tlhIngan Hol - an opinion

[richard]

Good Points:
general phonology. emphatics and fricatives all over the shop, plus a reasonably loose and different vowel system. cool.
the letter tlh. How awesome is that? Ive never seen the sound isolated before, yet it is really common.
culture and background. you could watch and read the source material solid for a month and not run out, and a language is nothing but dead code without a race to live it and back it up.
calligraphy. pIqaD, as it stands isnt that bad as a writing system, its loose and visceral while still seeming no-nonsense and practical. I know its not Hol proper, but its still nice.
Strongly CVC. No-nonsense. Nough said.
Syntax. OVS with some quite cool features.
Agglutinating. Such a cool affix system, easily the finest ive seen.

Not so Good Points:
Orthography. Huh? As the Language Construction Kit from Zompist.com says:

An outlandish orthography is probably an attempt to jazz up a phonetic system that didn't turn out to be interestingly different from English. Work on the sounds, then find a way to spell them in a straightforward fashion.

The differences from latin are completely superfluous since with CVC he didnt have any restrictions on him. I'd say the rampant uppercase is cute, but despite peoples arguments, the difference between I and l are too small to be comfortable. Its not as if this is arabic and he actually has more consonants to relate. Ill get used to it im sure, but i shouldnt have to.

Morphology. Not so much effort went into here methinks. As an agglutinating language Okrand had rights to go mental with word formation, but instead he just makes up more and more single syllable formations. The resulting homophones dont bother me, but the lack of meaning does (aside from the awful puns of course).
A better approach would be to do it the Sumerian way, ie. assign intrinsic meaning to each vowel and consonant. The most basic needs and concepts therefore had the most basic sounds and there was a symbollic relationship between them ("a" is the most open vowel, thus related to opening your throat for drinking, while "z" as cartoonists know, is related to sleep). I know theres a few thousand years evolutionary difference, but it would be nice if there were more links to these primal concepts.

A bit too little distinguished. I am aware of Okrands purpose was not to create the best language, but the most usable by budget actors, but there does seem a distinct lack of consonants. They may well have been phased out, but it would have been nice if there was a normal d as well as D, k as well as q, a throaty h as well as H (kh), and a normal h too. This is just a matter of taste though I suppose.

Any comments or counter-arguments?
Cheers!

[Qunchuy]

A comment on orthography:

Okrand's original notes on the sounds of Klingon used IPA. He adapted it to standard typewriiter-compatible characters, both so it could be incorporated into typewritten scripts and so it could be (mostly) understood by actors who did not know IPA.

The "rampant uppercase" isn't just for cuteness. The uppercase letters are that way as a hint that they're not what you'd expect them to sound like in English (or Italian, etc.).

[richard]

Okrand is overcompensating then. Theres no need to make klingon look any stranger.

Even languages with odd sounds that do not have tv show appearances to show pronounciation get away with friendlier systems, so i dont see why klingon is treated as so awesomely different when the phonetics aint actually all that hard. It just seems too gimmicky to me.

 

[Klythe]

You also have to keep in miind not just the actors, but the fans who are going to use(read misuse) the language because they don't even have so much as a coach to correct them when they are wrong.  

     But most importantly, try set asside your personal perferences as a conlanger, and try to think about the fictional culture that is supposed to be using this language and the situations in which they would use it.   Klingons are not elves.   They are not known for subtley and their speech is not optimized for beautiful oration in a relatively quite senate forum.

     The language is for warriors to use in battle where the noise and chaos of battle will tend to drowned out the subtle distinctions between 'd' and D, 'k' and q,  'h' and H.   Consider some of Earth's more recognised warrior cultures: Feudal Japan, Hawai'i, Vikings...   How many consonants do these languages have?

   Actually, I also disagree with you about the pIqaD Many of the letters do not look like they could be made easily with a stylus, pencil pen or simple brush.  I see far more nonsense in the fancy orthography than the default ASCII orthography.

[richard]

The language is for warriors to use in battle where the noise and chaos of battle will tend to drowned out the subtle distinctions between 'd' and D, 'k' and q, 'h' and H. Consider some of Earth's more recognised warrior cultures: Feudal Japan, Hawai'i, Vikings... How many consonants do these languages have?

Aye, thats fair enough.

Actually, I also disagree with you about the pIqaD Many of the letters do not look like they could be made easily with a stylus, pencil pen or simple brush. I see far more nonsense in the fancy orthography than the default ASCII orthography.

Nah, its easy. Of course, im assuming that the letters we know are the typed versions, the equivelent of 'times new roman'. Each letter can be reduced to a single stroke of uniform thickness (no need to lift the pen off, and no strange writing equipment required) and is still quick and distinct (and cool looking).

Ill scan some in if anyone is interested.

 

[Klythe]

I would love to see how you did that.  Could up please post that to the Klingon Calligraphy thread  then we can link to it here.
 

[Abbot Nej vIt]

This Has Always been Of Interest to Me... Even in the ST: 3 Era, it was Interesting if Mostly Nonsense...

I am admittidly No Linguist, And Definately Fall into the Catagory of Fan that Is as Likely to Misuse as Use Correctly the Minor Efforts I have Made...

That Having Been Said, One thing that I Think Marc Okrand Did Very well, was to Suggest that the Language Might Change from Dialect to Dialect Based on the Region From Which a Current Emperor (Or Even Chancller?), might Hail... Thus Making it Logical that We Might not all Use the Language in Precisely the Same Way... (Which Seems Logical From my Real World Travels)... Anyway, I Would that I Could add a More Academic Observation But As Stated I Am No Linguist, So Instead I will State that I am Very Happy that it Not Only Exists Beyond a Few Smatterings Spat out In the Movies, But that there are So Many Resources out there For My Limited Researches...

Great Comments!

[Malari'anai]

It sort of reminds me of arabic with some extra stuff thrown in for flavor. Last thing I heard was that it was created to be a "living" language for the klingons. I think it's cool in that light. From the perspective of me of course.

[Abbot Nej vIt]

It sort of reminds me of arabic with some extra stuff thrown in for flavor. Last thing I heard was that it was created to be a "living" language for the klingons. I think it's cool in that light. From the perspective of me of course.

You are Correct... And it "IS" Pretty Kewl... The Question is, Will it Survive the Lack of Television Promotion... (The K.L.I. Aside), there are Less People Interested in the Klingon Language These days then in times Past... Certainly Fewer People Talking about what Might be Published Next...

[richard]

ive found that i do slip into an arabic accent occasionally what with the 'q' and 'D' sounds, but thats usually cos im not speaking forcefully enough.

Structurally though they are very very different, not just stuff thrown in for flavour.