The Foundering and Fate of the KLI?

[QoghtlhIH'u']

Hi ter'eS,

The KLI does not exist anymore?
Well, judging by the way the KLI website was kept "up-to-date" it is no surprise. One of the pages even contained E-mail spam and there is nothing about the qep'a' of 2008.
What can be done to restore the KLI or do anything else to have some group of people promoting and guarding tlhIngan Hol?


QoghtlhIH'u'

[Qunchuy]

The Klingon Language Institute "exists". Its core membership still gathers for the annual qep'a' (currently set for July 22-26, 2009, but with no more detail yet than that). The Klingon translation of the Tao Te Ching was recently published. There are other publication projects underway (e.g., Worlds of Translation).

The Internet face of the KLI, its web site at http://www.kli.org/, is sadly stagnant. The webmaster is the only person with access to the files making it up, and he is practically unreachable these days. I've been trying to get him to move a single file in order to update the Merchant Page for weeks.

[ter'eS]

I guess "no longer exists" is too strong a word.  There is still a core group of enthusiasts, many of whom meet at the annual qep'a', and  the occasional publication does appear.  I consider myself to still be a member, and I count the others as my friends.  On the other hand, mataHmeH maSachnIS ("To continue, we must grow"), and we're just not growing.  The new face on the KLI mailing list is very rare, and seldom remains for long.

I think the problem is two-fold: First, there has been no new Trek from Paramount in a long time, and a lot of new membership was driven by interest in Trek (some of those people left, but some found they liked the language itself and stayed).  I personally thought it was the beginning of the end when DS9 went off the air, and Star Trek Enterprise did little to revive interest in Klingons.  If the new movie renews general interest in Trek and in Klingons in particular, then this may change.

Second, the language eventually stagnated due to the lack of growth and of the resolution of various issues.  You can only argue about -moH for so long, especially when there's no way to resolve the issue.  Similarly, although I think amazing things have been done with the existing vocabulary of Klingon, it could always be larger, but Marc Okrand has stopped producing new words in any quantity, and the ones he did produce are something of a disappointment, such as the names for Klingon birds, and didn't use the existing resources of Klingon, thus giving us no indications how we might expand the vocabulary ourselves.  Contrast this with what Zamenhof did with Esperanto, where he basically just wrote the language and then turned it over to its users. (Of course, the problem that Paramount owns Klingon prevents that.)

Finally, the lack of a venue for publication in Klingon discourages writers.  Why write if no one will ever read it?  How do you even know if what you write is real Klingon, except by passing it on to others and seeing if they understand you?  The KLI used to publish a literary journal, jatmey, and also had a monthly newsletter in Klingon, Qo'noS qonoS, but neither are active today.  The KLI has the only (AFAIK) license from Paramount to publish works in Klingon; I don't know what would happen if someone else started a literary journal or tried to publish a non-authorized work.

 My dream is to someday win the lottery, buy Klingon from Okrand and Paramount, and then turn it over to a committee to oversee its future. 

[QoghtlhIH'u']

hi ter'eS,

Do I understand it correctly that it is actually forbidden to publish anything in the Klingon language?
ghuy'cha' jatlh QoghtlhIH'u' , DaH nuq yIvang?
QoghtlhIH'u' says &#*(%$&  , now what'll I do? (with my manuscript)
 

But if the KLI has a publishing license, than anyone who has some works in Klingon can at least try to find support from what remains of the KLI just to get something published, or not?

By the way, Zamenhoff wanted world peace, and the Klingons probably just want to conquer this world, after having divided it by giving the world only part of their language. 

[Qunchuy]

Do I understand it correctly that it is actually forbidden to publish anything in the Klingon language?

It's not quite that drastic. It's close, though. At one point, the lawyers for the Star Trek franchise did state that anything written in Klingon would be a derivative work of The Klingon Dictionary and thus fall under TKD's copyright. That's obviously too strong a claim, but they do have the right to control the use of the trademarked name "Klingon".

I don't know enough about the KLI's license to comment on what it would permit to be published.