, I become confused thinking that it's a new word which I
don't know.
So, in things that I write, I avoid omitting the gap between noun-noun
constructions.
And that's why the convention exists. Not because it's "canonical," not
because it's a rule of Klingon grammar, but because it helps us
recognize the difference between a lexicalized word and a phrase that we
made up ourselves. Okrand doesn't have to figure out which words are
lexicalized and which aren't; we do.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SuStel
tlhIngan-Hol mailing list
tlhIngan-Hol@lists.kli.org
On 1/26/2022 2:19 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
yesusingspacesandotherkindsofpunctuationareaconventionbutsomeconventionsaremoreimportantthanothers On this list, the convention is to not forge new compound nouns where there is no precedent for doing so. I think the Klingon model is heavily inspired by English. English has two kinds of compound words, words like "post office" written with space and words like "mailbox" written without a space. It is quite arbitrary.
No, it's not arbitrary, though you may not know how this comes to be, and there are three types of compound nouns, not two. In general, in American English, when a relatively new compound becomes lexicalized, it is lexicalized as two separate words. Often, compounds will become hyphenated to disambiguate which nouns are tied to which in strings of nouns, and these hyphenated forms become lexicalized. Finally, a very common compound will become a single word with no punctuation after long use. No, it's not totally consistent, but it's also not "quite arbitrary." The general pattern is N1 N2 --> N1-N2 --> N1N2 or N1 N2 --> N1N2 depending on whether the word needed to be disambiguated with a hyphen a lot. English dictionaries are constantly removing hyphens from nouns as English evolves and new editions are published. /Bumble-bee/ to /bumblebee; cry-baby/ to /crybaby, pigeon-hole/ to /pigeonhole,/ and so on. It also depends on dialect. In some old-fashioned British English dialects, one hyphenates nearly every genitive noun pair. Read /The Lord of the Rings/ in English for an example. As dictionaries get updated, a lot of genitives that were hyphenated in British English are dropping their hyphens, whether or not they lose the space between them. At the end of the day, YES, KLINGON SHOWS HEAVY ENGLISH BIAS, and if you want to study Klingon, you have to learn to live with that.
In languages like Finnish
Here we go.
and German, all compound words are written together without a space, and people don't see any difference between lexicalized and non-lexicalized compounds. Why does there have to be a distinction? Is it important to use punctuation to mark this distinction?
In Finnish and German, it's not important, because you haven't got a fictional race whose language you are trying to piece together through fictitious anthropological and archaeological research. You can ask native Finnish and German speakers, "Is this a word you'd find in the dictionary?" That is almost impossible in Klingon, and even where it is possible, it's done through someone who failed to live up to your ideal of not-English when he invented it.
The rules Okrand use are not clear. There are compounds written with a space that appear in Okrand's dictionaries (for example "tuq Degh" in KGT). If that is not lexicalized, why is it listed in a dictionary?
Those are lexicalized. Who said they're not?
Clearly spaces are not, for example, used to differentiate between canon compounds and non-canon compounds, as "tuq Degh" is a canon compound that has a space.
Nobody said noun-nouns with spaces can't be lexicalized. I said if we form no-space compounds of our own, we lose the ability to distinguish between canonical lexicalization and otherwise. I'll say it again, because you didn't read it the first time: It's not a grammatical requirement; it's a convention to keep ourselves sane.
If there is no linguistic reason to write some compounds with space and some without, I'd prefer to write all of them in the same way. One way might be to wrote possessive noun-noun constructions with a space and all other without. That would at least be useful for the reader.
So, what, are we taking a vote now?
Remember that the Okrandian notation is a romanization. It is a tool for us, not for Klingons.
Yes, it is a CONVENTION for us. Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. Not because Klingon grammar demands it, but because we want to keep distinct our knowledge of what is a known term and what is something we made up ourselves. And even that convention isn't arbitrary. Okrand himself rarely pushes together two nouns that he hasn't separately lexicalized for us that way. Our convention comes from his own habits. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
There is no need to shout. Maybe my previous message wasn'r clear. In English, some nouns are written together and some are not for historical reasons (because they are lexicalized such way). With Klingon, there is are no lexicalized words. The Okrandian notation is a human-made brand new writing system with no (fictive) history. There is no reason to add historic ambiguity. So what does using spaces mean. It does not mean: - Lexicalization - Whether the word is in the dictionary or not - Whether the word is canon or not - Special grammar, as we can interpret it as a regular noun-noun cosntruct and it follows the same rules (not including yejquv, SeHjan, etc.) - Historical reason (as the writing system is "new") There seems to be no meaning.
In Finnish and German, it's not important, because you haven't got a fictional race whose language you are trying to piece together through fictitious anthropological and archaeological research. You can ask native Finnish and German speakers, "Is this a word you'd find in the dictionary?" That is almost impossible in Klingon, and even where it is possible, it's done through someone who failed to live up to your ideal of not-English when he invented it.
Irrelevant, as the spacing does not signify whether or not the word is included in a dictionary.
Yes, it is a CONVENTION for us. Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. Not because Klingon grammar demands it, but because we want to keep distinct our knowledge of what is a known term and what is something we made up ourselves.
As "tuq Degh" etc. shows, there are "known terms" not made by us written without a space.
It's not a grammatical requirement; it's a convention to keep ourselves sane.
What exactly is it that keeps us sane? Can you give me one consitent property that compounds written without a space have that compounds written with a space don't? It doesn't seem to mean anything. According to Lieven, Okrand uses spaces inconsistently as Klingon wasn't supposed to be a written language and the Okrandian notation was supposed to be a pronunciation guide. If this is true, why should we bother to use spaces consistently? Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Wednesday, January 26th, 2022 at 22.11, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 2:19 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
yesusingspacesandotherkindsofpunctuationareaconventionbutsomeconventionsaremoreimportantthanothers On this list, the convention is to not forge new compound nouns where there is no precedent for doing so.
I think the Klingon model is heavily inspired by English. English has two kinds of compound words, words like "post office" written with space and words like "mailbox" written without a space. It is quite arbitrary.
No, it's not arbitrary, though you may not know how this comes to be, and there are three types of compound nouns, not two. In general, in American English, when a relatively new compound becomes lexicalized, it is lexicalized as two separate words. Often, compounds will become hyphenated to disambiguate which nouns are tied to which in strings of nouns, and these hyphenated forms become lexicalized. Finally, a very common compound will become a single word with no punctuation after long use.
No, it's not totally consistent, but it's also not "quite arbitrary." The general pattern is
N1 N2 --> N1-N2 --> N1N2 or N1 N2 --> N1N2
depending on whether the word needed to be disambiguated with a hyphen a lot.
English dictionaries are constantly removing hyphens from nouns as English evolves and new editions are published. Bumble-bee to bumblebee; cry-baby to crybaby, pigeon-hole to pigeonhole, and so on.
It also depends on dialect. In some old-fashioned British English dialects, one hyphenates nearly every genitive noun pair. Read The Lord of the Rings in English for an example. As dictionaries get updated, a lot of genitives that were hyphenated in British English are dropping their hyphens, whether or not they lose the space between them.
At the end of the day, YES, KLINGON SHOWS HEAVY ENGLISH BIAS, and if you want to study Klingon, you have to learn to live with that.
In languages like Finnish
Here we go.
and German, all compound words are written together without a space, and people don't see any difference between lexicalized and non-lexicalized compounds. Why does there have to be a distinction? Is it important to use punctuation to mark this distinction?
In Finnish and German, it's not important, because you haven't got a fictional race whose language you are trying to piece together through fictitious anthropological and archaeological research. You can ask native Finnish and German speakers, "Is this a word you'd find in the dictionary?" That is almost impossible in Klingon, and even where it is possible, it's done through someone who failed to live up to your ideal of not-English when he invented it.
The rules Okrand use are not clear. There are compounds written with a space that appear in Okrand's dictionaries (for example "tuq Degh" in KGT). If that is not lexicalized, why is it listed in a dictionary?
Those are lexicalized. Who said they're not?
Clearly spaces are not, for example, used to differentiate between canon compounds and non-canon compounds, as "tuq Degh" is a canon compound that has a space.
Nobody said noun-nouns with spaces can't be lexicalized. I said if we form no-space compounds of our own, we lose the ability to distinguish between canonical lexicalization and otherwise. I'll say it again, because you didn't read it the first time: It's not a grammatical requirement; it's a convention to keep ourselves sane.
If there is no linguistic reason to write some compounds with space and some without, I'd prefer to write all of them in the same way. One way might be to wrote possessive noun-noun constructions with a space and all other without. That would at least be useful for the reader.
So, what, are we taking a vote now?
Remember that the Okrandian notation is a romanization. It is a tool for us, not for Klingons.
Yes, it is a CONVENTION for us. Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. Not because Klingon grammar demands it, but because we want to keep distinct our knowledge of what is a known term and what is something we made up ourselves.
And even that convention isn't arbitrary. Okrand himself rarely pushes together two nouns that he hasn't separately lexicalized for us that way. Our convention comes from his own habits.
-- SuStel http://trimboli.name
As "tuq Degh" etc. shows, there are "known terms" not made by us written without a space.
This should be "'known terms' not made by us written with a space". Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Wednesday, January 26th, 2022 at 22.28, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@protonmail.com> wrote:
There is no need to shout.
Maybe my previous message wasn'r clear. In English, some nouns are written together and some are not for historical reasons (because they are lexicalized such way). With Klingon, there is are no lexicalized words. The Okrandian notation is a human-made brand new writing system with no (fictive) history. There is no reason to add historic ambiguity.
So what does using spaces mean. It does not mean:
- Lexicalization - Whether the word is in the dictionary or not - Whether the word is canon or not - Special grammar, as we can interpret it as a regular noun-noun cosntruct and it follows the same rules (not including yejquv, SeHjan, etc.) - Historical reason (as the writing system is "new")
There seems to be no meaning.
In Finnish and German, it's not important, because you haven't got a fictional race whose language you are trying to piece together through fictitious anthropological and archaeological research. You can ask native Finnish and German speakers, "Is this a word you'd find in the dictionary?" That is almost impossible in Klingon, and even where it is possible, it's done through someone who failed to live up to your ideal of not-English when he invented it.
Irrelevant, as the spacing does not signify whether or not the word is included in a dictionary.
Yes, it is a CONVENTION for us. Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. Not because Klingon grammar demands it, but because we want to keep distinct our knowledge of what is a known term and what is something we made up ourselves.
As "tuq Degh" etc. shows, there are "known terms" not made by us written without a space.
It's not a grammatical requirement; it's a convention to keep ourselves sane.
What exactly is it that keeps us sane? Can you give me one consitent property that compounds written without a space have that compounds written with a space don't? It doesn't seem to mean anything.
According to Lieven, Okrand uses spaces inconsistently as Klingon wasn't supposed to be a written language and the Okrandian notation was supposed to be a pronunciation guide. If this is true, why should we bother to use spaces consistently?
Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Wednesday, January 26th, 2022 at 22.11, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 2:19 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
yesusingspacesandotherkindsofpunctuationareaconventionbutsomeconventionsaremoreimportantthanothers On this list, the convention is to not forge new compound nouns where there is no precedent for doing so.
I think the Klingon model is heavily inspired by English. English has two kinds of compound words, words like "post office" written with space and words like "mailbox" written without a space. It is quite arbitrary.
No, it's not arbitrary, though you may not know how this comes to be, and there are three types of compound nouns, not two. In general, in American English, when a relatively new compound becomes lexicalized, it is lexicalized as two separate words. Often, compounds will become hyphenated to disambiguate which nouns are tied to which in strings of nouns, and these hyphenated forms become lexicalized. Finally, a very common compound will become a single word with no punctuation after long use.
No, it's not totally consistent, but it's also not "quite arbitrary." The general pattern is
N1 N2 --> N1-N2 --> N1N2 or N1 N2 --> N1N2
depending on whether the word needed to be disambiguated with a hyphen a lot.
English dictionaries are constantly removing hyphens from nouns as English evolves and new editions are published. Bumble-bee to bumblebee; cry-baby to crybaby, pigeon-hole to pigeonhole, and so on.
It also depends on dialect. In some old-fashioned British English dialects, one hyphenates nearly every genitive noun pair. Read The Lord of the Rings in English for an example. As dictionaries get updated, a lot of genitives that were hyphenated in British English are dropping their hyphens, whether or not they lose the space between them.
At the end of the day, YES, KLINGON SHOWS HEAVY ENGLISH BIAS, and if you want to study Klingon, you have to learn to live with that.
In languages like Finnish
Here we go.
and German, all compound words are written together without a space, and people don't see any difference between lexicalized and non-lexicalized compounds. Why does there have to be a distinction? Is it important to use punctuation to mark this distinction?
In Finnish and German, it's not important, because you haven't got a fictional race whose language you are trying to piece together through fictitious anthropological and archaeological research. You can ask native Finnish and German speakers, "Is this a word you'd find in the dictionary?" That is almost impossible in Klingon, and even where it is possible, it's done through someone who failed to live up to your ideal of not-English when he invented it.
The rules Okrand use are not clear. There are compounds written with a space that appear in Okrand's dictionaries (for example "tuq Degh" in KGT). If that is not lexicalized, why is it listed in a dictionary?
Those are lexicalized. Who said they're not?
Clearly spaces are not, for example, used to differentiate between canon compounds and non-canon compounds, as "tuq Degh" is a canon compound that has a space.
Nobody said noun-nouns with spaces can't be lexicalized. I said if we form no-space compounds of our own, we lose the ability to distinguish between canonical lexicalization and otherwise. I'll say it again, because you didn't read it the first time: It's not a grammatical requirement; it's a convention to keep ourselves sane.
If there is no linguistic reason to write some compounds with space and some without, I'd prefer to write all of them in the same way. One way might be to wrote possessive noun-noun constructions with a space and all other without. That would at least be useful for the reader.
So, what, are we taking a vote now?
Remember that the Okrandian notation is a romanization. It is a tool for us, not for Klingons.
Yes, it is a CONVENTION for us. Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. Not because Klingon grammar demands it, but because we want to keep distinct our knowledge of what is a known term and what is something we made up ourselves.
And even that convention isn't arbitrary. Okrand himself rarely pushes together two nouns that he hasn't separately lexicalized for us that way. Our convention comes from his own habits.
-- SuStel http://trimboli.name
On 1/26/2022 3:28 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
Maybe my previous message wasn'r clear. In English, some nouns are written together and some are not for historical reasons (because they are lexicalized such way).
No. In English, some nouns are lexicalized as written together and some are not because the lexicons are attempting to reflect current usage. It's not the other way around.
With Klingon, there is are no lexicalized words. The Okrandian notation is a human-made brand new writing system with no (fictive) history. There is no reason to add historic ambiguity.
So are we using different definitions of the word /lexicalized?/ I'm using it to mean those words that Okrand has given to us as the product of a (fictitious) Klingon informant saying, "This is a real word." Sometimes it's not always easy to tell when Maltz is giving us a word that would appear in a dictionary on Kronos and when he's trying to find a good translation for some human concept, but we have plenty of definitely-in-a-dictionary examples to work from. What I've been talking about has nothing to do with whether Klingons writing in their own script routinely combine nouns into complex nouns or keep them separate. It's all about how /we/ write Klingon. I haven't said anything about historic ambiguity in the latinized Klingon writing system; I only mentioned ambiguity in the context of hyphens in English nouns.
So what does using spaces mean. It does not mean:
- Lexicalization - Whether the word is in the dictionary or not - Whether the word is canon or not - Special grammar, as we can interpret it as a regular noun-noun cosntruct and it follows the same rules (not including yejquv, SeHjan, etc.) - Historical reason (as the writing system is "new")
There seems to be no meaning.
For a third time. It doesn't have a grammatical meaning in spoken Klingon. It is a convention that we follow so we can keep straight what's lexicalized and what isn't. I don't see how I can explain that any clearer.
In Finnish and German, it's not important, because you haven't got a fictional race whose language you are trying to piece together through fictitious anthropological and archaeological research. You can ask native Finnish and German speakers, "Is this a word you'd find in the dictionary?" That is almost impossible in Klingon, and even where it is possible, it's done through someone who failed to live up to your ideal of not-English when he invented it.
Irrelevant, as the spacing does not signify whether or not the word is included in a dictionary.
Wow. Whenever a discussion covers several topics, you always cherry-pick an argument from one part and apply it to another to show how it doesn't work. When a student of Klingon comes across a sentence like *vaj toDuj Daj ngeHbejDIvI',* if they're as awesome as a Finn they're going to be looking in the word-list for the word *ngeHbejDIvI',* and they'll fail to find it. They'll have to find and differentiate between *ngeH, ngeHbej, bej, DI, vI', *and *DIvI'.* This sentence is already hard to figure out because of its origin, but honestly the only way to really parse it is to point out that it looks like this: *vaj toDuj Daj ngeHbej DI vI'.* For the sake of understanding sentences like this easier, we go along with the convention that we put spaces between words that have been lexicalized for us. Not because it's said any differently. Not because the grammar changes. Simply because the convention has been established to make it easier to understand. Now, if it's really the case that spacing doesn't matter, then it also doesn't matter if we /do/ include spacing, so what are you complaining about?
Yes, it is a CONVENTION for us. Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. Not because Klingon grammar demands it, but because we want to keep distinct our knowledge of what is a known term and what is something we made up ourselves.
As "tuq Degh" etc. shows, there are "known terms" not made by us written without a space.
You're cherry-picking from different parts of the argument again.
It's not a grammatical requirement; it's a convention to keep ourselves sane.
What exactly is it that keeps us sane? Can you give me one consitent property that compounds written without a space have that compounds written with a space don't? It doesn't seem to mean anything.
Totally not what I argued and said explicitly two times before this message.
According to Lieven, Okrand uses spaces inconsistently as Klingon wasn't supposed to be a written language and the Okrandian notation was supposed to be a pronunciation guide. If this is true, why should we bother to use spaces consistently?
If this is true, then why /shouldn't/ we impose our own convention of including spaces? Now, let's remember that there ARE certain situations where Okrand has explicitly said that spacing matters. http://klingon.wiki/En/Spacing *DI'raq loD,* and all male/female distinctions for animals, are written as two words, we are told. Okrand edited *qo'Sor* to *qo' Sor* in /The Klingon Art of War./ *wabDo* as one word means a measurement term /(Mach);/ *wab Do* as two words means /speed of sound./ With two exceptions, all *XQeD* and *Xtej* sciences and scientist words are written with no space, we are told. So there ARE grammatical differences with spaces after all. Hey, maybe they're not clearly understood. It's possible. But that would suggest that keeping the words separate is the safer thing to do, right? After all, TKD tells us how to construct noun-nouns but not that we can put together our own one-word compounds. If only we could establish a convention that handles this for us... -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
I might have used the word lexicalized in two different contexts with different meanings. When talking about the writing system, it is not "naturally developed". Even in fiction, it is a constructed writing system, so words are not written as they are because in time people started to write them as such (process known as "lexicalization"), but because one person decided how to write them. So the written forms are not "lexicalized" (not the words but the Okrandian notation representations of them). So if I interpret you correctly, you argue that Klingons themselves label some compounds as lexicalized as some as not, on a basis unknown to us. Then Okrand depicts this fictional lexicalization with the spaces. If what Lieven said is true (and I interpreted him correctly), this was nor originally Okrand's idea. Even if it was, I don't see why we need to mark this categorization as we don't actually know what it means. Outside the fiction of Klingon, I argue that all canon compounds (spaces or no spaces) in TKD, KGT and other dictionary listings are lexicalized, unless explicitly stated by Okrand that they are not. Spaces are not useful in this regard. I'm not promoting any particular alternative punctuation. I'm just saying that the current usage is not consistent and that there are possible ways to write consistently: - Write canon compounds without spaces - Write genitive compounds without spaces - Write compounds with max two parts without spaces - Write no compounds without spaces - etc. Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Wednesday, January 26th, 2022 at 22.55, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 3:28 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
Maybe my previous message wasn'r clear. In English, some nouns are written together and some are not for historical reasons (because they are lexicalized such way).
No. In English, some nouns are lexicalized as written together and some are not because the lexicons are attempting to reflect current usage. It's not the other way around.
With Klingon, there is are no lexicalized words. The Okrandian notation is a human-made brand new writing system with no (fictive) history. There is no reason to add historic ambiguity.
So are we using different definitions of the word lexicalized? I'm using it to mean those words that Okrand has given to us as the product of a (fictitious) Klingon informant saying, "This is a real word." Sometimes it's not always easy to tell when Maltz is giving us a word that would appear in a dictionary on Kronos and when he's trying to find a good translation for some human concept, but we have plenty of definitely-in-a-dictionary examples to work from.
What I've been talking about has nothing to do with whether Klingons writing in their own script routinely combine nouns into complex nouns or keep them separate. It's all about how we write Klingon. I haven't said anything about historic ambiguity in the latinized Klingon writing system; I only mentioned ambiguity in the context of hyphens in English nouns.
So what does using spaces mean. It does not mean:
- Lexicalization - Whether the word is in the dictionary or not - Whether the word is canon or not - Special grammar, as we can interpret it as a regular noun-noun cosntruct and it follows the same rules (not including yejquv, SeHjan, etc.) - Historical reason (as the writing system is "new")
There seems to be no meaning.
For a third time.
It doesn't have a grammatical meaning in spoken Klingon.
It is a convention that we follow so we can keep straight what's lexicalized and what isn't.
I don't see how I can explain that any clearer.
In Finnish and German, it's not important, because you haven't got a fictional race whose language you are trying to piece together through fictitious anthropological and archaeological research. You can ask native Finnish and German speakers, "Is this a word you'd find in the dictionary?" That is almost impossible in Klingon, and even where it is possible, it's done through someone who failed to live up to your ideal of not-English when he invented it.
Irrelevant, as the spacing does not signify whether or not the word is included in a dictionary.
Wow. Whenever a discussion covers several topics, you always cherry-pick an argument from one part and apply it to another to show how it doesn't work.
When a student of Klingon comes across a sentence like vaj toDuj Daj ngeHbejDIvI', if they're as awesome as a Finn they're going to be looking in the word-list for the word ngeHbejDIvI', and they'll fail to find it. They'll have to find and differentiate between ngeH, ngeHbej, bej, DI, vI', and DIvI'. This sentence is already hard to figure out because of its origin, but honestly the only way to really parse it is to point out that it looks like this: vaj toDuj Daj ngeHbej DI vI'. For the sake of understanding sentences like this easier, we go along with the convention that we put spaces between words that have been lexicalized for us.
Not because it's said any differently.
Not because the grammar changes.
Simply because the convention has been established to make it easier to understand.
Now, if it's really the case that spacing doesn't matter, then it also doesn't matter if we do include spacing, so what are you complaining about?
Yes, it is a CONVENTION for us. Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. Not because Klingon grammar demands it, but because we want to keep distinct our knowledge of what is a known term and what is something we made up ourselves.
As "tuq Degh" etc. shows, there are "known terms" not made by us written without a space.
You're cherry-picking from different parts of the argument again.
It's not a grammatical requirement; it's a convention to keep ourselves sane.
What exactly is it that keeps us sane? Can you give me one consitent property that compounds written without a space have that compounds written with a space don't? It doesn't seem to mean anything.
Totally not what I argued and said explicitly two times before this message.
According to Lieven, Okrand uses spaces inconsistently as Klingon wasn't supposed to be a written language and the Okrandian notation was supposed to be a pronunciation guide. If this is true, why should we bother to use spaces consistently?
If this is true, then why shouldn't we impose our own convention of including spaces?
Now, let's remember that there ARE certain situations where Okrand has explicitly said that spacing matters.
http://klingon.wiki/En/Spacing
DI'raq loD, and all male/female distinctions for animals, are written as two words, we are told.
Okrand edited qo'Sor to qo' Sor in The Klingon Art of War.
wabDo as one word means a measurement term (Mach); wab Do as two words means speed of sound.
With two exceptions, all XQeD and Xtej sciences and scientist words are written with no space, we are told.
So there ARE grammatical differences with spaces after all.
Hey, maybe they're not clearly understood. It's possible. But that would suggest that keeping the words separate is the safer thing to do, right? After all, TKD tells us how to construct noun-nouns but not that we can put together our own one-word compounds.
If only we could establish a convention that handles this for us...
-- SuStel http://trimboli.name
On Jan 26, 2022, at 11:32 AM, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@protonmail.com> wrote:
So if I interpret you correctly, you argue that Klingons themselves label some compounds as lexicalized as some as not, on a basis unknown to us. Then Okrand depicts this fictional lexicalization with the spaces.
Where you are getting your interpretation is mysterious. Okrand “depicts” lexicalization of a term the same way any linguist does: by including it in a dictionary. This is explicit in the first paragraph of TKD section 3.4. The noun-noun construction. Read it yourself and reflect that it contradicts a lot of both what you’re saying and what you’re misconstruing others as saying. SuStel has repeated his core statement more than enough times: the convention here is to use spaces in noun-noun constructions. The pragmatic reason is because it makes it possible for people to read them as written. (There’s also a prescriptive argument pointing out that TKD tells us how to interpret spaceless compounds when we see them, but when it tells us that we can make something like them ourselves it uses spaces between the words.) -- ghunchu'wI'
Where you are getting your interpretation is mysterious. Okrand “depicts” lexicalization of a term the same way any linguist does: by including it in a dictionary. This is explicit in the first paragraph of TKD section 3.4. The noun-noun construction. Read it yourself and reflect that it contradicts a lot of both what you’re saying and what you’re misconstruing others as saying.
As I have said before, there are entries in Okrand's dictionaries that have spaces. Therefore, the spacing does not tell us whether or not the word is found in a dictionary or not.
From TKD:
Some combinations of two (or more) nouns in a row are so common as to have become everyday words. These are the compound nouns (as discussed in section 2.0.0). In addition, it is possible to combine nouns in the manner of a compound noun to produce a new construct even if it is not a legitimate compound noun ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary).
Okrand contradicts himself by including compound nouns with spaces in his dictionary. If they are in the dictionary, they should be "legitimate" and therefore be written without spaces. That, or then he is referring to a fictional Klingon dictionary and not his own dictionary. We don't know on what basis fictional Klingons include words in their dictionaries. That is what I referred to when I said "Then Okrand depicts this fictional lexicalization with the spaces." Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Thursday, January 27th, 2022 at 01.03, Alan Anderson <qunchuy@alcaco.net> wrote:
On Jan 26, 2022, at 11:32 AM, Iikka Hauhio fergusq@protonmail.com wrote:
So if I interpret you correctly, you argue that Klingons themselves label some compounds as lexicalized as some as not, on a basis unknown to us. Then Okrand depicts this fictional lexicalization with the spaces.
Where you are getting your interpretation is mysterious. Okrand “depicts” lexicalization of a term the same way any linguist does: by including it in a dictionary. This is explicit in the first paragraph of TKD section 3.4. The noun-noun construction. Read it yourself and reflect that it contradicts a lot of both what you’re saying and what you’re misconstruing others as saying.
SuStel has repeated his core statement more than enough times: the convention here is to use spaces in noun-noun constructions. The pragmatic reason is because it makes it possible for people to read them as written. (There’s also a prescriptive argument pointing out that TKD tells us how to interpret spaceless compounds when we see them, but when it tells us that we can make something like them ourselves it uses spaces between the words.)
-- ghunchu'wI'
On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 at 00:09, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@protonmail.com> wrote:
Where you are getting your interpretation is mysterious. Okrand “depicts” lexicalization of a term the same way any linguist does: by including it in a dictionary. This is explicit in the first paragraph of TKD section 3.4. The noun-noun construction. Read it yourself and reflect that it contradicts a lot of both what you’re saying and what you’re misconstruing others as saying.
As I have said before, there are entries in Okrand's dictionaries that have spaces. Therefore, the spacing does not tell us whether or not the word is found in a dictionary or not.
From TKD:
Some combinations of two (or more) nouns in a row are so common as to have become everyday words. These are the compound nouns (as discussed in section 2.0.0). In addition, it is possible to combine nouns in the manner of a compound noun to produce a new construct even if it is not a legitimate compound noun ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary).
Okrand contradicts himself by including compound nouns with spaces in his dictionary. If they are in the dictionary, they should be "legitimate" and therefore be written without spaces.
That, or then he is referring to a fictional Klingon dictionary and not his own dictionary. We don't know on what basis fictional Klingons include words in their dictionaries. That is what I referred to when I said "Then Okrand depicts this fictional lexicalization with the spaces."
I think you've conflated two different things which are described in TKD, compound nouns (section 3.2.1) and the noun-noun construction (section 3.4). Both of these can be lexicalised (i.e., appear in the dictionary). By convention, the former is written without a space, while the latter is written with spaces. I also think, as a result of this conflation, that you're misreading the sentence ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary). The unwritten implication here is "... found in a dictionary (as one word written without spaces)". You wrote that he contradicts himself by including "compound nouns with spaces", but it's not a contradiction because compound nouns are written without spaces in his convention. The dictionary contains both compound nouns (without spaces) *and* noun-noun constructions (with spaces), but by the classification described in TKD, they are different classes of noun constructs. -- De'vID
On 1/26/2022 4:31 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
So if I interpret you correctly, you argue that Klingons themselves label some compounds as lexicalized as some as not, on a basis unknown to us. Then Okrand depicts this fictional lexicalization with the spaces.
I'm not going to repeat myself on the difference between native grammar and convention. You're not understanding the distinction.
Outside the fiction of Klingon, I argue that all canon compounds (spaces or no spaces) in TKD, KGT and other dictionary listings are lexicalized, unless explicitly stated by Okrand that they are not. Spaces are not useful in this regard.
You and I use Klingon entirely outside of the fiction of Klingon, but we pretend that we have a bridge to the inside, and we get all our information about Klingon from across that bridge and only from across that bridge. If we didn't, then there would be no reason at all to care about what Okrand says about Klingon, and we could all just make up whatever words and rules we liked. But we're NOT inside that fiction ourselves. We can't go to Kronos and meet Klingons; we can't make a subspace call to a Klingon planet; we can't even hope to be invaded by Klingons in the future. We have only that little fiction between studying an "alien" language and arguing about a semi-joke language that some linguist threw together as a novelty. Even as things are, there are no Klingon Police that will come and arrest you if you decide you want to shove nouns together. Go right ahead. It would be an interesting test to see if others would tolerate it.
I'm not promoting any particular alternative punctuation. I'm just saying that the current usage is not consistent and that there are possible ways to write consistently:
If you're expecting to find consistency in Klingon, you're going to be sorely disappointed. Much of the fun is in recognizing that we don't know and can't predict the answer and trying to figure it out. You're saying that the current usage is not consistent. I completely agree. There are examples of compound nouns I wouldn't expect to be compounded, and examples of noun-nouns that I could easily imagine being compounded. You're saying there are possible ways to write consistently. Again, I agree. We could make up our own rules to cover all situations. And we /do/ have our own rules: we have developed a convention whereby we do not invent our own compounds, and any genitive nouns get a space before their head nouns; only Okrand can invent compounds. It's not always consistent with what Okrand has done, but as you AND Okrand both admit, Okrand himself hasn't been consistent. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
ghunchu'wI':
No. Leaving out spaces is not what makes a compound noun “legitimate”. Being a common combination is what grants it its own dictionary entry. Things like {ropyaH qach} for “hospital” and {'Iw HIq} for “bloodwine” are lexicalized terms because they have a specific meaning when the words are used together, regardless of whether or not they remain separated by a space when used.
You must have misunderstood me. 'Iw HIq and ropyaH qach are lexicalized, I haven't denied that. Both compounds are included in a dictionary, so they both are legitimate (this is Okrand's definition of "legitimate"). My argument was that they should be written without space: in TKD Okrand says that legitimate copounds don't have a space. ghunchu'wI':
I will be generous and assume you’re not just arguing to be contrary, but instead are basing your arguments on a non-native-English misinterpretation of things that are clearly understood by native speakers of English. In which case I suggest that you cease projecting your mistaken ideas onto what native English speakers are saying, and just read and accept their words without twisting them to fit your preconceptions.
Please don't assume anything. You clearly didn't understand me, so I might as well say that you can't understand it because your native language is English. Please just accept what I say. That is what you sound like. SuStel:
You're saying that the current usage is not consistent. I completely agree. There are examples of compound nouns I wouldn't expect to be compounded, and examples of noun-nouns that I could easily imagine being compounded.
You're saying there are possible ways to write consistently. Again, I agree. We could make up our own rules to cover all situations. And wedohave our own rules: we have developed a convention whereby we do not invent our own compounds, and any genitive nouns get a space before their head nouns; only Okrand can invent compounds. It's not always consistent with what Okrand has done, but as you AND Okrand both admit, Okrand himself hasn't been consistent.
Great that we agree. There doesn't seem to be any dispute between us anymore. Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Thursday, January 27th, 2022 at 02.04, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 4:31 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
So if I interpret you correctly, you argue that Klingons themselves label some compounds as lexicalized as some as not, on a basis unknown to us. Then Okrand depicts this fictional lexicalization with the spaces.
I'm not going to repeat myself on the difference between native grammar and convention. You're not understanding the distinction.
Outside the fiction of Klingon, I argue that all canon compounds (spaces or no spaces) in TKD, KGT and other dictionary listings are lexicalized, unless explicitly stated by Okrand that they are not. Spaces are not useful in this regard.
You and I use Klingon entirely outside of the fiction of Klingon, but we pretend that we have a bridge to the inside, and we get all our information about Klingon from across that bridge and only from across that bridge. If we didn't, then there would be no reason at all to care about what Okrand says about Klingon, and we could all just make up whatever words and rules we liked. But we're NOT inside that fiction ourselves. We can't go to Kronos and meet Klingons; we can't make a subspace call to a Klingon planet; we can't even hope to be invaded by Klingons in the future. We have only that little fiction between studying an "alien" language and arguing about a semi-joke language that some linguist threw together as a novelty.
Even as things are, there are no Klingon Police that will come and arrest you if you decide you want to shove nouns together. Go right ahead. It would be an interesting test to see if others would tolerate it.
I'm not promoting any particular alternative punctuation. I'm just saying that the current usage is not consistent and that there are possible ways to write consistently:
If you're expecting to find consistency in Klingon, you're going to be sorely disappointed. Much of the fun is in recognizing that we don't know and can't predict the answer and trying to figure it out.
You're saying that the current usage is not consistent. I completely agree. There are examples of compound nouns I wouldn't expect to be compounded, and examples of noun-nouns that I could easily imagine being compounded.
You're saying there are possible ways to write consistently. Again, I agree. We could make up our own rules to cover all situations. And we do have our own rules: we have developed a convention whereby we do not invent our own compounds, and any genitive nouns get a space before their head nouns; only Okrand can invent compounds. It's not always consistent with what Okrand has done, but as you AND Okrand both admit, Okrand himself hasn't been consistent.
-- SuStel http://trimboli.name
On 1/26/2022 7:16 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
ghunchu'wI':
No. Leaving out spaces is not what makes a compound noun “legitimate”. Being a common combination is what grants it its own dictionary entry. Things like {ropyaH qach} for “hospital” and {'Iw HIq} for “bloodwine” are lexicalized terms because they have a specific meaning when the words are used together, regardless of whether or not they remain separated by a space when used.
You must have misunderstood me. *'Iw HIq* and *ropyaH qach *are lexicalized, I haven't denied that. Both compounds are included in a dictionary, so they both are legitimate (this is Okrand's definition of "legitimate").
As De'vID has just pointed out, the term "compound" has a specific meaning in TKD: it refers to complex nouns formed by putting together two or more other nouns. *jolpa'* is a compound; *'Iw HIq* is not.
My argument was that they should be written without space: in TKD Okrand says that legitimate copounds don't have a space.
Which means that a noun-noun like *'Iw HIq* is not a compound noun, not that it can't appear as a "legitimate" entry in a dictionary.
SuStel:
You're saying that the current usage is not consistent. I completely agree. There are examples of compound nouns I wouldn't expect to be compounded, and examples of noun-nouns that I could easily imagine being compounded.
You're saying there are possible ways to write consistently. Again, I agree. We could make up our own rules to cover all situations. And we/do/have our own rules: we have developed a convention whereby we do not invent our own compounds, and any genitive nouns get a space before their head nouns; only Okrand can invent compounds. It's not always consistent with what Okrand has done, but as you AND Okrand both admit, Okrand himself hasn't been consistent.
Great that we agree. There doesn't seem to be any dispute between us anymore.
maj! I'm glad we can agree that the convention to distinguish between compound nouns and noun-noun constructions with punctuation is a reasonable one. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
De'vID:
I also think, as a result of this conflation, that you're misreading the sentence ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary). The unwritten implication here is "... found in a dictionary (as one word written without spaces)". You wrote that he contradicts himself by including "compound nouns with spaces", but it's not a contradiction because compound nouns are written without spaces in his convention. The dictionary contains both compound nouns (without spaces) *and* noun-noun constructions (with spaces), but by the classification described in TKD, they are different classes of noun constructs.
How I read it is that there are "combinations of nouns". If a combination is a "legitimate compound noun", it works as discussed in TKD section 2. Then if a combination is not a legitimate compound noun, it works like a noun-noun construct discussed in section 3.4. This would mean that noun-noun constructs are not "legitimate". But I agree that it can be read in the way you suggest. But sections 2 and 3.4 describe very similar constructs (they are both quite vague and section 3.4 doesn't really explain the genitive behavior of the noun-noun construct). What is the difference between a "compound noun" and a "noun-noun construction"? The only difference I see is that one has spaces and the other has not. SuStel:
maj! I'm glad we can agree that the convention to distinguish between compound nouns and noun-noun constructions with punctuation is a reasonable one.
It is reasonable as long as there is a reason to make a distinction between "compound nouns" and "noun-noun constructions". It is not yet clear to me what their difference is. We agree that Okrand is inconsistent when deciding whether a word is a compound noun or a noun-noun construction. Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Thursday, January 27th, 2022 at 02.43, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 7:16 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
ghunchu'wI':
No. Leaving out spaces is not what makes a compound noun “legitimate”. Being a common combination is what grants it its own dictionary entry. Things like {ropyaH qach} for “hospital” and {'Iw HIq} for “bloodwine” are lexicalized terms because they have a specific meaning when the words are used together, regardless of whether or not they remain separated by a space when used.
You must have misunderstood me. 'Iw HIq and ropyaH qach are lexicalized, I haven't denied that. Both compounds are included in a dictionary, so they both are legitimate (this is Okrand's definition of "legitimate").
As De'vID has just pointed out, the term "compound" has a specific meaning in TKD: it refers to complex nouns formed by putting together two or more other nouns. jolpa' is a compound; 'Iw HIq is not.
My argument was that they should be written without space: in TKD Okrand says that legitimate copounds don't have a space.
Which means that a noun-noun like 'Iw HIq is not a compound noun, not that it can't appear as a "legitimate" entry in a dictionary.
SuStel:
You're saying that the current usage is not consistent. I completely agree. There are examples of compound nouns I wouldn't expect to be compounded, and examples of noun-nouns that I could easily imagine being compounded.
You're saying there are possible ways to write consistently. Again, I agree. We could make up our own rules to cover all situations. And wedohave our own rules: we have developed a convention whereby we do not invent our own compounds, and any genitive nouns get a space before their head nouns; only Okrand can invent compounds. It's not always consistent with what Okrand has done, but as you AND Okrand both admit, Okrand himself hasn't been consistent.
Great that we agree. There doesn't seem to be any dispute between us anymore.
maj! I'm glad we can agree that the convention to distinguish between compound nouns and noun-noun constructions with punctuation is a reasonable one.
-- SuStel http://trimboli.name
On 1/26/2022 7:57 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
De'vID:
I also think, as a result of this conflation, that you're misreading the sentence ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary). The unwritten implication here is "... found in a dictionary (as one word written without spaces)". You wrote that he contradicts himself by including "compound nouns with spaces", but it's not a contradiction because compound nouns are written without spaces in his convention. The dictionary contains both compound nouns (without spaces) *and* noun-noun constructions (with spaces), but by the classification described in TKD, they are different classes of noun constructs.
How I read it is that there are "combinations of nouns". If a combination is a "legitimate compound noun", it works as discussed in TKD section 2. Then if a combination is /not/ a legitimate compound noun, it works like a noun-noun construct discussed in section 3.4. This would mean that noun-noun constructs are not "legitimate".
No. TKD says "it is possible to combine nouns in the manner of a compound noun to produce a new construct even if it is not a legitimate compound noun ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary)." It doesn't say that noun-noun constructions are not legitimate in this sense; it says it is possible to combine them as noun-noun constructions /even if///they're not legitimate. That doesn't mean that all noun-nouns are illegitimate; it means that /even if/ the noun-noun is not legitimate, you can still construct it. You don't need the dictionary's permission to construct a particular noun-noun. So *'Iw HIq* is a noun-noun that appears lexicalized. It represents a known thing that has a set phrase. *nuH pegh* does not appear in the dictionary. It is coined on the spot and does not represent a set, lexicalized phrase. That passage about "legitimate" combinations is about being allowed to construct phrases like *nuH pegh* even though they don't appear in the word list.
But sections 2 and 3.4 describe very similar constructs (they are both quite vague and section 3.4 doesn't really explain the genitive behavior of the noun-noun construct). What is the difference between a "compound noun" and a "noun-noun construction"? The only difference I see is that one has spaces and the other has not.
A compound noun is a type of complex noun that is lexicalized. A noun-noun construction is a combination of nouns that are not a compound noun, not a complex noun, and may or may not be lexicalized. We assume the convention that we may not create compound nouns because we cannot create lexicalized terms, but we can create noun-noun constructions because we can create non-lexicalized terms. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
SuStel:
A noun-noun construction is a combination of nouns that are not a compound noun, not a complex noun, and may or may not be lexicalized.
But what is the concrete difference between a compound noun and a noun-noun construction? Imagine that instead of 'Iw HIq we had 'IwHIq and instead of ropyaH we had rop yaH. How would the language be different? Would these words have different a usage, meaning, grammar or pronunciation? Would something else be different, and if so, what? What is the justification to have a distinction between these two ways to form similar word combinations? Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Thursday, January 27th, 2022 at 03.25, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 7:57 PM, Iikka Hauhio wrote:
De'vID:
I also think, as a result of this conflation, that you're misreading the sentence ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary). The unwritten implication here is "... found in a dictionary (as one word written without spaces)". You wrote that he contradicts himself by including "compound nouns with spaces", but it's not a contradiction because compound nouns are written without spaces in his convention. The dictionary contains both compound nouns (without spaces) *and* noun-noun constructions (with spaces), but by the classification described in TKD, they are different classes of noun constructs.
How I read it is that there are "combinations of nouns". If a combination is a "legitimate compound noun", it works as discussed in TKD section 2. Then if a combination is not a legitimate compound noun, it works like a noun-noun construct discussed in section 3.4. This would mean that noun-noun constructs are not "legitimate".
No. TKD says "it is possible to combine nouns in the manner of a compound noun to produce a new construct even if it is not a legitimate compound noun ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary)." It doesn't say that noun-noun constructions are not legitimate in this sense; it says it is possible to combine them as noun-noun constructions even ifthey're not legitimate. That doesn't mean that all noun-nouns are illegitimate; it means that even if the noun-noun is not legitimate, you can still construct it. You don't need the dictionary's permission to construct a particular noun-noun.
So 'Iw HIq is a noun-noun that appears lexicalized. It represents a known thing that has a set phrase. nuH pegh does not appear in the dictionary. It is coined on the spot and does not represent a set, lexicalized phrase. That passage about "legitimate" combinations is about being allowed to construct phrases like nuH pegh even though they don't appear in the word list.
But sections 2 and 3.4 describe very similar constructs (they are both quite vague and section 3.4 doesn't really explain the genitive behavior of the noun-noun construct). What is the difference between a "compound noun" and a "noun-noun construction"? The only difference I see is that one has spaces and the other has not.
A compound noun is a type of complex noun that is lexicalized. A noun-noun construction is a combination of nouns that are not a compound noun, not a complex noun, and may or may not be lexicalized. We assume the convention that we may not create compound nouns because we cannot create lexicalized terms, but we can create noun-noun constructions because we can create non-lexicalized terms.
-- SuStel http://trimboli.name
On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 at 02:40, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@protonmail.com> wrote:
SuStel:
A noun-noun construction is a combination of nouns that are not a compound noun, not a complex noun, and may or may not be lexicalized.
But what is the concrete difference between a compound noun and a noun-noun construction?
I already answered this question in my previous email, which I was about to send when you sent this one.
Imagine that instead of *'Iw HIq *we had *'IwHIq *and instead of *ropyaH* we had *rop yaH*. How would the language be different? Would these words have different a usage, meaning, grammar or pronunciation? Would something else be different, and if so, what? What is the justification to have a distinction between these two ways to form similar word combinations?
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. 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. -- De'vID
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.
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. 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. Iikka "fergusq" Hauhio ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Thursday, January 27th, 2022 at 03.58, De'vID <de.vid.jonpin@gmail.com> wrote:
On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 at 02:40, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@protonmail.com> wrote:
SuStel:
A noun-noun construction is a combination of nouns that are not a compound noun, not a complex noun, and may or may not be lexicalized.
But what is the concrete difference between a compound noun and a noun-noun construction?
I already answered this question in my previous email, which I was about to send when you sent this one.
Imagine that instead of 'Iw HIq we had 'IwHIq and instead of ropyaH we had rop yaH. How would the language be different? Would these words have different a usage, meaning, grammar or pronunciation? Would something else be different, and if so, what? What is the justification to have a distinction between these two ways to form similar word combinations?
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.
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.
--
De'vID
On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 at 11:54, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@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
On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 at 01:57, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@protonmail.com> wrote:
De'vID:
I also think, as a result of this conflation, that you're misreading the sentence ("legitimate" in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary). The unwritten implication here is "... found in a dictionary (as one word written without spaces)". You wrote that he contradicts himself by including "compound nouns with spaces", but it's not a contradiction because compound nouns are written without spaces in his convention. The dictionary contains both compound nouns (without spaces) *and* noun-noun constructions (with spaces), but by the classification described in TKD, they are different classes of noun constructs.
How I read it is that there are "combinations of nouns". If a combination is a "legitimate compound noun", it works as discussed in TKD section 2. Then if a combination is *not* a legitimate compound noun, it works like a noun-noun construct discussed in section 3.4. This would mean that noun-noun constructs are not "legitimate". But I agree that it can be read in the way you suggest.
But sections 2 and 3.4 describe very similar constructs (they are both quite vague and section 3.4 doesn't really explain the genitive behavior of the noun-noun construct). What is the difference between a "compound noun" and a "noun-noun construction"? The only difference I see is that one has spaces and the other has not.
The difference between compound nouns and noun-noun constructions isn't explained clearly in TKD, so what I write is just speculation, but I think the known examples do point to a difference. Compound nouns: - an "earthworm" is not merely a worm that lives in the earth, but a specific kind of "earth worm". - an {'Iwghargh} is like "earthworm" in being a specific kind of worm. I guess you could dip or raise any kind of worm in blood, and it would be {'Iw ghargh} but not {'Iwghargh}. - a "password" is not a "pass word", and indeed nowadays is usually not a word but a combination of letters, numbers, and punctuation. - a {jolpa'} isn't just a "transporter beam room" (any room with a transporter beam), but a room with a very specific purpose and layout. - a {tIjwI'ghom} isn't just any group of random people who go aboard a ship, but a specific team configuration with a set mission. - a {qulHuD} isn't just a "fire mountain", but specifically a volcano. - a {may'Duj} is not just any "battle ship", but a specific type or class known as a "battle cruiser". I don't know why {DIvI'may'Duj} is a compound, but possibly it refers to a specific make of "Federation battle cruiser" and not to any "battle cruiser" belonging to the Federation, but that would be a guess. - {yuQjIjDIvI'} is not any "federation of cooperative planets", but *the* United Federation of Planets. - {wabDo loS} means "Mach 4", whereas {wab Do loS} would mean "speed of sound number 4" (i.e., "speed number 4, of sound"). - a {ropyaH} isn't just a "disease duty station", it's an infirmary, a specific duty station dealing with the sick and injured. Noun-noun constructions: - {nuH pegh} "weapon's secret", "secret of the weapon" - {jaghpu' yuQmey} "enemies' planets" - {puqwI' qamDu'} "my child's feet" - {nagh Dung[Daq]} "above the rock" - {ropyaH qach} "infirmary building" = "hospital" - {tuq Degh} "House symbol" = "family crest" - {wab Do} "speed of sound" In each of these noun-noun constructions, the meaning is completely obvious from the components, in a way that the meaning of compound nouns are not. A {tuq Degh} is the "symbol" of a "House", and nothing more or other than that. It's given the translation "family crest" in the dictionary because that's just a more natural English expression for the concept, but its meaning is clear from the components alone. A *{tuqDegh} would imply, to me, not just a family crest, but perhaps family crests of a specific format (like in heraldry). {wab Do} is the "speed of sound". That's obvious from the components. But {wabDo} is the "Mach number", a specific concept in fluid dynamics which isn't specified by "sound" and "speed" alone. {ropyaH qach} is an even more interesting example, because {ropyaH} is a compound noun, participating in a noun-noun construction. The meaning of {ropyaH} is not "duty station of disease". Its meaning is not determined by the components alone. If I saw {rop yaH} separated with a space, I might *guess* that it refers to an infirmary, but it isn't the only possibility. But a "hospital" is pretty much just an infirmary-building, a {ropyaH qach}. As for why it's {'Iw HIq} and not {'IwHIq}, the names of some other known alcoholic drinks are also noun-noun constructions with {HIq}, e.g., {cha'vatlh ben HIq}, {pubtaHbogh ghargh HIq}, and {romuluS HIq}, and so I would guess that {HIq} is not productive to form compound nouns for some reason. ({HIq qIj}, with an adjectival verb, is also written with a space and not as *{HIqqIj}.) As everyone has already agreed, Okrand isn't always consistent. But he's consistent enough that there are patterns that we can follow. And one of those patterns is that compound nouns (written without a space) generally represent concepts which are not derivable from their component parts alone, whereas noun-noun constructions (written with spaces) generally represent concepts which are the sum of their parts and no more. -- De'vID
On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 at 01:16, Iikka Hauhio <fergusq@protonmail.com> wrote:
ghunchu'wI':
No. Leaving out spaces is not what makes a compound noun “legitimate”. Being a common combination is what grants it its own dictionary entry. Things like {ropyaH qach} for “hospital” and {'Iw HIq} for “bloodwine” are lexicalized terms because they have a specific meaning when the words are used together, regardless of whether or not they remain separated by a space when used.
You must have misunderstood me. *'Iw HIq* and *ropyaH qach *are lexicalized, I haven't denied that. Both compounds are included in a dictionary, so they both are legitimate (this is Okrand's definition of "legitimate"). My argument was that they should be written without space: in TKD Okrand says that legitimate copounds don't have a space.
You refer to these as "compounds", but I believe that this isn't correct by the terminology used in TKD. These are both noun-noun constructions. TKD gives us these examples of "compound nouns": "earthworm", "password", {jolpa'}, {tIjwI'ghom}. In both English and Klingon, what they have in common is that they are written without a space. TKD gives us these examples of "noun-noun constructions'': {nuH[vam] pegh}, {jaghpu' yuQmey[Daq]}, {puqwI' qamDu'}, {nagh Dung[Daq]}. They are all written with a space in between (and furthermore, the first noun can take a suffix). Your argument draws the wrong conclusion from the explanation in TKD of what makes a "legitimate" compound noun. {'Iw HIq} and {ropyaH qach} are written with a space in the dictionary because they are noun-noun constructions, i.e., nouns which have been combined (to quote TKD section 3.4) "in the manner of a compound noun to produce a new construct even if it is not a legitimate compound noun ('legitimate' in the sense that it would be found in a dictionary)". The implied "legitimate compound nouns" in this case are *{'IwHIq} and *{ropyaHqach}, which are *not* found in the dictionary. {'Iw} and {HIq} have been combined in the *manner* of a compound noun, but it's not a "legitimate" compound noun. Since TKD says that "legitimate" compound nouns are written without a space, the correct conclusion here should be that {'Iw HIq} (which is not a compound noun at all, though it's constructed in the manner of one) should be written *with* a space. -- De'vID
On Jan 26, 2022, at 10:11 AM, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds.
If the meaning is carried adequately by two separate words, there is certainly no reason to make a compound out of them. It is easier for the reader that way, at the trivial expense of asking the writer not to be lazy. Using a single-word compound might sometimes imply something that isn’t clear in a straightforward noun-noun construction, but the writer had better be pretty darn sure of his or her motivation when doing it. — ghunchu'wI'
On 1/26/2022 3:34 PM, ghunchu'wI' 'utlh wrote:
On Jan 26, 2022, at 10:11 AM, SuStel<sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
Another convention we use is spacing noun-nouns that aren't lexicalized as no-space compounds. If the meaning is carried adequately by two separate words, there is certainly no reason to make a compound out of them. It is easier for the reader that way, at the trivial expense of asking the writer not to be lazy.
jIQochbe'chu'.
Using a single-word compound might sometimes imply something that isn’t clear in a straightforward noun-noun construction, but the writer had better be pretty darn sure of his or her motivation when doing it.
I'm pretty sure Iikka Hauhio will accuse you of English bias for saying that. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
Am 26.01.2022 um 13:36 schrieb mayqel qunen'oS:
Perhaps this is a ridiculous question, but since {-ngan} isn't listed in the official klingon suffixes, then how are we able to write {'elaDya'ngan} unless we have the specific word {'elaDya'ngan} in Ca'Non?
Because basically, this is a simple compound noun as described in TKD, chapter 3.2.1. Now some people say we are not allowed to make compounds ourselves or that they are not canon, but in this case, the pattern is very clear that all Xnganpu' are compound nouns. Additionally, at qepHom 2019, Okrand said: "{-ngan} is generally translated as "people of", but it's more generally used to indicate a group of beings, not necessarily beings from a particular place. " Note that Okrand wrote is using a hyphen. That does not mean it's a suffix per definition, but it shows that {ngan} is usually attached to the origin of people. So at least in this case, it's no problem to write {'elaDya'ngan} without breaking rules. -- Lieven L. Litaer aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany" http://www.tlhInganHol.com http://klingon.wiki/Word/Ngan
Thank you fergusq and lieven for replying. fergusq:
'elaDya'ngan is same as 'elaDya' ngan, a noun-noun construction meaning "inhabitant of Greece"
Initially, I thought the same. But I started wondering whether there was this subtle difference: {'elaDya'ngan} = someone born, raised, and living in Greece {'elaDya' ngan} = someone living in Greece but who has come from another country lieven:
Additionally, at qepHom 2019, Okrand said: "{-ngan} is generally translated as "people of", but it's more generally used to indicate a group of beings, not necessarily beings from a particular place. "
Seemingly/apparently this means that the opposite of what I believed actually happens. {'elaDya'ngan} doesn't refer only to people born and raised in Greece, but to any other inhabitant too. And this shows that indeed there's no difference between {'elaDya'ngan} and {'elaDya' ngan}, as fergusq previously wrote. lieven:
Note that Okrand wrote is using a hyphen. That does not mean it's a suffix per definition, but it shows that {ngan} is usually attached to the origin of people.
This is very important indeed. The fact that 'oqranD chose to write {-ngan} instead of {ngan}, proves that we can freely attach it to any country/location/etc. -- Dana'an https://sacredtextsinklingon.wordpress.com/ Ζεὺς ἦν, Ζεὺς ἐστίν, Ζεὺς ἔσσεται· ὦ μεγάλε Ζεῦ
Of course though, all of the above inevitably lead to the following realization. If there's an Italian living permanently in Greece because he married a greek woman, then how should we call him? {'elaDya'ngan/'elaDya' ngan} or {'Italya'ngan/'Italya' ngan}? -- Dana'an https://sacredtextsinklingon.wordpress.com/ Ζεὺς ἦν, Ζεὺς ἐστίν, Ζεὺς ἔσσεται· ὦ μεγάλε Ζεῦ
Am 26.01.2022 um 14:42 schrieb mayqel qunen'oS:
Of course though, all of the above inevitably lead to the following realization.
If there's an Italian living permanently in Greece because he married a greek woman, then how should we call him? {'elaDya'ngan/'elaDya' ngan} or {'Italya'ngan/'Italya' ngan}?
I would follow what you did in English: {'elaDya' Dabbogh 'Italya'ngan} Also, a Klingon will certainly keep saying {tlhIngan jIH} even after many years on Earth, even just for his pride and honor. -- Lieven L. Litaer aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany" http://www.tlhInganHol.com http://klingon.wiki/Word/Ngan
On 1/26/2022 8:36 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:
Thank you fergusq and lieven for replying.
fergusq:
'elaDya'ngan is same as 'elaDya' ngan, a noun-noun construction meaning "inhabitant of Greece" Initially, I thought the same. But I started wondering whether there was this subtle difference:
{'elaDya'ngan} = someone born, raised, and living in Greece {'elaDya' ngan} = someone living in Greece but who has come from another country
lieven:
Additionally, at qepHom 2019, Okrand said: "{-ngan} is generally translated as "people of", but it's more generally used to indicate a group of beings, not necessarily beings from a particular place. " Seemingly/apparently this means that the opposite of what I believed actually happens. {'elaDya'ngan} doesn't refer only to people born and raised in Greece, but to any other inhabitant too. And this shows that indeed there's no difference between {'elaDya'ngan} and {'elaDya' ngan}, as fergusq previously wrote.
No, that's not what it means. He's giving some wiggle room for, say, a *romuluSngan* who has never been to *romuluS, *but was brought up in a Romulan colony. Or a *tera'ngan* who was born and raised on the Moon. So *-ngan* as an element of a compound noun means something like /one of the group of people associated with living on/in./ *ngan* as a separate word means /inhabitant of./ A human being is a *tera'ngan,* but the human's cat is not a *tera'ngan,* though it is a *tera' ngan.*
lieven:
Note that Okrand wrote is using a hyphen. That does not mean it's a suffix per definition, but it shows that {ngan} is usually attached to the origin of people. This is very important indeed. The fact that 'oqranD chose to write {-ngan} instead of {ngan}, proves that we can freely attach it to any country/location/etc.
No, it doesn't prove that. Okrand may just have used the hyphen to indicate an element of a complex noun that comes at the end. It's not automatically an indication of productivity. I happen to think you /can/ freely attach it, provided it keeps the /people of/ meaning, but that hyphen isn't proof. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name
On Wed, 26 Jan 2022 at 14:57, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:
On 1/26/2022 8:36 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:
lieven:
Note that Okrand wrote is using a hyphen. That does not mean it's a suffix per definition, but it shows that {ngan} is usually attached to the origin of people.
This is very important indeed. The fact that 'oqranD chose to write {-ngan} instead of {ngan}, proves that we can freely attach it to any country/location/etc.
No, it doesn't prove that. Okrand may just have used the hyphen to indicate an element of a complex noun that comes at the end. It's not automatically an indication of productivity. I happen to think you *can* freely attach it, provided it keeps the *people of* meaning, but that hyphen isn't proof.
It's important to note the context of Okrand's words. His words quoted above were part of an explanation of why "Kelpien" is {qelpIngan} in Klingon. He probably just wrote {-ngan} with a hyphen because he was referring specifically to the last syllable in {qelpIngan}. -- De'vID
Am 26.01.2022 um 14:36 schrieb mayqel qunen'oS:
Initially, I thought the same. But I started wondering whether there was this subtle difference:
Regarding space in words, Okrand once explained that as Klingon was initially intended to be a spoken language, so written spaces make no difference for him. When saying the words, they do not sound differently. Read more on that topic here: http://klingon.wiki/En/Spacing For you to keep record, here's the relavant part: The space between words has caused some confusion and also some discussions among Klingonists because Marc Okrand has not always been very consistent in using them. Explanation Basically when a space is left between two words, it is called a noun-noun-construction while omitting the space creates a compound noun. The only grammatical difference between these is that suffixes cannot be added into a compound noun. Okrand has mentioned several times that since Klingon is intended as a spoken, not written, language, he does not see much difference in the usage of the language: "Marc Okrand recently mentioned to me that while there's a common perception that noun-noun constructs must be separated by spaces, he's actually not at all picky about that." -- Lieven L. Litaer aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany" http://www.tlhInganHol.com
On Wed, 26 Jan 2022 at 13:36, mayqel qunen'oS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:
Perhaps this is a ridiculous question, but since {-ngan} isn't listed in the official klingon suffixes, then how are we able to write {'elaDya'ngan} unless we have the specific word {'elaDya'ngan} in Ca'Non?
Nobody has pointed this out, but the out-of-universe origin of {ngan} is almost certainly that it is a good fit for the English ending "-ian" for Trek alien names (Organian, Denebian, Cardassian, Ligonian, etc.) and also happens to be the ending of {tlhIngan}. (One can theorise that {tlhIngan} was originally a demonym for people from a place named {tlhIng}, a name which survives in {tlhIng yoS}.) Thus, the "people of" meaning probably came first, and the "inhabitant" definition for the standalone {ngan} probably arose out of the necessity of giving it *some* definition. I have no problem accepting {'elaDya'ngan} to mean "Greek", in the same way that {DenIbngan} means "Denebian". For the "inhabitant" meaning, I'd be more specific about the place: {tlhIng yoS ngan} "an inhabitant of Klingon district", {tera' yuQ ngan} "an inhabitant of planet Earth", {'elaDya' Sep ngan} "an inhabitant of the region/country Greece". -- De'vID
participants (7)
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Alan Anderson -
De'vID -
ghunchu'wI' 'utlh
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Iikka Hauhio -
Lieven L. Litaer -
mayqel qunen'oS -
SuStel