[Tlhingan-hol] Klingon Word of the Day: jang

[Steven Boozer]

FYI here's the entire interview as I have it:



[Will Martin interviews Marc Okrand on verbs of speech (HolQeD, Dec 1998)]

MO:   ... Verbs of speech are "say" verbs, like jatlh and ja'.

WM:   In English, we use many of them.

MO:   Yes.  In English, we say, "Give me some water," he said.  "Give me
      some water," he pleaded.  "Give me some water," he yelled.

WM:   He added.  He begged.  He opined.

MO:   Exactly.  I think that's an English thing to do.  That's not a Klingon
      thing to do.  In Klingon, you jatlh and you ja'.  That's about it.  The
      guard asked the prisoner a question.  He replied.  He said, "[gestures a
      quotation he never quite made]"

      [After the intewiew, I made the following three lines of examples to show
      how this worked:

      qama' yu''avwI'.  jatlh Qu'lIj DarIn'a'?
      'avwI' jang qama'.  jatlh tugh.  vIrInmeH taj vlpoQ.
      mon 'avwI'.  jatlh chotojmeH bInIDchu'ta'.

      Dr. Okrand modified one sentence and said he accepted them as valid but
      wanted it noted that they were my sentences and not his, in his words, "a
      suggestion by you, okayed by me." - WM]

WM:   So, basically, in Klingon, you would just use jatlh a lot.  If someone
      is asking a question, would you state the question and say jatlh?

MO:   If it's a direct quotation, I would.  Yes.

[clip]

MO:   The way I see I see the verbs of speech, there may be more than just
      ja' and jatlh, but there is only a small number of words, unlike
      English.  You have to use a separate sentence for the replying,
      pleading, screaming.  "He screamed.  He said,'Come help me.'"

WM:   Since a direct quotation grammatically looks like two separate
      sentences, you are saying that it would now look like three separate
      sentences at that point.  You'd have one describing what style of
      verbalization he was having, one saying "he said" and one giving
      the quotation.

MO:   Yes.

WM:   Very interesting.

[clip]

WM:   Just to mention particular verbs in terms of whether they can be
      used for speech or not, you are saying that ghel is a word that
      would probably not be used typically as a verb of speech.  That even
      if you are asking a question you would still tend to use ja' or jatlh.

MO:   Yes.  "He asked me.  He said,'blah, blah, blah.'"  Or "He said,'blah,
      blah, blah.' He asked me."  It doesn't matter.

WM:   jang - "answer" would be similar?

MO:   Yes.

WM:   And tlhob would similarly be...

MO:   tlhob also has the non-quoting sense.

WM:   Things you would unlikely use for speech are bach, chel ...

MO:   bach is slang.  The rules might be a little bit different.  For non-
      slang...

WM:   chup "suggest."  jach "cry out."  SIv "wonder."

MO:   I've got to figure out what to do about "wonder."  That summer, the
      more I thought about it the more confused I got.

WM:   Are there any other verbs of speech that you would care to
      comment on?

MO:   Are there any other verbs of speech?

WM:   And a typical direct object of ja' would be the person addressed and
      a typical object of the verb jatlh would be the thing you say.

MO:   The speech event.

WM:   I like that term.

MO:   Including a direct quote.  I'm telling a story.  He "blah, blah, blah"
      jatlh.



--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons

From: Noah Bogart [mailto:nbtheduke at gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, November 11, 2011 9:21 AM
To: tlhingan-hol at kli.org
Subject: Re: [Tlhingan-hol] Klingon Word of the Day: jang

As used in canon:

 jang 'avwI' <<jIghung je>>
 The guard replies, "I am also hungry." PK

 jang 'avwI' <<jI'oj je>>
 The guard replies, "I am also thirsty." PK

 jang 'avwI' <<lIchopbe'chugh ghewmey!>>
 The guard answers, "If the bugs do not bite you!" PK


Related verbs:
{ghel} "ask (a question)", {yu'} "question, interrogate" & {tlhob} "ask, request, plead"


Mark Okrand described the use of {jang} in an interview with Will Martin (HolQeD [Dec. 1998: p.4-7]):

  [....]

WM:   Just to mention particular verbs in terms of whether they can be
     used for speech or not, you are saying that {ghel} is a word that
     would probably not be used typically as a verb of speech. That
     even if you are asking a question you would still tend to use
     {ja'} or {jatlh}.

MO:   Yes. "He asked me. He said,'blah, blah, blah'." Or "He said,
     'blah, blah, blah.' He asked me."  It doesn't matter.

WM:   {jang} - "answer" would be similar?

MO:   Yes.

WM:   And {tlhob} would similarly be...

MO:   {tlhob} also has the non-quoting sense.

  [....]

The Power Klingon examples seem to contradict the HolQeD conversation, don't they? PK doesn't have: {jang 'avwI'. jatlh <<jI'oj je>>}, which is what MO was suggesting, right?
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