[Tlhingan-hol] Religious terminology

[qunnoQ HoD]

I believe the whole discussion of what a beginner should try
translate,and what not,is taking place on the wrong basis ; It is not
*what* a beginner should translate. It is rather *why* he wants to
translate and *how* he proceeds doing it.

Lets assume 3 beginners : Tom,Dick, and Harry

Tom is a newcomer ; He just read TKD,and in awe of the complexity of
Klingon goes about 1,2,3.. months,then 1,2 years and so on translating
<my targh is red>, <the officer sees the child> etc.. The result will
be,that he will never challenge himself and his progress -if any- will
never be beyond the simple examples put forth in TKD. Chances are that
after a while he may loose interest altogether and quit. After all it
would take someone quite insecure,to expect that anyone should
"approve" his level (if he ever attains any) before moving on to more
complex translations. With the question being of course,since there
aren't Klingon books specifically written for each and every
level,then who will decide which translation is proper for each level
and which is not.

So much for Tom..

And then we come to Dick. Dick just read the TKD,and wants to
translate everything he can get his hands on ; From the tragedies of
ancient Greece,to articles from CERN. The problem with Dick,isn't so
much that he doesn't have the skill,or that Klingon could never rise
to the demands of these translations even if someone was an expert ;
The problem with Dick is that he is arrogant and vain,wishing to
translate in order to gain approval from the community,in order for
his translation to be uploaded to KLI,the Klingon wiki or whatever.
And the worst of all is that Dick,doesn't actually want to
learn,because if he wanted to learn he would listen to those saying
that Klingon doesn't have the vocabulary for translating particle
physics or whatever.

But then there is Harry..

Harry too just read the TKD,and maybe he read it again ; who knows ?
And who cares.. What matters though is that Harry realizes that in
order to learn,he must apply somewhere the things he read. So he
chooses passages that an average human being would understand, and he
tries applying what he has learned. The most important thing in Harry
is not that wants to translate things in Klingon. Maybe he couldn't
care less whether his translations would gain acceptance,or whether
someone would say "well done". The only thing he cares,is that he will
take an english passage,which may seem complex at first, and proceed
by transforming each sentence to a simpler one,a sentence which's
meaning could eventually be expressed by the grammar existing in TKD.
So that then his ultimate goal would be achieved. Which is not so much
the translation itself,as is the process of translating ; The process
of making himself go through TKD again and again,revising all the time
the given grammar so that then and only then,he would have achieved
his goal of learning.

It is not what you choose to translate ; It is the *why* and *how* that matter.

qun HoD

ps. the choice of the names "tom,dick,and harry" is based on the
"(T)ibialis posterior,flexor (D)igitorum longus,flexor (H)allucis
longus" and the mnemonic way I was taught,on how to remember their
anatomy ; I mean no offense to any "tom,dick,and harry" if there are
members here with those names.

On Wed, Dec 2, 2015 at 1:16 AM, chransberry at gmail.com
<chransberry at gmail.com> wrote:
> Oh, a FAQ! I hadn't seen that before! Very interesting! Apparently this
> discussion of indirect objects and double transitivity is nothing new.
>
> -QISta'
>
> Sent from my Verizon Wireless Phone
>
> ----- Reply message -----
> From: "Lieven" <levinius at gmx.de>
> Date: Tue, Dec 1, 2015 14:54
> Subject: [Tlhingan-hol] Religious terminology
> To: "tlhingan-hol at stodi.digitalkingdom.org"
> <tlhingan-hol at stodi.digitalkingdom.org>
>
> ghItlh De'vID:
>> This is excellent advice for all beginners. Every beginner should read
>> this.
> [...]
>>  that it's all but impossible for a beginner to translate the Bible, or
>> Harry Potter, or whatever.
>
> Reminds me of one line in the mailing list's FAQ:
> "I've just finished reading TKD and I'm translating the Iliad into
> Klingon; anyone want to help? "
>
> See more:
> http://www.klingonwiki.net/En/MailingListFAQ
>
>
> --
> Lieven L. Litaer
> aka Quvar valer 'utlh
> Grammarian of the KLI
> http://www.facebook.com/Klingonteacher
>
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