On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 11:19 AM, mayqel qunenoS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:

De'vID:

...

That's clearly a situation which isn't yet a problem.

This means that the {wej qay'bogh ghu'} is correct/acceptable too ?

De'vID is pointing out that *wej *also is an adverbial meaning "not yet". Since relative clauses can take adverbials, *wej qay'bogh ghu'* could also be translated as "a situation which isn't yet a problem". It's more about the specific number you picked rather than the construction in general. On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 11:28 AM, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:

I have no problem with this either, and I don't find it jarring. TKD tells us that when you construct a relative clause, that clause with its head noun is treated as if it were itself just a noun. If *qay'bogh ghu'* is *foo,* then *wej foo *is completely legal.

How many *qay'bogh ghu'* do you have? *wej qay'bogh ghu'.*

It makes sense grammatically. But as a stylistic thing, it feels to me like there's more potential for confusion when splitting the words apart like that. An object of a relative clause could be interpreted as the first N of a N-N construction, or vice versa, or some other confusing thing. Keeping a N-N or number-N construction together feels clearer, more orderly, etc. to me. (Nobody is likely to interpret *qay'bogh wej ghu'* as "a situation that's not yet a problem".) It's an aesthetic thing -- it's not wrong, per se, but it's probably not how I would write it, unless I was intentionally going for a pun or wordplay. (I wonder, though: would using commas to set off the relative clause make sense to most Klingonists? If so, how would you use them? E.g., if I had a sentence which went like *...mu' mu' wej, qay'bogh ghu', mu' mu'...*, would that be interpreted as what mayqel is going for? The comma between *wej *and *qay'bogh* is intended to emphasize that *wej* isn't part of the relative clause, but would it also make it less clear that *wej* and *ghu'* are forming a N-N construction? Does the comma after *ghu'* make this more or less clear? I know there's no explicit canon guidance on the proper use of commas, this is just a style question.)

On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 1:30 PM, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:

How about a *romuluSngan Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh nejwI'** Romulan hunter-killer probe *(KCD)? It is explicitly NOT a probe that hunts and kills Romulans; it is a probe of Romulan manufacture that hunts and kills. That's some canon evidence of using a relative clause as the second noun of a noun-noun construction. Your aesthetic sense would make you say *Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh romuluSngan nejwI',* but that's not what we get.

That's true: my own personal aesthetic sense would make me say *Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh romuluSngan nejwI'*. That's not what we get, because Okrand isn't me, and he presumably has his own stylistic preferences. But I don't think it's unreasonable to prefer one grammatical phrasing over another, even if Okrand doesn't share that preference. In the right context, or if they're aware of it as a phrase from canon, readers will understand the intended meaning of *romuluSngan Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh nejwI'*. Since Okrand wrote it, we know it's a grammatical expression and that Klingons consider the phrasing stylistically acceptable. But I don't think it's necessarily the *best *way to express that idea, because it can be misinterpreted. Since the difference between mayqel's two examples is primarily one of stylistic preference, I was sharing mine: that in general, sentences are clearer if you keep the parts of N-N and number-N constructions together. It's a habit I stick to even in cases where doing it the other way has no potential for confusion. mayqel doesn't have to agree.

It's all about scope. A *Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh **romuluSngan nejwI'* is a "Romulan probe" that "hunts and kills." Of all Romulan probes, this is the kind that hunts and kills. A *romuluSngan Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh nejwI'* is a Romulan "probe that hunts and kills." Of all hunter-killer probes, this is the Romulan kind.

I'm sure there are cases where the distinction between *A (Vbogh B)* and *Vbogh (A B)* would be relevant enough that it's worth splitting the N-N construction with the relative clause (though I'm having trouble thinking of a good one off the top of my head). Speaking personally, though, I don't think the distinction between "Romulan (probe that hunts and kills)" and "(Romulan probe) that hunts and kills" is very important in most cases. Either way, you know what things the probe does and who's responsible if it does those things. With that in mind, rather than emphasize a scope distinction I don't think is important, I would choose the phrasing I think is clearer. Okrand chose another phrasing for his own reasons.

On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 3:53 PM, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:

Is it any more ambiguous than the English *Romulan hunter-killer probe?* Is that a hunter-killer probe that hunts and kills Romulans or a hunter-killer probe of Romulan make? Why isn't it a *hunter-killer Romulan probe?* Doesn't *hunter-killer Romulan probe* sound just plain WRONG to you, even though it can't be misinterpreted?

I do think the English phrase "Romulan hunter-killer probe" is potentially ambiguous. As you point out, trying to clarify the meaning simply by shifting a word doesn't sound right because of how English arranges adjectives. If I were worried that context wouldn't make things clear, I'd probably have to include other words entirely: "a hunter-killer probe built by Romulans", "a probe that hunts and kills Romulans". Both of those phrasings include relative clauses, and are a little more complex than a noun phrase. So I would probably be willing to put up with a little more grammatical ambiguity before I decide to move away from the simpler four-noun phrase. This isn't the case with the Klingon, though. We don't know what sounds wrong to native speakers, and clearing up the ambiguity simply requires moving a noun, rather than rephrasing the idea entirely into a somewhat more complex form. It's less of a hassle to remove the ambiguity than it is in the English.

Does Klingon obey those rules? No idea. But when a native English speaker invents the language and translates into it, it's possible that he is unconsciously following those rules. I wouldn't declare this sort of thing solved, but it's worth examining Okrand's possible biases in this light.

That sounds like a reasonable explanation for why he phrased it that way. Lately, I've been thinking a lot about the fact that a lot of Okrand's Klingon is translated from an English original, how that might have affected the writing style of canon Klingon, and what other sorts of less-English writing styles there are. But I don't have my thoughts together enough to really post about it yet.

On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 8:56 PM, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:

It's perfectly fine if you have a preference. It's just that your preference doesn't seem to be borne out in at least one example, and might be unlikely given the English bias of the creator of canon.

I'm not trying to suggest that my preference is shared by all Klingons or all Klingonists. It's entirely possible that if Maltz heard about this discussion he'd think I'm a pedantic weirdo. (*ghaytan mujbe' net jal.*)

I don't think "removes some ambiguity" is sufficient cause to go against the grain. But if you wrote* quvHa'moHbogh 'ej QeHmoHbogh verengan qID* instead of *verengan quvHa'moHbogh 'ej QeHmoHbogh qID,* I wouldn't bat an eyelash.

"Romulan hunter-killer probe" might have been a bad example to argue about, really, since it already exists in canon as a set phrase. (I just think the set phrase could be better!) But if I were writing something about Ferengi jokes, I'd use *quvHa'moHbogh 'ej QeHmoHbogh verengan qID* instead of the alternative unless I had some compelling reason not to.

Exhibit A: the prefix trick.

Features getting retconned out of errors because Okrand slipped into "English brain" during a translation is not quite the sort of thing I was thinking of. My feelings are more like this: Because the original English lines are often written by people who don't know what features Klingon has, the translations don't always take full advantage of those features, or they have some awkward phrasing in order to match the English. Okrand usually seems to stay as close to the original phrase as possible, and doesn't seem inclined to add meanings beyond what's originally written in the English. So, for instance, would more canonical Klingon lines from TV and movies use *-bej* or *-ba'* if the episode writers had known that the concepts of "certainly" and "obviously" were just single-syllable suffixes in Klingon and wrote the English accordingly? One example I think of a lot is this bit from the paq'batlh:* nItebHa' molor HI''a' SuvvIpghach puj je HarghmeH yeq chaH* *United to do battle together! Against the tyrant Molor! Against fear and against weakness!** SuvvIpghach* works fine in this context to mean "fear". But would the English line have contained the noun "fear" at all if the writer knew that Klingons usually talk about fear using verbs (either with *ghIj* "scare" or the suffix *-vIp*)? In other words, when Okrand is translating someone else's English work (TV and movie lines, the Warrior's Anthem, the paq'batlh, Shakespeare, etc.), the English phrasing style sometimes shows through. How would Klingon "look" if it was more often written starting from the Klingon? What words would get used more often, which suffixes would be more common, what sentence structures would we see more frequently? That sort of thing.

On 10/19/2017 11:17 AM, nIqolay Q wrote:

On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 10:55 AM, mayqel qunenoS <mihkoun@gmail.com <mailto:mihkoun@gmail.com>> wrote:

Lets say I write:

{qay'bogh ghu'} a situation which is a problem

I can also write: {qay'bogh cha' ghu'} two situations which are problem

But can I also write: {wej qay'bogh ghu'} three situations which are problem ?

1) The gloss for *qay'* is "be a problem, be a hassle". The use of "be" in the gloss suggests it might be intended as a stative verb, though I don't think it's ever been used either adjectivially or with a *-bogh* so I can't say for sure. So you can probably just get away with *ghu' qay'*.

I see no problem at all with *ghu' qay'.*

2) *wej qay'bogh ghu'* feels wrong to me. Are there examples where an N-N construction or a number-N phrase is interrupted by an intervening *-bogh* clause, *A (Vbogh B)*? In this case, *qay'* isn't transitive, so it's not likely someone would get confused and interpret the *wej* as an object. But splitting the construction like that feels... awkward. It might not be strictly ungrammatical (or it might be) but stylistically it's kind of jarring.

I have no problem with this either, and I don't find it jarring. TKD tells us that when you construct a relative clause, that clause with its head noun is treated as if it were itself just a noun. If *qay'bogh ghu'* is /*foo,*/ then *wej /foo/ *is completely legal. How many *qay'bogh ghu'* do you have? *wej qay'bogh ghu'.* mayqel is once again probing the limits of noun ordering and scopes, and the answer here is the same as always: we don't have enough data to answer. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name