156 lines
8.8 KiB
Plaintext
156 lines
8.8 KiB
Plaintext
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BBS: The Electronic RPO!
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Date: 03-31-93 (18:02) Number: 6436
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From: DONALD BURR Refer#: NONE
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To: ALL Recvd: NO
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Subj: Klingon as a second langu Conf: (21) 805 Net
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---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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AREA:805-NETWORK
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Thought you folks might find this interesting. I did. Some may find it
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somewhat humorous as well. This is out of one of our local-area newspapers,
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the Santa Barbara News-Press, Monday, March 29, 1993, page B-4, in case you
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were curious.
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Enjoy,
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Donald
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KLINGON AS A SECOND LANGUAGE
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by Lynn Van Matre, Chicago Tribune
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The scene: A convention of one sort or another -- linguists, say, or
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science fiction fans -- in the not too distant future. With folks
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attending from all over the world, hundreds of tongues are represented, but
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there's still a communications problem. There doesn't seem to be one
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single language that everybody speaks.
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Until, that is, someone shouts -- spitting on himself slightly as he
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boldly barks out the words -- "tlhIngan hol Dajatlh'a'" (Do you speak
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Klingon?)
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Heads swivel; ears perk up all over the room, followed by a guttural
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cacophony as countless voices chorus, "HISlaH" (Yes).
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Communications problem solved. Klingon spoken here.
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"It sounds absurd," acknowledges Lawrence M. Schoen, founder of the
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Klingon Language Institute and a man who enjoys envisioning the above
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scenario when he's not busy teaching psychology at Chestnut Hill College in
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Philadelphia. "But it could happen."
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Sure, sure, Klingon is a tough-to-learn, totally made-up language spoken
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by gruff, traditionally warriorlike extraterrestrials from the fictitious
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Klingon Empire in assorted "Star Trek" films and TV's "Star Trek: The Next
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Generation." Klingon words are a disconcerting alphabet soup of upper case
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and lower case letters and odd accent marks, and Klingon punctuation
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doesn't bother with question marks and exclamation points.
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But it's also one of the hottest new languages in the universe, with
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more Terrans (the Klingon term for us Earthlings) tackling conversational
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Klingon every day, mastering useful phrases such as "Where is the
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bathroom?", "I have a headache," and "Surrender or die!"
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Right now, you're probably asking, "Where can I learn this happening
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language?" No problem -- or, as Klingons would say, "qay'be" (pronounced
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kyBE). Consider:
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-- The Klingon Language Institute (KLI), a Philadelphia-based group that
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includes a number of linguists as well as teen-age and college-age "Star
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Trek" fans, is offering a free, 11-lesson correspondence course in Klingon.
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So far, more than 60 Terrans have signed up.
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-- "Star Trek: Conversational Klingon" (Simon & Schuster Audioworks,
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$11), a new audiocassette featuring Michael Dorn (who plays resident
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Klingon Lt. Worf on "The Next Generation") and Klingon language creator
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Marc Okrand, is aimed at Terrans planning a visit to the Klingon Empire,
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home to many colorful customs. You'll learn to recognize common Klingon
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phrases, including "Checkout time is 5 a.m." (frequently heard when
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checking into a Klingon hotel) and "Buy or die!" (uttered routinely by
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Klingon shopkeepers).
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-- Several colleges or college-affiliated organizations offer or have
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offered non-credit courses in Klingon.
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"Klingons are very popular with 'Star Trek' fans, so I'm not surprised
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that people might be interested in their weird language," says Okrand, who
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created the harsh-sounding tongue for the 1984 film "Star Trek III: The
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Search for Spock" and authored "The Klingon Dictionary" (Pocket Books,
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$10), recently published in a revised and expanded version. "What is
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surprising to me is that people are actually studying it."
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Near-fanatical interest in "Star Trek" and Klingon culture is nothing
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new, of course. Devoted fans -- many decked out as Klingons or other "Star
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Trek" characters -- have been holding conventions for years. It's only
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recently, though, that the concept of actually speaking and writing Klingon
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has begun to gather steam and intrigue serious linguists as well as
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dedicated Trekkers.
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Schoen, for example, grew up watching the original "Star Trek" shows,
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but notes that he was "a fan, not a fanatic. I never owned a pair of
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pointy rubber Vulcan ears or went to 'Star Trek' conventions."
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Schoen, 33, a former professor at Lake Forest College in suburban Lake
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Forest, initially started studying Klingon a year ago to take his mind off
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the looming threat of unemployment.
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"The college was having budget problems, and my position was being cut,"
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says Schoen. "I wanted something to distract me while I was waiting to
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hear about another job, and I came across a copy of 'The Klingon
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Dictionary.' My academic specialty is psycholinguistics, which deals with
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how we think about language, and I wondered if there were people who were
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actually studying Klingon the way people study the fictitious languages
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spoken by mythical races of elves in J.R.R. Tolkien's 'Lord of the Rings.'"
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Using computer electronic bulletin boards, Schoen began searching for
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people interested in speaking the extraterrestrial tongue and was surprised
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at the large response. After hearing from scores of people eager to chat
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in Klingon, he founded the Klingon Language Institute and began publishing
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a quarterly academic journal called HolQeD (from the Klingon "Hol," which
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means language, and "QeD," science).
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The journal, a non-profit, all-volunteer operation, generally takes a
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scholarly approach, but it also features jokes, puns and even an occasional
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contest.
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Now based in Flourtown, Pa., a suburb of Philadelphia, KLI -- which
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celebrates its first anniversary this month -- boasts more than 200
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members, who pay $5 annually ($15 if they wish to also receive HolQeD).
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Many KLI members, Schoen notes, also belong to "Star Trek" and/or Klingon
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fan clubs.
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"We're trying to bring in more academics, but we also want to appeal to
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a wide audience," he says. "As an educator, I think this is a great avenue
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for sneaking in education. People learn best when they learn something
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that is of interest to them. We have a number of teen-age members, for
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example -- maybe we'll turn some of them into linguists."
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A word of warning: Klingon is a tough language to learn (and a somewhat
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messy one, given the preponderance of guttural sounds). Schoen doesn't
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claim to be fluent.
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Even Okrand shies away from describing himself as Klingon-fluent.
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"Not many people are," he says.
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"I intentionally violated linguistic rules in creating the language,"
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adds Okrand, who has a doctorate in linguistics. "The sounds are hard to
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make, and the grammatical features are unique. The basic word order in
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English is subject, verb, object; in Klingon it is object, verb, subject,
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and there is no distinction between adjectives and verbs."
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As for the disconcerting way Klingon words mix upper case and lower case
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letters and toss around accent marks like confetti, Okrand explains he
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"wanted to make the language seem more otherworldly, though the capital
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letters are also used to indicate that you don't pronounce the sound the
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way you would in English."
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Okrand, who works for the National Captioning Institute in Washington,
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D.C., wound up putting words in Klingons' mouths thanks to a lucky break.
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In 1982, he traveled to Los Angeles to coordinate closed-captioned
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programming for the deaf for that year's Academy Awards show. During his
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stay, a friend working as a secretary at Paramount Pictures suggested
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Okrand join her and a co-worker for lunch at the studio commissary.
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"Over lunch, the subject of linguistics somehow came up, and they
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mentioned that Paramount needed a linguist to help with some Vulcan dialect
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for 'Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan,' which was in post-production at the
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time," Okrand explains.
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"I said, 'I can do that.' The associate producer of the film happened
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to walk by right then, and I ended up doing the dialogue for a short scene
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where Spock and a female Vulcan are talking. Then, when they did 'Star
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Trek III,' they called me to do the Klingon dialogue.
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"The producers wanted it to sound guttural and call to mind Samurai
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warriors," he adds, "but it was my idea to make it a 'real' language rather
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than just nonsense sounds."
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For more information about the Klingon Language Institute, send a
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self-addressed, stamped envelope to KLI, P.O. Box 634, Flourtown, Pa.
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19031-0634.
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SIDEBAR: "First Lesson", Chicago Tribune
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Ready to speak Klingon, Terran? Here are some handy phrases from "The
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Klingon Dictionary" (Pocket Books, $10) to get you started.
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What do you want? (standard Klingon greeting) NuqneH (pronounced
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nook-NEKH)
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