There is a school of thought in tlhIngan Hol learners, which says: Since you chose to learn a constructed language, you need to get “in-character”; you need to get the “feeling of this language”, by letting go of your native-language-habit, of insulting someone by the use of sexually-oriented words which would concern his mother. After all - this school of thought continues -, perhaps klingons wouldn’t find anything sexual offensive; perhaps they would be way more offended by the sound of {yIH muSHa’wI’} rather than “cocks***r”. I can partly understand this school of thought, at least as far as cosplaying is concerned. After all, during cosplay, one could expect klingons to express terran concepts, to the same degree one would expect orcs from the lord of the rings, to talk about phasers, photon torpedoes, and warp drives.. However, the extent of my willingness to agree with this school of though ends, the moment cosplay clothes are taken off, and real life begins. Klingon obviously started as the language of the fictitious star trek warrior race, however not all of the real-life-actually-breathing-on-this-earth people, learn it for the purpose of understanding star trek dialogues. And some of us don't even like klingons to start with.. So, here comes the second school of thought, that says: Klingon should at least have the vocabulary to construct the mu’qaD veS phrases needed in actual everyday life. And I always counted myself among the people of the second group.. I’m really sorry (actually not at all..), but I could never stop being irritated by the argument “klingons would never use this or that”. It is the money-laundering equivalent for “how do we justify the obvious inadequacies ? lets say, klingons would never say that”. And what irritates me is, that the vocabulary needed to construct real-life mu’qaD veS, should already exist. Lets talk about the vocabulary which concerns procreation.. We already have bogh, yatlh, nga’chuq.. But do we have a word for “penis” ? No.. Do we have a word for “vagina” ? No again.. For a baby to be born, first something needs to enter something.. And after a while, the baby has to come out of somewhere.. And it isn’t like I’m saying “we should have the vulgar versions of the male/female reproductive systems”; we could make due with the medical/scientific terms, as is the case with lay. Unfortunately though, klingon lacks these words, although we do have numerous words which describe the various body parts. So, I wonder.. Why is that ? Are we some kind of underaged children, who must at all costs never hear the f-word, let alone use it ? Or is it perhaps, that klingon mothers vuj their babies through their Sa’HutDu’, so there is no need for words which would describe their reproductive systems ? Sovba' qeylIS neH.. qeylIS neH.. ~ channgan qIj
On Tue, 16 Oct 2018 at 16:01, mayqel qunenoS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:
Lets talk about the vocabulary which concerns procreation..
We already have bogh, yatlh, nga’chuq.. But do we have a word for “penis” ? No.. Do we have a word for “vagina” ? No again..
You have American Puritanism to thank for that. For various reasons (insert history lesson here), American mainstream television has decided that violence is okay, and bodily functions like farting and defecating are somewhat okay (though comical), but anything sexual is taboo for a "family-friendly" audience. Star Trek, being family-friendly, has therefore tended to shy away from talking too much about that kind of thing. -- De'vID
I don't think MO has ever elaborated why he hasn't talked much about sexual vocabulary. He's talked about why Maltz doesn't talk about sexual vocabulary, but that sort of in-character answer is probably not what you're looking for. He might just want to keep things PG. Or perhaps he's working on it as we speak. Who knows? I assume we'll get there eventually. Discovery tends to be more TV-MA than other Trek series, so it's possible Qov or Quvar have already asked for some of this vocabulary. On some level, even if you're talking about real-world thngs and events using Klingon, the language is still influenced by its fictional culture. {ghaH vuv SuS neH} can still be used to talk about real-world idiots even though Kahless and the city of Quin'lat have never existed. Klingon speakers don't try to translate "please" and "thank you" and "you're welcome" in their everyday Klingon speech, even though most Klingon speakers come from cultures that typically require that sort of politeness. That said, there are plenty of ways to craft real-world insults using existing Klingon vocabulary, without necessarily having to reference Klingon social attitudes. They don't all have to be sexual. On Tue, Oct 16, 2018 at 10:01 AM mayqel qunenoS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:
There is a school of thought in tlhIngan Hol learners, which says: Since you chose to learn a constructed language, you need to get “in-character”; you need to get the “feeling of this language”, by letting go of your native-language-habit, of insulting someone by the use of sexually-oriented words which would concern his mother.
After all - this school of thought continues -, perhaps klingons wouldn’t find anything sexual offensive; perhaps they would be way more offended by the sound of {yIH muSHa’wI’} rather than “cocks***r”.
I can partly understand this school of thought, at least as far as cosplaying is concerned. After all, during cosplay, one could expect klingons to express terran concepts, to the same degree one would expect orcs from the lord of the rings, to talk about phasers, photon torpedoes, and warp drives..
However, the extent of my willingness to agree with this school of though ends, the moment cosplay clothes are taken off, and real life begins.
Klingon obviously started as the language of the fictitious star trek warrior race, however not all of the real-life-actually-breathing-on-this-earth people, learn it for the purpose of understanding star trek dialogues.
And some of us don't even like klingons to start with..
So, here comes the second school of thought, that says: Klingon should at least have the vocabulary to construct the mu’qaD veS phrases needed in actual everyday life.
And I always counted myself among the people of the second group..
I’m really sorry (actually not at all..), but I could never stop being irritated by the argument “klingons would never use this or that”. It is the money-laundering equivalent for “how do we justify the obvious inadequacies ? lets say, klingons would never say that”.
And what irritates me is, that the vocabulary needed to construct real-life mu’qaD veS, should already exist.
Lets talk about the vocabulary which concerns procreation..
We already have bogh, yatlh, nga’chuq.. But do we have a word for “penis” ? No.. Do we have a word for “vagina” ? No again..
For a baby to be born, first something needs to enter something.. And after a while, the baby has to come out of somewhere..
And it isn’t like I’m saying “we should have the vulgar versions of the male/female reproductive systems”; we could make due with the medical/scientific terms, as is the case with lay.
Unfortunately though, klingon lacks these words, although we do have numerous words which describe the various body parts. So, I wonder.. Why is that ? Are we some kind of underaged children, who must at all costs never hear the f-word, let alone use it ?
Or is it perhaps, that klingon mothers vuj their babies through their Sa’HutDu’, so there is no need for words which would describe their reproductive systems ?
Sovba' qeylIS neH.. qeylIS neH..
~ channgan qIj _______________________________________________ tlhIngan-Hol mailing list tlhIngan-Hol@lists.kli.org http://lists.kli.org/listinfo.cgi/tlhingan-hol-kli.org
Am 16.10.2018 um 16:01 schrieb mayqel qunenoS:
And I always counted myself among the people of the second group..
I partially agree with this, because I hav also begun to speak Klingon from the real-world view. But nevertheless, I still remember what Klingon is based on. So I might not say "Klingons don't do that", I would say "you don't say that in Klingon." or "there is no expression for that in Klingon." I mean, I have just translated the little prince into Klingon, and that book is filled with things that a Klingon would never say. It's not a Klingon story, and real Klingons might even hate it. But I made the translation for real world people. To show the real world that one can still express basic ideas without needing strange expressions. Look at the word "please". I know there is no word for that in Klingon, and a Klingon would not say it. But I've translated it anyway. And it works, becaue it's not a Klingon saying it.
Unfortunately though, klingon lacks these words, although we do have numerous words which describe the various body parts. So, I wonder..
I agree that it would be good to have those words. As you say, those are just scientific descriptions of body parts, and DSC even showed that Klingons have even two of them.
is that ? Are we some kind of underaged children, who must at all costs never hear the f-word, let alone use it ?
Maybe that's really an American thing that we Europeans will never understand. -- Lieven L. Litaer aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany" http://www.klingonisch.de http://www.klingonwiki.net/En/Sexuality
participants (4)
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De'vID -
Lieven L. Litaer -
mayqel qunenoS -
nIqolay Q