[Tlhingan-hol] Klingon language known issues

[qunnoQ HoD]

> they've translated Hamlet !

actually,i had thought of this myself sometime ago. i told myself,if they
have translated Hamlet,Christmas Carol etc,then surely a workaround must
exist for almost every difficulty that may arise. but i think that in order
for someone to find this workaround,some considerable skill in the use of
the language must exist. let alone that the workaround,must be clear and
well understood by any listener of similar skill.

> But Okrand knows about that and is working on it

out of curiosity,when Okrand decides on supplementing Klingon with whatever
it may be lacking (at least as far as grammar is concerned) where will he
post it ? Here ? At the KLI ? A new book ?

As a sidenote to all this,yes i agree that all of the languages,do have
limitations ; i mean in Greek,we have tons of words which do not exist in
other languages. Still when talking in English you can still convey the
desired meaning,as long as you know English well enough. You just need to
describe it in more words.

qunnoQ


On Mon, Oct 19, 2015 at 6:31 PM, Doug Henning <likethemagician at gmail.com>
wrote:

>
>
>
> Consider the following three alternate questions:
>
> Are there any known issues/limitations in the English language? I mean for
> example, lack of the ability to translate into English certain handling
> verbs, lack of a momentaneous, semelfactive, and repetitive verb contrasts,
> etc.? Vocabulary aside, are there in English grammar deficiencies which
> would make the translation of a Navajo text into English impossible?
>
> Are there any known issues/limitations in the English language? I mean for
> example, lack of the ability to translate into English certain noun
> classifiers, lack of tense and aspect particles, etc.? Vocabulary aside,
> are there in English grammar deficiencies which would make the translation
> of a Chinese text into English impossible?
>
> Are there any known issues/limitations in the English language? I mean for
> example, lack of the ability to translate into English certain honorific
> forms, lack of a causative suffix, etc.? Vocabulary aside, are there in
> English grammar deficiencies which would make the translation of a Klingon
> text into English impossible?
>
> ********
>
> Every language has a grammar that emphasizes some contrasts at the expense
> of others, and the lack of a particular contrast is not a deficiency. The
> only way to pack every logically possible contrast into a language is to
> follow the route of Ithkuil and similar attempts to add precision to
> language. Otherwise, a given language will morphologically or lexically
> encode some aspects of semantic space while ignoring others or expressing
> them periphrastically, e.g. adding "again and again" in English to
> emphasize the repetition that is obligatorily conjugated in Navajo as a
> separate aspect.
>
> Klingon marks causatives directly on the verb, where English uses phrases
> like "You made him verb" or "You had him verb" to express the idea of one
> participant in a clause causing the action that another participant takes,
> along with the unproductive suffix "-en" on adjectives like "darken" or
> "redden". Klingon may not be able to have a sentence as a subject, but
> English (with traditional grammar) cannot have a sentence without an
> expressed subject, as the pro-drop language Chinese can.
>
> You bring up passive voice, which emphasizes the patient of the verb by
> making the object of the active verb the subject. Klingon has two ways to
> do something similar: using the indefinite subject <-lu'> when the object
> is to be emphasized without mentioning the subject: <torgh HoHlu'> =
> "Someone killed Torg", which is close to "Torg was killed." You can also
> explicitly mention a pronominal object or <-'e'>-suffix the object noun to
> topicalize it e.g. <ghaH HoH> = "He/she killed **him/her**" or <torgh'e'
> HoH ghawran> "Gowron killed **Torg**" which is close to "Torg was killed
> by Gowron". (Note that if you are using the passive voice to create
> suspense until the killer is revealed, Klingon word order does this for you
> anyway.) None of these constructions are actually in the passive voice but
> they convey most of the same meaning as the English passive voice does.
>
> Even irrealis meanings are possible but, unless Maltz remembers an
> irrealis adverb, require context or some sort of periphrastic construction
> like <tlhIngan SoHbe' 'ach SoHchugh bIquv> to be unambiguous. However, as
> Quvar said, the missing components aren't really needed, any more than
> Chinese needs tense.
>
>
> Doug Henning
>
>
>
>
> *SIqral bIQtIQDaqjoqtaHbogh molor tIqDu' qem qeylISbIQ DoqDaq tlhabmoH-
> paq'batlh, paq'raD 23 «Hay' chaH»*
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Monday, October 19, 2015 9:43 AM, qunnoQ HoD <mihkoun at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> I've been meaning to ask..
>
> Whenever you download a program,there is usually a section in the
> developer's page where the "known issues" concerning the application are
> described ; bugs,problems etc..
>
> Are there any known issues/limitations in the Klingon language ? I mean
> for example,lack of the ability to translate into Klingon certain
> tenses,lack of a passive voice etc ? Vocabulary aside,are there in Klingon
> grammar deficiencies which would make the translation of an english text
> into Klingon impossible ?
>
> qunnoQ
>
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