From: Marc Okrand Newsgroups: startrek.klingon Date: Mon, 2 Mar 1998 22:53:39 -0500 Subject: Re: -be', -Ha' David Trimboli wrote ... >Qermaq wrote ... >>>par parHa' dislike like >>>naD naDHa' commend discommend >>>yuD yuDHa' dishonest honest >> >>Dishonesty may be a default too. Odd that is "trust" though... >> >>>yep yepHa' careful careless > > >An idea: ALL of these, including {voq}, could be the "default," as Qermaq >suggests. Consider a battle (a fairly default Klingon activity). Liking >and being honest are not particularly important in battle. However, >trusting and being careful are. Whether or not this is the actual reason >for these alleged defaults, it shows that there might easily be a good >reason that {voq} defaults to what we consider a positive term. > >(Note: disliking and being dishonest may equate with positive terms in >Klingon, thus their being "defaults.") > >SuStel Learning about Klingon character or mindset by way of studying what Qermaq terms "defaults" in vocabulary will probably lead to interesting insights. I think both Qermaq and SuStel are on the right track: {par} "dislike," for example, is probably the more neutral or expected reaction of a Klingon to someone else; {parHa'} "like" (or, more revealingly, "not dislike" or "undislike" or "misdislike" or even "disdislike" [?!], since it's made up of {par} "dislike" plus {-Ha'}, the negative suffix implying that something is undone or done wrongly) is a modification (an undoing?) of this expected reaction. It may be that not everything has a default. Note, for example, {QuchHa'} "be unhappy" and {'IQ} "be sad." These two words don't mean quite the same thing: {QuchHa'} is made up of {Quch} "be happy" plus the negative suffix {-Ha'}, suggesting a change from being happy to not being happy. {'IQ} does not have this connotation, nor does {Quchbe'} "be not happy" (or, if you prefer, "not be happy"). Nevertheless, is the default in this pair {Quch} "be happy" or is it {'IQ} "be sad"? On the other hand, when the only way to express a certain idea is by modifying a word (for example, by adding a suffix) rather than using an entirely different word, perhaps one can argue that the nonmodified word is the default. Thus, the only (known) way to express the opposite of {par} "dislike" is by adding a negative suffix to {par}. Unlike {QuchHa'} "be unhappy" and {'IQ} "be sad," there's no choice when it comes to "like"; you've got to use a word based on {par}: {parHa'}. It appears that the only kind of "like" there is is the "undoing" or "misapplication" of "dislike." (Of course, you could also say {parbe'} "like" or, more literally, "not dislike," using the negative suffix {-be'} "not"; but {parbe'} is also based on {par}. {parHa'} is heard more frequently than {parbe'}, however, and this may be a hint at the usual way a Klingon looks at things.) Interestingly (and bolstering the idea that "dislike" is a default), there's also the word {muS} "hate" (which is presumably stronger somehow than {par} "dislike"). It also has no known opposite except for the suffixed forms: {muSHa'} "dis-hate" or "unhate"; {muSbe'} "not hate." [[eof]]