[Tlhingan-hol] Lament (Re: A demonstration of aspect we can all follow)

[Qov]

At 10:56 '?????' 6/13/2012, you wrote:
> > --- On Thu, 6/7/12, David Trimboli and many others wrote:
> >>lots of stuff
>
>ter'eS:
> > [poD] ...  if we work hard enough, we can make this language 
> totally unusable.
>
>Despite the disagreement about the exact technical meaning of the type
>7 suffixes, people don't generally seem to be unable to understand
>each other's Klingon sentences.

HIja'!

>I actually found the discussion very useful.  As a result of it, I
>read up on grammatical aspect and re-read sections of TKD, and I would
>say I have a better understanding of aspect (both in and outside of
>Klingon) than I did before.

Likewise! I find ALL discussions, ranging from advanced minutia down 
to corrections of newbisms like "jIH chu' naDev," useful because yes, 
they make us engage with canon, go back to the sources, and think.

>ter'eS:
> > If anybody wonders why more newbies don't post here,
>
>This is a problem.  I guess back in the day when there were no or very
>few experts, most of the conversations on the list happened at a
>beginner's or an intermediate level.

I'm not sure that there were fewer experts posting in 1996, when I 
joined the list. They were different ones. It is certain that there 
were more newbies.

>  It's not that there's a lack of
>beginners, but newbies are intimidated by long posts entirely in
>Klingon (several people have told me this off-list),

As the person mostly responsible for this year's quota of long posts 
entirely in Klingon, I want to address this. Does the presence of 
such posts turn them off the group all together?  Does an English 
introduction and summary make any difference? The idea that doing 
what I love and trying to showcase the abilities of the language 
could turn people away is painful. What do I need to do? I don't 
really want to translate it all, because the story itself is a bit 
like a targ walking on its hind legs.

I remember when I was new, I would choose a post that seemed not to 
long for me to handle and translate that. At first that would be a 
single line in an otherwise English post and then longer posts and 
I'm sure it wasn't more than a few months before I was one of the 
ones generating all-Klingon posts. It was something to aspire too.

Please beginners know that discussions at all levels are welcome 
here, and if there isn't one at your level, please start one. We 
adore beginners. We want to nurture you and help you learn.

>or long posts in
>English about arcane corner cases of grammar.
>
>Maybe a solution to this would be to split up the mailing list, and
>have a beginner's list where posts have to have at least as much
>English as Klingon and discussions about controversial or advanced
>points of grammar are now allowed.

"NOT allowed" obviously. At my qepHom last night a beginner asked me 
if if there was an all-Klingon, no English allowed list and I said I 
wish there were. He asked why there wasn't one then, and I couldn't 
come up with an answer.

I think such a thing would be welcome.  We might get Qanqor back on 
the all-Klingon list!

I think there might be an extremly low-volume one that I'm subscribed 
to but have forgotten the address for.

>ter'eS:
> > I'd say that this constant tendency to rethink long-established 
> patterns, this "everything you know is wrong" mindset, goes a long 
> way towards explaining it.
>
>I haven't detected "a constant tendency to rethink long-established
>patterns".  Aside from this recent spate of posts about aspect, what
>other occurrences of this do you have in mind?

Scientific enquiry has to occasionally address the possibility that 
everything we know is wrong.

>ter'eS:
> > I'm pretty much done with Klingon, and the way a once-firm 
> concensus about how it operates has been eroded in the last few 
> years is a large part of the reason why.
>
>Was there ever a "firm consensus" about how it operates?  I think
>there's as much consensus as there ever was about most of Klingon
>grammar -- otherwise, people wouldn't understand each other, and yet
>people do.

And we still violently misunderstand each other in English. I had an 
exchange, in English not too long ago with someone I thought was 
disagreeing with me but who turned out to be in agreement.

>I would be sad if a skilled Klingon speaker leaves the community on
>account of heated debates about grammar, as would I think other
>members of the community.

I'm sad too if new Klingon speakers leave the community on the basis 
of a story they can't understand.   It's not going to bite 
you!  Translate one sentence.  Ask me for help. I'm friendly!  What 
do you like your stories to be about?  I can direct you to a chapter 
on that. Except car chases. I don't have a single car chase. I have 
sex, duelling, torture, agriculture, foreign relations, Monday 
morning meetings, battle, conspiracy, water safety tips, spelunking, 
arguing with your girlfriend, engineering, first aid, systems design, 
data restoration, drunken camaraderie, and I take requests.

- Qov

(who is kind of stunned that someone could want her story to not be here)