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Klingon Language

Learn Klingon the First Alien Language

Learn Klingon the First Alien Language
By Arik Nitsan

The Klingon is a made up language which came out of Hollywood.

Throughout history probably thousands of made up languages were created by people who wanted simply to communicate and share information. As some of those made up languages became established and spoken by larger and larger communities, some individuals created new languages of their own to be able to communicate privately or secretly in the presence of other people.

The best known artificial language is the Esperanto which was created by Zamenhof in Poland around 1887. The aim of Zamenhof was to create an easy to learn universal language which would bring world peace and understanding between people.

The Klingon idiom was created for the Star Trek: The Motion Picture. During all the years of the popular TV show, the aliens always spoke English, but for the release of a motion picture the Klingons had to be more realistic for the viewers. The actor James Doohan who was the Commander Montgomery "Scotty" Scott in the show created a few words and basic grunting sounds, harsh and guttural to fit the rough look of the Klingons in the movie.

After the movie, Marc Okrand who was a trained linguist and a professor of linguistic, developed those rudiments into a fully-fledged and structured language. He published The Klingon Dictionary in which he detailed the grammar, the vocabulary, the sounds and the cultural context of the Klingon language. The Klingon is a verb based language because the Klingons are creatures of action.

Initiated as an academic exercise and a linguistic challenge, the Klingon has now a life of his own, Star Trek fans have kept this language alive and it is spoken by fans everywhere on the globe. Many languages around the world have slowly died so it is encouraging to see a new one emerging.

Tolkien, the author of The Lord Of The Rings also invented and created many languages for the races of his stories. He was in fact a specialist in old languages and philological studies, therefore he was able to create a structured grammar that can be learned. He is one of the author who emphasizes the importance of language in human society.

Tolkien based the Elvish idiom on existing languages (like Finnish and Welsh) whereas Doohan and Okrand create Klingon from scratch with no references whatsoever to any existing human language.

The language is part of the history of nations, communities, collectivities, consequently when a language disappears, it is a whole culture who dies with it.

Maybe someday you will hear somebody speak Klingon, don't be sarcastic and grab the occasion of being acquainted with a new tongue.

There are about six thousand languages spoken around the world, in the next fifty to one hundred years half of them will be extinguished. Today, some languages are spoken only by a few elderly people and their language will die with them.

How many of our current languages start out as a made up language?

Roj (Peace in Klingon)

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