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Welcome to Conlanguery, the podcast about

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constructed languages and
the people who create them.

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I'm George Corley.

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And with me in Washington, we have
someone who needs no introduction.

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Mark Okrund, the creator
of Klingon and Atlantean.

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Hi.

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Hi.

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Good to be here.

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Mark?

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We're, we're, we're fighting
with some Internet issues, but

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we're going to try to get the
show going as well as we can.

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But, uh, thank you so
much for being on, Mark.

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Um, I, you know, you are actually
an inspiration for a lot of conlangers

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because I think a lot of conlangers
saw Klingon and that was one of the, the.

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things that got them into conlanging in
the first place in the, in the community.

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Um, I know that one of
my first languages I made

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VOS specifically
because I saw it in Klingon.

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Um, but just wanted to have you on to,
to talk to you about, you know, you were

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one of the first people to create a
language for a major property in Star Trek.

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And I, I just, in terms of what you've
seen since that time, could you talk

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about like, how has that
sort of scenario changed?

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How has that changed in terms of like
the number of properties that are putting

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conlangs in and how they're seeking
out conlangers and things like that?

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Yeah, it's changed a lot.

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Uh, cause when I did it
for, for Klingon, which was

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back in 1984, uh, there'd
been essentially nothing.

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That's not quite true.

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There was a little bit before me, there
was a little bit of Klingon before me.

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Um, maybe six, eight lines in
the, in the first Star Trek movie.

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And there was, you know, one or two
other movies or TV shows where they'd

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done actual conlanging, made up real
consistent languages and stuff, but teeny

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tiny bit, but ever since Klingon, and not
immediately when, when Klingon came out,

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but, you know, within a number of years,
maybe, maybe 10, 15 years, uh, things

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changed so that now any film, it seems
any, any TV show that makes use of a, uh,

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a people, a civilization or something
that's somehow different, it's either,

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you know, outer space
people or some mythological

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fantasy like people
or something like that.

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Um, they always now seem to
have their own language and it's

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always conlanged by somebody
who knows what they're doing.

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And that's a, that's a huge
change from the way it was before.

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I think it's great.

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I mean, for years and years and years,
people making films and TV shows have

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paid attention to, to one degree or
another to the science and the history

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to make sure that that's
as accurate as it can be.

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And when it came to language,
everybody, you know, in American, North

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American TV anyway, and movies,
everybody just spoke English all the

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time, no matter what, or, or spoke
gobbledygook, but no longer, no longer.

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Now, now when they speak something
that's not the major language of the film,

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it's, it's legit, it's real.

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And that's terrific.

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Yeah, it's, it's really great.

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And it's interesting to think about,
like, I've seen talks by you talking

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about like the process of doing
Klingon dialogue and just sort of the, the,

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the general chaos of an actor does a
line wrong and you being very gracious

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and actually going through and just
like making new Klingon words so that this

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line just happens to be entirely
homophonous with the other line.

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Um, I think one of the, my
favorite things from Klingon, and

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I, I don't know if this is the
way that you think about it.

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You can correct me if I'm
wrong about it is like, it seems

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to me like you took like the
canon names of, of things.

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And you said, well, this
is like a bad Anglicization.

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It's not Klingon.

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It's actually Klingon.

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It's not Kronos.

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It's actually Kroknos.

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And just sort of made it fit the Klingon
phonology and said, okay, this is what.

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some Federation person heard
and then turned into whatever that is.

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Well, that, that's exactly right.

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I decided, you know, made
up the phonological rules of

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Klingon and said, okay,
that's the way Klingon works.

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Um, people in, in the
Federation, non-Klingon,

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whatever, they, they
don't get it quite right.

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They mangle it a little bit.

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So what we hear them saying, what we hear
Captain Kirk saying and all of that is,

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is the Anglicized or
Federationized or something

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version of Klingon, not,
not the Klingon version.

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So it was taking all those names and
things that the writers had made up and,

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and making, you know, giving
them proper Klingon phonology.

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Yeah.

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And I mean, the, you know, the
writers are going to do their thing.

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The writers are going to
want their specific pet names.

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Was there anything that was particularly
difficult to integrate into Klingon?

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Like particular names
that you looked at that

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were like, no, this is just
like not even Klingon?

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Well, names in particular, when
they made up items, you know,

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names of weapons or something,
that was, that wasn't so bad.

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Names were tricky though, because names
tended to violate the rules of Klingon

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phonology, Klingon phonotactics
more than other things.

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I don't know why that's the case.

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But you know, the most famous
Klingon of all, I suppose, is Worf.

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And Worf can't be a Klingon word, right?

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You don't, you don't
have an F at all in Klingon.

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And even if you did, you wouldn't have
RF at the end of a word together like that.

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And other names they
made up too, just don't fit.

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So I thought about that
because it wasn't just the

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one, it was, it was a
number of different names.

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I had nothing to do with making
up any Klingon names, right?

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They made up for the films and TV shows.

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They made up all the
names with one exception.

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I made up the name for Worf's father.

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I didn't know that that's what I was doing.

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They just wanted a name
and I gave them some name.

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Turned out to be Worf's father, who knew?

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But anyway, I did "Molch".

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Yeah.

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What I decided for Klingon names so
that all these weird names could still fit.

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Cause I, the way I go, I
would Klingonize them

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is to still come up with
pretty weird Klingon.

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So Worf, for example, is
Worf, which is sort of Worf.

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Um, I decided that
the reason that these

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names are so strange
from a, from a Klingon.

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phonological point of view is because
in Klingon culture, Klingon naming

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practices happen to be that you give
your kid a name in another language.

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So it doesn't have to
follow the Klingon way.

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Oh, that works.

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Yeah.

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So it is very interesting that like
you have the philosophy of whatever is

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appearing on screen, you're going to treat
as canon and then you're going to bend

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Klingon around it to, to fit that even
when it's like, to anyone who knows the

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preexisting rules,
this is like bad Klingon.

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I think like, if you look at Conlanger's
today, at least, you know, I see David

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Peterson talking about like
when there's a bad edit and

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he's like, he'd just, he'd
just be like, well, that's wrong.

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That's not the actual Dothraki
that I made or whatever.

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Right.

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Right.

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And, but you were working
within like what they did and when

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they made a mistake, you
just said, okay, well, that's fine.

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Well, it depended on, on when
and when, when it happens too.

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If, if I, if I had any control over it at
the time they were doing it, I could make

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corrections, either, either redo it, which
didn't happen very often or figure out

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something so that going
forward I could make it fit.

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But if I didn't know
about it until I saw it

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on TV, I said, okay,
I'm, I'm stuck with that.

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They said it.

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That's it.

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Now, now the, the, the people who speak
Klingon, because now there's a bunch of

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people who do, which obviously wasn't
the case when all this got started, sort of

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make a distinction in their minds between,
between real Klingon language and TV

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Klingon language, if I
haven't adapted it yet.

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Oh, so they have an idea
sometimes of when there's, there's

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a mistake on screen that
it's like not actually what was.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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They hear some, no, no, that's just,
that's, that's just something that the

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actors did or the
producers did or something.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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But they'll always, then they'll come to
me and say, okay, someone so said this.

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What's this all about?

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You know, that could be years later in
the very first Next Generation episode

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that had Klingons in it at that time,
weren't paying any attention to it.

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Uh, so years later,
and there's, there's just

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a few lines of, of
Klingon in that episode.

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So years later, people said,
this guy, this Klingon guy

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goes to the food replicator
and he orders something.

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And, but he says is gobbledygook.

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Um, what does that mean?

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So I figured out something,
give him something

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tasty that he's
ordering from the thing.

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What is the, the back and forth between
you and like the, the Klingon language

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Institute people, the Klingon speakers,
uh, like I, I understand that mostly they

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treat you as like the ultimate authority,
but is there, do you ever draw things

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from materials that they make or,
or is it mostly like a one to one way?

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It's a, it's a two way
street, but it's, but it's,

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it's, it's not like two
sides of the highway.

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They're two different streets.

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The whole organization came into
being without my even knowing about it.

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I didn't know that it even existed
until, um, this is now years ago.

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There's 20 something years
ago, 28 years ago or something.

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Um, I got a call from
a guy who said he was

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the head of the Klingon
language Institute.

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And I said, what is that?

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Right.

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So he had to tell me all
about it, even though there'd

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been at that point in
existence for a little while.

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Uh, but since then I've gotten involved
with the organization to the extent

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that I know the people who, who run it
and the, and the, a lot of the members

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and I go to their annual meetings
and things like that, and they decided.

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I did not make this decision.

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They decided that the
ultimate source of who

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can say what's right
and what's wrong is me.

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Uh, and also the ult, the only, only
source of new vocabulary or new grammar.

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rules, if there's to be such a thing is me.

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So they come to me sort of all the
time, but generally twice a year, because

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there's a big, there's a big
meeting of Klingon speakers

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in, uh, usually North
America in the summertime.

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And there's one in Germany in November.

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And ahead of these meetings,
okay, here's a list of words.

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What are the, we'd like to
have Klingon equivalents

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for, or explanations or
phrases or something.

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And here's some grammatical things
that's that have been puzzling us.

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We don't know what to do.

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Um, and do it that way.

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So, so that's that the requests,
you know, uh, come from them.

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And the answers come from me having,
having said that in between times, the

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ones who are really, really good speakers
carry on all kinds of conversations and

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write things and so forth with material
that's available, they don't make anything

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up in the sense they don't make up
any, any new morphemes or, or any new

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grammatical rules, but
they make very, very clever.

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And I would say correct
use of what's there.

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Um, to say, to say what they
have to say, if there's not a

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word for something, I say, okay,
what, what, what can we use?

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What little short little phrase can
we use that means this, if there's not a

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single word already in existence, uh,
and some of those get incorporated into the

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language in the sense
that I say, yeah, that's cool.

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And some of them don't, but the ones
that don't are usually because I don't know

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about it, I don't know everything
that they're talking about.

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Yeah.

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That's, that's interesting.

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I mean, I've, they've translated
the Bible, they've translated Hamlet.

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Uh, there's the, uh, uh, a Klingon
opera that is actually performed.

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It's, it's really interesting.

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How much of like growth have you
seen since, since you started back in the

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eighties and, you know, you talk about
the Klingon Language Institute formed

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without you knowing about it, uh,
to me, this sounds like this is sort of.

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Because of, you know, pre Internet things.

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If we had social media in
the eighties, you'd probably get

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tweeted about it immediately.

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But like how much has like, how much
has the, the community changed because of.

221
00:14:21,820 --> 00:14:26,940
like the Internet and the
ability to communicate

222
00:14:26,941 --> 00:14:27,140
very rapidly with
all kinds of people?

223
00:14:27,141 --> 00:14:30,940
I would say that I wouldn't say the
community wouldn't exist without the,

224
00:14:31,090 --> 00:14:34,580
without the Internet, but
certainly the Internet was

225
00:14:34,581 --> 00:14:37,460
instrumental in getting it going
and, and, and keeping it going.

226
00:14:38,460 --> 00:14:44,300
Uh, because the, the, when I was working
on Star Trek three, which is the first

227
00:14:44,301 --> 00:14:49,940
film that had my Klingon in it, uh, I got
the idea of writing a book explaining how

228
00:14:49,941 --> 00:14:53,260
the language works,
thinking that Star Trek

229
00:14:53,261 --> 00:14:53,740
fans might think this
is funny or something.

230
00:14:54,140 --> 00:14:55,460
I don't know what I was thinking.

231
00:14:55,645 --> 00:14:58,260
I was not thinking that
people would really learn the

232
00:14:58,261 --> 00:14:59,660
language and carry on
discussions and translate things.

233
00:14:59,661 --> 00:15:01,340
That was not in my mind at the time.

234
00:15:02,190 --> 00:15:08,980
Um, and I wrote the book
and it came out in 1980,

235
00:15:08,981 --> 00:15:09,981
tail end of 84, beginning
of 85, something like that.

236
00:15:10,660 --> 00:15:17,500
And then a second edition
came out around 1992

237
00:15:17,550 --> 00:15:18,550
and that one sold
better than the first one.

238
00:15:18,820 --> 00:15:23,700
Um, for, for, for whatever you will
partly was because at that point, next

239
00:15:23,701 --> 00:15:27,380
generation had started and all kinds
and wharf was a big deal and so on.

240
00:15:28,080 --> 00:15:31,220
Um, but also that's when the
Internet was really getting going.

241
00:15:32,370 --> 00:15:36,380
Uh, uh, we're mutual, mutually
beneficial, you know, Klingon, Klingon is

242
00:15:36,381 --> 00:15:38,316
responsible for the growth
of the Internet, of course.

243
00:15:38,340 --> 00:15:42,860
Uh, but that's where
people were able to find each

244
00:15:42,861 --> 00:15:43,861
other, uh, in a way
that they couldn't before.

245
00:15:44,180 --> 00:15:46,780
And, you know, it wasn't just, I'm
the only one who's interested in this

246
00:15:46,781 --> 00:15:50,100
language is there's this other person,
this other person communities formed and

247
00:15:50,175 --> 00:15:55,100
eventually in-person communities formed
that, you know, because people knew each

248
00:15:55,101 --> 00:15:58,980
other on the Internet, but the Internet
was, I think, I think really, really

249
00:15:59,130 --> 00:16:01,820
critically important to
getting this thing going.

250
00:16:01,870 --> 00:16:04,780
People have been making up languages,
you know, people doing conlang, even though

251
00:16:04,781 --> 00:16:08,540
it wasn't called that for, you
know, for thousands and thousands

252
00:16:08,541 --> 00:16:09,980
of years, but everyone
thought, gee, I'm just doing this.

253
00:16:09,981 --> 00:16:10,900
No one else is doing this.

254
00:16:10,901 --> 00:16:13,020
I'm the only one, or maybe
my friend and that's it.

255
00:16:13,920 --> 00:16:17,340
Um, it was the same thing with Klingon
or would have been, I think the same thing

256
00:16:17,341 --> 00:16:21,340
with Klingon had the Internet not started
going now, having said that, of course

257
00:16:21,341 --> 00:16:23,976
there was Star Trek conventions and
things like that, where people would get

258
00:16:24,000 --> 00:16:26,896
together, so maybe people
would find each other, but it

259
00:16:26,920 --> 00:16:28,480
certainly wouldn't, wouldn't
have happened in the same way.

260
00:16:29,870 --> 00:16:31,220
Yeah, absolutely.

261
00:16:31,221 --> 00:16:34,060
It's, it's really interesting to see that.

262
00:16:34,160 --> 00:16:40,700
Um, speaking of like the Internet
changing things, like for me getting

263
00:16:40,701 --> 00:16:45,460
involved in the conlang community was
very much something that happened because

264
00:16:45,540 --> 00:16:57,180
of Internet forums and things, and it
seems that you have, um, in recent years

265
00:16:57,280 --> 00:17:03,100
gotten more involved with like
more broadly conlang community stuff.

266
00:17:03,150 --> 00:17:05,820
Like, uh, you just gave a talk at CopyCon.

267
00:17:06,545 --> 00:17:13,900
Um, uh, you appear in events with
the, with other, with, well, at least with

268
00:17:13,901 --> 00:17:18,260
the other movie conlangers with
Paul Fromer and, and David Peterson.

269
00:17:18,960 --> 00:17:26,020
Um, what has, how, what has that
been like, and has it like changed anything

270
00:17:26,021 --> 00:17:34,580
about like how you view what you've done
with your languages and, and what is your

271
00:17:34,581 --> 00:17:39,380
view of like the broader
conlang community now

272
00:17:39,381 --> 00:17:40,381
that you've had some
involvement with that?

273
00:17:41,300 --> 00:17:44,820
Yeah, well, in terms of the working with
the people who have, who have done other

274
00:17:44,821 --> 00:17:50,620
movies and TV shows and stuff,
what that's done for me is, uh, reinforce

275
00:17:50,621 --> 00:17:53,620
something that I knew all
along, which is I'm not alone.

276
00:17:53,720 --> 00:17:55,940
I'm not the only one doing this, you
know, for years and years, if I'd meet

277
00:17:55,941 --> 00:17:59,980
people, not people involved with
conlanging and not, and probably not even

278
00:18:00,280 --> 00:18:06,980
linguists, um, but
they'd say to me, uh, Oh,

279
00:18:06,981 --> 00:18:07,420
you, you made up Klingon,
you made up a language.

280
00:18:07,421 --> 00:18:07,900
Wow.

281
00:18:07,901 --> 00:18:09,780
How unique, how strange.

282
00:18:09,781 --> 00:18:11,100
And I said, it's not strange.

283
00:18:11,150 --> 00:18:13,340
People have been doing
this for a long, long time.

284
00:18:13,990 --> 00:18:18,740
Most people don't get their languages up
on a 70 millimeter screen, but people have

285
00:18:18,741 --> 00:18:20,740
been making up languages
forever and ever and ever.

286
00:18:20,741 --> 00:18:21,460
That's not unique.

287
00:18:21,461 --> 00:18:25,980
And working with the people who have,
who've done similar things to what I've

288
00:18:25,981 --> 00:18:28,460
done, meaning David Peterson
and Paul Frommer, right.

289
00:18:28,461 --> 00:18:31,580
And, and so on, who've
done it for movies and TV.

290
00:18:31,581 --> 00:18:34,060
So yeah, see, it's not just me.

291
00:18:34,160 --> 00:18:38,580
You know, other, other people
are doing it too, which is, uh, nice.

292
00:18:38,581 --> 00:18:39,980
It's nice to have this little community.

293
00:18:39,981 --> 00:18:46,420
It's nice to not feel
that I'm all alone in

294
00:18:46,421 --> 00:18:47,421
some kind of a silo
doing something or other.

295
00:18:47,500 --> 00:18:51,860
Um, but as a result of doing that, to
go to the other part of your question, you

296
00:18:51,861 --> 00:18:56,580
know, I've met people in, in the, in the
more general conlanging community, which

297
00:18:56,581 --> 00:19:00,260
certainly, uh, well, I wouldn't say I
wouldn't have happened, but it was,

298
00:19:00,410 --> 00:19:06,260
wouldn't have happened as, as, as
much, uh, had, had this not happened.

299
00:19:07,020 --> 00:19:13,300
Uh, and what I've found
meeting these people is

300
00:19:13,301 --> 00:19:14,140
how incredibly brilliant
and creative they are.

301
00:19:14,141 --> 00:19:17,460
The kind of stuff that they talk about and
do and the languages they came up with and

302
00:19:17,461 --> 00:19:21,540
the things they're concerned about
and, and, and, and the back and forth cross

303
00:19:21,541 --> 00:19:24,460
pollination and all is,
is just, is just brilliant.

304
00:19:25,260 --> 00:19:27,340
Uh, and you know, absolutely amazing.

305
00:19:27,341 --> 00:19:31,060
Now among the Klingon
speakers themselves,

306
00:19:31,061 --> 00:19:31,540
they do the same
thing, but it's just Klingon.

307
00:19:31,541 --> 00:19:32,820
Right.

308
00:19:33,370 --> 00:19:34,460
And they're brilliant too.

309
00:19:34,461 --> 00:19:35,100
They're brilliant too.

310
00:19:35,101 --> 00:19:37,740
And what they've done with
Klingon is a lot more than

311
00:19:37,741 --> 00:19:38,900
I would probably have
done with it all by myself.

312
00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:46,940
But the, the, the, the extent of the, I've
used the word brilliant too many times.

313
00:19:47,590 --> 00:19:50,620
with this, there's really, really smart
people doing this kind of thing and the

314
00:19:50,621 --> 00:19:53,140
kind of things that they're
concerned about and the kind of

315
00:19:53,141 --> 00:19:55,460
things they fuss about are,
are, are so just so interesting.

316
00:19:55,461 --> 00:19:56,461
Yeah.

317
00:19:56,940 --> 00:20:08,620
I, I, I do wonder, like thinking
about like, I think there's still cases of.

318
00:20:09,070 --> 00:20:15,260
people coming into a conlang project with
like preexisting material or, or at least

319
00:20:15,435 --> 00:20:21,940
like names to fit to or something
like that, but like, well, so I would say,

320
00:20:22,090 --> 00:20:25,900
well, maybe, maybe you have
actually experienced a difference here.

321
00:20:25,940 --> 00:20:33,700
So like you all also did the language
Atlantean for Disney's Atlantis.

322
00:20:34,550 --> 00:20:38,380
Was that a different experience
than what you did with Klingon?

323
00:20:38,381 --> 00:20:43,380
Like where you brought
on earlier, was there, was

324
00:20:43,430 --> 00:20:45,340
there more control on your
part or, or how was that?

325
00:20:45,490 --> 00:20:49,900
Yeah, that was, that was very
different in a number of different ways.

326
00:20:49,980 --> 00:20:57,220
Um, in, in no particular order, one, one
way was with Atlantean, I did not work

327
00:20:57,221 --> 00:21:02,140
with any of the actors, but another
difference that, that you just mentioned

328
00:21:02,141 --> 00:21:07,020
is with Klingon, well, Klingon
initially was just for Star

329
00:21:07,021 --> 00:21:08,580
Trek three and it was only,
I don't know, a dozen lines.

330
00:21:08,581 --> 00:21:12,140
Well, it's probably more than that, but
however many lines, 20 lines, something.

331
00:21:12,141 --> 00:21:13,141
That's it.

332
00:21:14,080 --> 00:21:16,780
Uh, and not very much time to do it.

333
00:21:17,505 --> 00:21:20,580
I mean, you know, several months,
but not gobs and gobs of time.

334
00:21:21,330 --> 00:21:24,540
Um, Atlantean was a four year project.

335
00:21:24,890 --> 00:21:29,380
Cause I got involved with that four
years before the film came out and a lot of

336
00:21:29,381 --> 00:21:33,140
ongoing discussions with the producer
and the directors of that film about the

337
00:21:33,141 --> 00:21:36,660
language and about the writing system,
which I did not do, other people did it,

338
00:21:36,661 --> 00:21:44,300
but we talked about it a lot and the
jumping off points for the two were very

339
00:21:44,301 --> 00:21:51,100
different, what I mean by that is
for Klingon, um, first I knew about the

340
00:21:51,101 --> 00:21:55,260
Klingons because I'd seen them on TV
and I read about them in the script, right?

341
00:21:55,261 --> 00:21:58,580
So there was some, some cultural
information I had about them.

342
00:21:58,581 --> 00:22:01,340
Not, not as much as we've had since
then, since Next Generation came around.

343
00:22:01,341 --> 00:22:02,660
They've been fleshed out a lot.

344
00:22:02,960 --> 00:22:07,060
Um, so I knew a little bit about, about
the people whose language, you know,

345
00:22:07,061 --> 00:22:09,940
who'd be speaking this language
I was going to create, right.

346
00:22:10,290 --> 00:22:13,500
And there was also a teeny bit of
language that, that preceded me because

347
00:22:13,501 --> 00:22:16,540
there's a few lines at the very, very
beginning of Star Trek, the motion

348
00:22:16,565 --> 00:22:22,580
picture, uh, and the people who
made that up, which is, uh, two people,

349
00:22:22,630 --> 00:22:26,340
primarily is John Povil, who
was one of the producers

350
00:22:26,341 --> 00:22:27,621
and James Dillon, who was
the actor who played Scotty.

351
00:22:27,740 --> 00:22:30,060
The two of them came up with that Klingon.

352
00:22:30,760 --> 00:22:35,660
Uh, we're very concerned with what it
sounded like, not so much with grammar

353
00:22:35,810 --> 00:22:37,300
and vocabulary and stuff like that.

354
00:22:37,725 --> 00:22:38,500
But that was a start.

355
00:22:38,501 --> 00:22:41,780
I had to make use of those words or
phrases or whatever you want to call them.

356
00:22:42,310 --> 00:22:43,940
So I wasn't starting from zero.

357
00:22:43,941 --> 00:22:47,100
So I wasn't starting from zero in
terms of who, who, who is the speaking

358
00:22:47,101 --> 00:22:50,980
community, and it wasn't starting from
zero in terms of the phonology anyway.

359
00:22:50,981 --> 00:22:52,740
I was in terms of grammar and stuff.

360
00:22:54,140 --> 00:23:01,620
Um, and, and went from there
and also, and also knew that,

361
00:23:01,621 --> 00:23:04,060
uh, I'm making up a language
of people from another planet.

362
00:23:04,760 --> 00:23:08,900
So there's no reason for their language
to resemble a language on earth, except

363
00:23:08,925 --> 00:23:12,940
for the fact that human actors
are the ones who are going to say it.

364
00:23:13,390 --> 00:23:17,140
So I had to make it pronounceable,
even if it was weird and stuff like that.

365
00:23:18,040 --> 00:23:21,980
Uh, for Atlantean, I knew very
little about the Atlantean people.

366
00:23:21,981 --> 00:23:26,100
I'd read the script, but there was just,
you know, that that's all there was to

367
00:23:26,101 --> 00:23:31,820
know, uh, didn't have
any, any background from

368
00:23:31,821 --> 00:23:32,821
seeing them on TV earlier
or something like that.

369
00:23:33,620 --> 00:23:39,740
Uh, and there's a line in, in the film,
in the script, well, there's a scene in

370
00:23:39,741 --> 00:23:47,140
the script, in the, in the film, uh, where
the explorers, uh, get to Atlantis and

371
00:23:47,141 --> 00:23:50,020
they encounter the Atlantean people
and the Atlantean people are speaking

372
00:23:50,021 --> 00:23:53,180
Atlantean to them, which of course
the explorers don't understand.

373
00:23:53,181 --> 00:23:57,220
And then the Atlantean people quickly
realized that the explorers don't understand.

374
00:23:57,221 --> 00:23:58,620
So they try out other languages.

375
00:23:58,660 --> 00:24:04,340
The Atlanteans do, uh, and they try
out, you know, I forget which one's Spanish

376
00:24:04,490 --> 00:24:06,020
and French, Chinese or whatever it is.

377
00:24:06,021 --> 00:24:10,060
They're, they're doing different things
and very, very quickly, uh, figure out

378
00:24:10,061 --> 00:24:13,460
that English is the
language that they should use

379
00:24:13,485 --> 00:24:14,940
and then proceed to talk
English to the explorers.

380
00:24:14,941 --> 00:24:19,060
And one of the characters,
the explorer says to, you know,

381
00:24:19,061 --> 00:24:20,980
the hero of the movie, Milo
Thatch is the hero of the movie.

382
00:24:20,981 --> 00:24:21,740
He's a linguist.

383
00:24:21,765 --> 00:24:23,820
He's the main guy in the exploration team.

384
00:24:24,660 --> 00:24:29,180
Uh, they say to him, how did
they learn our language so fast?

385
00:24:29,181 --> 00:24:30,581
How did they learn English so fast?

386
00:24:31,610 --> 00:24:35,340
And Milo says, well, that's because
their language is a root dialect.

387
00:24:35,415 --> 00:24:37,620
You know, it's the language
that all the languages

388
00:24:37,621 --> 00:24:39,020
on earth came from
or something like this.

389
00:24:39,920 --> 00:24:46,620
Um, and I said to the
director, they said, you

390
00:24:46,621 --> 00:24:48,060
know, it doesn't, it
doesn't really work like this.

391
00:24:48,160 --> 00:24:52,460
There should be another reason
that the, that they're speaking English.

392
00:24:53,610 --> 00:24:56,420
Uh, I think I came up with two or three
different explanations or something, but

393
00:24:56,421 --> 00:25:02,980
the line ended up staying in the
movie anyway, so I said, okay, uh, I don't

394
00:25:02,981 --> 00:25:06,140
think that whatever
they're speaking is really the

395
00:25:06,141 --> 00:25:08,020
language that all languages
of the world came from.

396
00:25:08,970 --> 00:25:14,420
But I have to make up something that
has characteristics such that Milo could

397
00:25:14,445 --> 00:25:19,500
come to that, uh, conclusion,
even if he's wrong, right?

398
00:25:20,870 --> 00:25:26,300
So instead of making a language that's
as different as I could from, from earth.

399
00:25:26,750 --> 00:25:30,380
languages, like for Klingon, I made a
language that's sort of as common as I

400
00:25:30,381 --> 00:25:34,460
could, it had very, very, very common
sounds, very, very common grammatical,

401
00:25:35,010 --> 00:25:37,220
uh, structure for vocabulary.

402
00:25:37,221 --> 00:25:43,500
If I could find a relevant word or root
or something in proto-Indo-European or

403
00:25:43,501 --> 00:25:46,900
proto-Sino-Tibetan or something
like that, I would, I would incorporate it

404
00:25:47,100 --> 00:25:49,460
into the thing as long
as it didn't sound like

405
00:25:49,461 --> 00:25:50,740
English, which a lot of the
Indo-European things did.

406
00:25:51,540 --> 00:25:55,820
Um, and if, if I couldn't find
it, then I just make stuff up.

407
00:25:55,920 --> 00:26:00,980
So there's, there is, there was a effort
to make it earth language like in a way.

408
00:26:01,330 --> 00:26:05,420
And with Klingon, there was an effort to
make it not earth language like in a way,

409
00:26:05,421 --> 00:26:08,060
even though I didn't fully
achieve either one for either one.

410
00:26:09,560 --> 00:26:10,560
Oh, okay.

411
00:26:10,770 --> 00:26:11,770
Interesting.

412
00:26:11,860 --> 00:26:18,940
See, I would, had been under the
impression that Atlantean was like an

413
00:26:18,941 --> 00:26:27,020
Indo-European language, but what you're
telling me was like, okay, the, the, the

414
00:26:27,021 --> 00:26:34,420
writer people have said that Milo thinks
this is proto-world, which doesn't make

415
00:26:34,421 --> 00:26:40,340
any sense, but we'll go
with that and make something

416
00:26:40,341 --> 00:26:42,140
that sounds like it could
be maybe proto-world.

417
00:26:44,420 --> 00:26:49,740
It sounds, sounds like something
that would spark that idea in Milo's head.

418
00:26:49,741 --> 00:26:52,686
Again, whether he's right or
wrong, it was, it was a, Hey,

419
00:26:52,710 --> 00:26:54,220
maybe this is why that,
that, that might fit the facts.

420
00:26:54,221 --> 00:26:54,740
Let's see.

421
00:26:54,741 --> 00:26:55,940
Yeah.

422
00:26:55,941 --> 00:26:58,420
Yeah.

423
00:26:58,620 --> 00:27:00,700
That's, that's, that's interesting.

424
00:27:00,701 --> 00:27:07,900
It's always interesting to have that
back and forth in terms of like what the

425
00:27:07,901 --> 00:27:15,660
writers think is good world
building versus what the

426
00:27:15,661 --> 00:27:18,740
linguist knows about how
things actually work and, and that.

427
00:27:19,040 --> 00:27:25,580
So, and it's also
interesting that like, you're

428
00:27:25,581 --> 00:27:27,100
interpreting that in a way
of like, this is his statement.

429
00:27:27,350 --> 00:27:33,260
This isn't actually
necessarily true, but it's like a

430
00:27:33,285 --> 00:27:36,900
hypothesis that he came up
with based on limited exposure.

431
00:27:37,340 --> 00:27:38,340
Right.

432
00:27:39,520 --> 00:27:42,060
And it fits and it fix what it fits,
what's been presented to us in the film.

433
00:27:42,061 --> 00:27:43,966
It doesn't come out of
the, from out of the blue.

434
00:27:43,990 --> 00:27:45,420
Yeah.

435
00:27:45,421 --> 00:27:50,271
I do wonder with
having to go, going back

436
00:27:50,283 --> 00:27:55,500
to Klingon with having
to fit to preexisting

437
00:27:55,501 --> 00:28:04,340
material, if you had been brought
onto that project earlier and been able to,

438
00:28:04,515 --> 00:28:09,220
help design Klingon
from the beginning, do you

439
00:28:09,221 --> 00:28:10,221
think you would have
done it any differently?

440
00:28:10,780 --> 00:28:18,300
Probably, but don't ask
me what would be different.

441
00:28:19,100 --> 00:28:22,500
Cause I don't know, since I
didn't have to sit around and

442
00:28:22,501 --> 00:28:24,101
think of, okay, we're starting
from scratch, what should I do?

443
00:28:24,320 --> 00:28:29,180
I never considered altered,
altered, alternate forms of Klingon.

444
00:28:29,220 --> 00:28:34,740
You know, I have made up
languages or language fragments

445
00:28:34,741 --> 00:28:37,260
for other Star Trek races,
if you want to call them that.

446
00:28:37,261 --> 00:28:43,260
So I have, have thought of
stuff that's very UN-Klingon

447
00:28:43,261 --> 00:28:45,820
and, and on English, on
French, on Chinese, whatever.

448
00:28:46,220 --> 00:28:50,020
But for Klingon in
particular, I don't know, I

449
00:28:50,021 --> 00:28:50,340
don't know what I would
have done differently.

450
00:28:50,341 --> 00:28:52,540
The grammar was all my own.

451
00:28:52,541 --> 00:28:52,820
Right.

452
00:28:52,821 --> 00:28:53,180
Right.

453
00:28:53,230 --> 00:28:56,460
Cause there was, there
was no, no way to figure out

454
00:28:56,461 --> 00:28:57,540
from the beginning what
the grammar was all about.

455
00:28:57,541 --> 00:28:58,180
Right.

456
00:28:58,181 --> 00:29:01,380
Um, so there was no problem.

457
00:29:01,580 --> 00:29:04,140
That may or may, may or
may not have been the same.

458
00:29:04,141 --> 00:29:04,620
I don't know.

459
00:29:04,670 --> 00:29:11,420
And the vocabulary
initially, uh, was all

460
00:29:11,421 --> 00:29:12,421
what was needed for
the film and nothing more.

461
00:29:12,500 --> 00:29:15,546
So, you know, the, the first batch of
words that I made up for Klingon were those

462
00:29:15,570 --> 00:29:18,500
that were needed to translate
the lines in the script, period.

463
00:29:18,501 --> 00:29:20,500
Right.

464
00:29:20,600 --> 00:29:21,916
And they never talk in the script.

465
00:29:21,940 --> 00:29:22,700
They never talk in the script.

466
00:29:22,701 --> 00:29:23,901
They never talk in the script.

467
00:29:24,700 --> 00:29:25,020
Right.

468
00:29:25,021 --> 00:29:26,300
And they never talk in the script.

469
00:29:26,301 --> 00:29:29,300
They never talked about, you
know, I'd like a bowl of spaghetti.

470
00:29:29,301 --> 00:29:31,380
So I didn't make up a way
to say bowl or spaghetti.

471
00:29:34,330 --> 00:29:36,540
That's, that's super interesting.

472
00:29:36,690 --> 00:29:44,540
The, just the, the difference in the
process, the, the, the having to fit to

473
00:29:44,740 --> 00:29:51,980
just preexisting gibberish and all of
the things that you've, you've sort of

474
00:29:51,981 --> 00:29:57,580
rationalized in order to make Klingon
make some kind of sense and also make like

475
00:29:57,581 --> 00:30:00,660
statements made about
Atlantean make some kind of sense.

476
00:30:00,685 --> 00:30:08,380
It's, it's a very interesting approach
that you have to making these languages.

477
00:30:08,580 --> 00:30:16,740
Um, do you envision yourself like doing any
more of this kind of work in the future?

478
00:30:17,200 --> 00:30:24,300
Like, you know, if you were contacted by
Hollywood studios now, would you take on

479
00:30:24,301 --> 00:30:30,540
another conlanging job or would you pass
it to other conlangers you know, or, or

480
00:30:30,541 --> 00:30:33,380
what would you, other
linguists that you know?

481
00:30:33,381 --> 00:30:37,500
Yeah.

482
00:30:37,650 --> 00:30:43,700
These days, these days,
if it's, if it's really starting

483
00:30:43,701 --> 00:30:45,180
from scratch, uh, I'll pass
it on to somebody else.

484
00:30:46,180 --> 00:30:46,460
Yeah.

485
00:30:46,860 --> 00:30:50,100
It's, it's, it's, it's that time
for, for a lot of reasons.

486
00:30:50,700 --> 00:30:57,660
Uh, if it, if it's, if it's Klingon, uh,
then yeah, I'll, I'll, I'll do Klingon.

487
00:30:57,661 --> 00:30:58,980
And I do that, that happens.

488
00:30:58,981 --> 00:31:02,540
On the other hand, there's other
people doing Klingon for Star Trek as well.

489
00:31:03,340 --> 00:31:10,340
Uh, in Star Trek Discovery, that,
that, that show, um, the first season, uh,

490
00:31:10,490 --> 00:31:12,100
plot wise was heavy on Klingons.

491
00:31:12,101 --> 00:31:15,340
There's, they, they had a strange new
look, but there was Klingons all over the

492
00:31:15,440 --> 00:31:17,820
place and there was Klingon
language all over the place.

493
00:31:17,821 --> 00:31:22,140
A lot, lot, lot more Klingon
language in that than in

494
00:31:22,141 --> 00:31:24,220
anything else, you know,
by far, and I didn't do it.

495
00:31:24,620 --> 00:31:26,780
I didn't, I didn't do any
Klingon for that show.

496
00:31:26,781 --> 00:31:30,020
So all of the words that
were used were mine.

497
00:31:30,021 --> 00:31:31,380
The grammar was all mine.

498
00:31:31,381 --> 00:31:31,820
Okay.

499
00:31:31,945 --> 00:31:34,145
But the actual translations
were done by somebody else.

500
00:31:34,190 --> 00:31:37,740
They were done by
Robin Stewart, who is one

501
00:31:37,741 --> 00:31:38,020
of the best Klingon
speakers in the world.

502
00:31:38,021 --> 00:31:40,980
And a guy called Alan
Anderson, who's another

503
00:31:40,981 --> 00:31:41,260
one of the best Klingon
speakers in the world.

504
00:31:41,261 --> 00:31:41,460
You know?

505
00:31:42,230 --> 00:31:45,260
Um, uh, they were, they
were the ones who did that.

506
00:31:45,360 --> 00:31:50,140
And they're sort of, I
think in the Star Trek

507
00:31:50,141 --> 00:31:51,100
Rolodex of people to
call if, if Klingon is needed.

508
00:31:51,101 --> 00:31:51,900
And that's great.

509
00:31:51,901 --> 00:31:52,740
That's wonderful.

510
00:31:52,741 --> 00:31:54,420
I'm not, I'm not upset by that.

511
00:31:54,421 --> 00:31:57,100
I'm actually pleased by
that for a number of reasons.

512
00:31:57,200 --> 00:32:00,580
Flattered that the, you know, that the
language is such that other people can,

513
00:32:00,680 --> 00:32:04,660
is that, is that a state that other people
can take it and, and, and translate all

514
00:32:04,810 --> 00:32:07,020
these strange things
that they had to translate.

515
00:32:08,920 --> 00:32:09,740
And there's other people too.

516
00:32:09,741 --> 00:32:12,660
I think, you know, Star Trek in
particular has like a group of, I don't

517
00:32:12,661 --> 00:32:16,020
know, four or five different people that
they called for the different languages.

518
00:32:16,021 --> 00:32:18,540
Yeah.

519
00:32:18,840 --> 00:32:24,100
I, um, I know that I've interviewed,
uh, Britton Watkins and I believe he did

520
00:32:24,101 --> 00:32:34,660
some, uh, some, uh, coaching for like
the reboot movie, some Klingon coaching.

521
00:32:35,310 --> 00:32:38,420
And I know that's really interesting.

522
00:32:38,421 --> 00:32:39,421
Klingon.

523
00:32:42,560 --> 00:32:43,560
Uh, yeah.

524
00:32:47,440 --> 00:32:51,580
No, what I was going to say is, is in,
in the, in the reboot movies, the three of

525
00:32:51,581 --> 00:32:56,660
them, there's, there
was Klingon in the first

526
00:32:56,661 --> 00:32:57,661
two and there's none
in the, in the third one.

527
00:32:58,170 --> 00:33:03,540
Uh, and in the second movie, uh, they cut
way back from what was originally there.

528
00:33:03,541 --> 00:33:04,980
And this is not unusual at all.

529
00:33:04,981 --> 00:33:07,496
I mean, in moviemaking, you're
making these kinds of changes in

530
00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:09,520
post-production all the
time, so it's no big deal.

531
00:33:10,130 --> 00:33:12,740
Uh, and Britton was on
set for the second movie.

532
00:33:13,390 --> 00:33:18,980
So I made up the lines, but Britton
coached the actors in saying the lines.

533
00:33:20,080 --> 00:33:24,340
Uh, but what ended
up happening and he did

534
00:33:24,341 --> 00:33:25,341
a great job and the
actors did a great job.

535
00:33:25,420 --> 00:33:28,100
Uh, but what ended up
happening is they edited this one.

536
00:33:28,975 --> 00:33:32,980
They edited so much that there was only
one scene left that had Klingon language

537
00:33:32,981 --> 00:33:39,340
in it and they edited
it so much that the

538
00:33:39,341 --> 00:33:40,341
Klingon that was left
didn't make any sense.

539
00:33:40,590 --> 00:33:41,860
They, they shortened it.

540
00:33:41,960 --> 00:33:45,060
They took the end of one sentence and
put it at the beginning of another one, or

541
00:33:45,061 --> 00:33:48,460
they started a sentence in the middle of
the sentence and threw away the beginning.

542
00:33:48,461 --> 00:33:49,140
I forget what they did.

543
00:33:49,141 --> 00:33:50,660
They just scrambled it all up.

544
00:33:51,710 --> 00:33:56,260
Um, and they realized that it
didn't make any sense anymore.

545
00:33:57,010 --> 00:34:00,260
Um, and the pronunciation was gorgeous,
but it just didn't make any sense.

546
00:34:00,261 --> 00:34:04,060
And it certainly didn't mean what the,
what the new subtitles were going to mean.

547
00:34:05,360 --> 00:34:12,460
So they gave me a call and they told
me this and they said basically that they

548
00:34:12,461 --> 00:34:16,100
had three choices about
what to do about this situation.

549
00:34:17,700 --> 00:34:22,300
One was ignore it and
just go with what they got.

550
00:34:22,301 --> 00:34:25,820
And they said, you know, once upon a
time they could have gotten away with that,

551
00:34:26,320 --> 00:34:28,740
but not anymore because the
audience is paying attention.

552
00:34:28,741 --> 00:34:32,900
There's people who really
speak Klingon out there

553
00:34:32,901 --> 00:34:33,780
who will know that this
just, this doesn't work.

554
00:34:33,830 --> 00:34:34,991
That is, so we can't do that.

555
00:34:35,160 --> 00:34:37,361
We have, we have to, we
have to have to do it properly.

556
00:34:37,790 --> 00:34:39,736
And there's two proper
ways they thought of doing it.

557
00:34:39,760 --> 00:34:41,220
One is shoot it over again.

558
00:34:42,370 --> 00:34:44,460
And that's not going to
happen at this late stage.

559
00:34:45,410 --> 00:34:47,060
And the other is the one that they did.

560
00:34:47,061 --> 00:34:55,740
They asked me if it were possible and then
we ended up doing it, which is we, um, uh,

561
00:34:56,890 --> 00:35:03,140
they played me or sent me a video of
the scene and I made up Klingon, basically

562
00:35:03,141 --> 00:35:11,580
Klingon gibberish, uh, that sounded like
Klingon and matched the lip movements.

563
00:35:11,880 --> 00:35:13,060
that were already there.

564
00:35:13,210 --> 00:35:15,540
And when I say gibberish,
it's not really gibberish

565
00:35:15,541 --> 00:35:17,580
because I had to make
it be real Klingon, right?

566
00:35:18,230 --> 00:35:25,140
Um, so I could make up new
vocabulary and did to, to make

567
00:35:25,141 --> 00:35:26,460
all this made sense, but I
couldn't make up new grammar.

568
00:35:27,260 --> 00:35:30,540
So grammatically it had to fit in
with, with, with what Klingon was

569
00:35:30,690 --> 00:35:33,060
there, uh, had already existed.

570
00:35:33,435 --> 00:35:39,620
So, uh, we did this, there was only
two speakers in, in what was left.

571
00:35:39,621 --> 00:35:44,020
Uh, there was Uhura, actually a
non-Klingon, uh, who does most of the

572
00:35:44,070 --> 00:35:50,700
talking, uh, and listened to her lines
and figured out how to, how to change,

573
00:35:50,950 --> 00:35:56,340
you know, this to that
and make the, make the

574
00:35:56,341 --> 00:35:57,341
mouth movements work
for the new, the new lines.

575
00:35:57,795 --> 00:36:00,660
Then there was one guy, one
Klingon guy who has basically one line.

576
00:36:01,760 --> 00:36:06,780
Uh, and when I listened to him, I didn't
understand at all what he was saying,

577
00:36:07,980 --> 00:36:12,660
you know, with, with the Uhura lines, Zoe
Saldana, uh, who, who worked with Britain.

578
00:36:13,660 --> 00:36:16,980
Uh, what, what, what was recorded
there was, was beautiful and clear.

579
00:36:16,981 --> 00:36:19,501
It's just chopped off in the
middle of a sentence or something.

580
00:36:19,830 --> 00:36:25,580
Um, but with this guy
and Britain worked with

581
00:36:25,581 --> 00:36:25,700
him too, it didn't
make any sense at all.

582
00:36:25,701 --> 00:36:27,300
I said, no, no, Britain was there.

583
00:36:27,301 --> 00:36:28,140
Britain did a good job.

584
00:36:28,141 --> 00:36:29,141
What is going on here?

585
00:36:29,465 --> 00:36:31,540
This guy doesn't even
sound like he's talking Klingon.

586
00:36:31,541 --> 00:36:33,260
He sounds like he's talking backwards.

587
00:36:34,560 --> 00:36:40,900
I said, Oh, so I looked at my notes
to see what lines he might be saying.

588
00:36:40,901 --> 00:36:44,021
Cause there was a bunch of lines that
it might've been, but only one was left.

589
00:36:44,250 --> 00:36:45,340
I said, I think it's this one.

590
00:36:45,341 --> 00:36:48,980
And I wrote it out phonetically
backwards and then listened to him again.

591
00:36:48,981 --> 00:36:50,780
And that's exactly what it was.

592
00:36:51,630 --> 00:36:55,300
So I called up the movie people and
then said, is this guy talking backwards?

593
00:36:55,301 --> 00:36:56,700
Are you playing the film backwards?

594
00:36:56,701 --> 00:36:58,820
I know it's not film,
whatever it is these days.

595
00:36:58,821 --> 00:37:02,540
Um, and they said, yeah, it goes backwards.

596
00:37:02,665 --> 00:37:04,060
And I said, why?

597
00:37:05,110 --> 00:37:07,060
And they said, because it looks better.

598
00:37:07,061 --> 00:37:09,380
And we knew we were going
to replace the audio anyway.

599
00:37:10,380 --> 00:37:14,740
So I had to make up new Klingon that
meant what the new subtitle said and be

600
00:37:14,741 --> 00:37:18,020
grammatically accurate with perhaps
some new vocabulary that matched the lip

601
00:37:18,021 --> 00:37:20,300
movements of some guy
talking Klingon backwards.

602
00:37:20,301 --> 00:37:20,900
Right.

603
00:37:21,275 --> 00:37:24,660
So all the, all the great work that
Britain did did not end up in the film.

604
00:37:24,760 --> 00:37:25,760
Yeah.

605
00:37:26,020 --> 00:37:29,020
Well, hopefully they had
someone doing dialect

606
00:37:29,021 --> 00:37:30,900
coaching for the ADR
work they had to do later.

607
00:37:30,901 --> 00:37:31,460
That was good.

608
00:37:31,461 --> 00:37:32,740
Yeah.

609
00:37:32,741 --> 00:37:36,460
That's that, that is always, yeah.

610
00:37:36,461 --> 00:37:38,020
Yeah.

611
00:37:38,021 --> 00:37:38,420
Yeah.

612
00:37:38,421 --> 00:37:39,580
Yeah.

613
00:37:40,360 --> 00:37:50,180
So with collaborating with the other, or
I won't even say that I'll, I'll let you.

614
00:37:50,530 --> 00:37:55,180
define, so when you have other people
doing the dialect coaching or doing the

615
00:37:55,181 --> 00:38:02,780
translation for Klingon now, like how
much collaboration with you is there?

616
00:38:02,880 --> 00:38:08,820
Do they, do they email you questions
or do they, do they like talk to you or are

617
00:38:08,821 --> 00:38:14,700
they mostly just going
for, with your materials,

618
00:38:14,701 --> 00:38:15,701
taking your materials
and applying it?

619
00:38:16,520 --> 00:38:19,820
It's the latter, you know, they're
doing, they're doing it all on their own.

620
00:38:19,821 --> 00:38:25,300
It's again, it's, it's my
grammar and, and, and, and

621
00:38:25,301 --> 00:38:26,821
vocabulary and morphology
and all that kind of stuff.

622
00:38:27,230 --> 00:38:34,380
Um, but they're, they're making use of
that with, with extremely rare exceptions.

623
00:38:34,730 --> 00:38:37,780
You know, every once in a while
they, they would hit a stone wall, but it's

624
00:38:37,781 --> 00:38:43,540
less like over the course of the series,
two words, three words, something like that.

625
00:38:44,190 --> 00:38:49,580
Now for, for another interesting thing
that happened with Discovery, uh, for

626
00:38:49,581 --> 00:38:55,180
the first season of Discovery, the
Klingon season, um, that year Discovery

627
00:38:55,181 --> 00:39:02,060
was on, uh, was streaming, I guess,
in, in the U S on what's now it called

628
00:39:02,061 --> 00:39:03,940
Paramount Plus,
whatever it was called then.

629
00:39:04,440 --> 00:39:06,180
CBS All Access it was called.

630
00:39:07,120 --> 00:39:09,020
And it was on something or other in Canada.

631
00:39:09,021 --> 00:39:13,540
I don't know what, but everywhere
else in the world, it was on Netflix and on

632
00:39:13,541 --> 00:39:18,300
Netflix for anything, not just Star Trek,
but for anything, you know, you can use.

633
00:39:18,900 --> 00:39:21,660
to watch subtitles in any
of a number of languages.

634
00:39:21,661 --> 00:39:25,020
So you could watch a German show
with French subtitles and an English show

635
00:39:25,021 --> 00:39:29,820
with a Spanish subtitles
and the Spanish show with

636
00:39:29,821 --> 00:39:30,821
German subtitles and
so on, all that kind of stuff.

637
00:39:31,400 --> 00:39:35,700
For Star Trek Discovery
season one, you could watch

638
00:39:35,701 --> 00:39:37,580
the entire season with
Klingon subtitles, right?

639
00:39:37,581 --> 00:39:40,900
When they're talking English,
there's Klingon subtitles.

640
00:39:41,500 --> 00:39:45,260
Um, and I didn't do that either.

641
00:39:45,560 --> 00:39:49,460
I wasn't in, in, uh, because right.

642
00:39:49,510 --> 00:39:50,300
No, no, no, no.

643
00:39:50,301 --> 00:39:51,740
It's in regular Roman characters.

644
00:39:51,741 --> 00:39:56,380
The, the, the, uh, the TV
technology does not support PICARD.

645
00:39:56,455 --> 00:39:59,740
Oh, it's it's, oh, I, it
would be impossible to do.

646
00:39:59,790 --> 00:40:00,790
Yeah.

647
00:40:00,840 --> 00:40:01,580
Yeah.

648
00:40:01,581 --> 00:40:03,700
No, there's a guy leaving Littar.

649
00:40:03,950 --> 00:40:08,140
So they had someone
translate the entire script, right?

650
00:40:08,540 --> 00:40:09,540
The entire script.

651
00:40:09,910 --> 00:40:12,740
Um, this guy in Germany,
leaving Littar did it.

652
00:40:12,940 --> 00:40:16,260
Uh, and I worked with him a little bit
while he was doing it because there was a

653
00:40:16,385 --> 00:40:20,620
whole lot more English to be translated
into Klingon than there was Klingon to be

654
00:40:20,621 --> 00:40:24,260
translated, you know, in,
uh, spoken Klingon in it.

655
00:40:24,261 --> 00:40:28,860
So he had a lot, a lot of questions about
vocabulary, uh, that the, that the ones

656
00:40:28,861 --> 00:40:30,980
doing the Klingon dialogue
didn't have to deal with.

657
00:40:31,900 --> 00:40:35,220
Uh, so I worked, worked
with him a bit on that, but it's

658
00:40:35,221 --> 00:40:38,100
all his work or, or, or
virtually, uh, all his work.

659
00:40:38,101 --> 00:40:39,101
Yeah.

660
00:40:39,225 --> 00:40:42,540
It's interesting too, because the way it
worked is, is the program was subtitled

661
00:40:42,740 --> 00:40:45,860
in Klingon, meaning the
whole program was subtitled

662
00:40:45,861 --> 00:40:47,101
in Klingon, including when
they were talking Klingon.

663
00:40:48,820 --> 00:40:52,620
So the first time I saw that
show, actually, I wasn't home.

664
00:40:52,621 --> 00:40:58,780
I was, I was in Belgium, uh, and watching
at a friend's house and the program

665
00:40:58,781 --> 00:41:01,540
begins and I said, turn on,
turn on the Klingon subtitles.

666
00:41:01,541 --> 00:41:03,126
I want to see how the Klingon subtitles go.

667
00:41:03,150 --> 00:41:04,060
So, okay.

668
00:41:04,061 --> 00:41:06,940
So we turn on the Klingon subtitles
and the first, I don't know, 10 minutes of

669
00:41:06,941 --> 00:41:11,500
the show or something is people
talking Klingon with Klingon subtitles.

670
00:41:12,700 --> 00:41:15,300
And after a little while,
my friend turned to me

671
00:41:15,301 --> 00:41:16,420
and he said, well, this
is all very interesting.

672
00:41:16,421 --> 00:41:18,561
I don't have the slightest
idea what anybody's saying.

673
00:41:18,585 --> 00:41:20,580
Please turn on subtitles
in another language.

674
00:41:20,581 --> 00:41:21,581
Right.

675
00:41:21,850 --> 00:41:28,740
Oh, that's, that's great.

676
00:41:28,780 --> 00:41:34,660
I did not know that they did the
whole thing that has to be like some kind

677
00:41:34,810 --> 00:41:36,620
of landmark that your language.

678
00:41:36,621 --> 00:41:39,260
Yeah.

679
00:41:39,560 --> 00:41:40,500
It's just, yeah.

680
00:41:40,501 --> 00:41:41,580
Just that season.

681
00:41:41,730 --> 00:41:44,380
Um, yeah.

682
00:41:44,381 --> 00:41:53,060
So, I mean, with all of these other
people doing Klingon, do you feel like,

683
00:41:53,310 --> 00:41:55,420
you know, Star Trek is not going anywhere.

684
00:41:55,570 --> 00:41:58,420
I don't think it's been going for.

685
00:41:59,720 --> 00:42:02,820
What, like 70 years, 60, 70 years.

686
00:42:03,720 --> 00:42:13,700
Uh, do you, do you feel like in the
future that you'll be just handing off

687
00:42:13,701 --> 00:42:22,340
Klingon to the speakers and,
and Paramount will continue

688
00:42:22,341 --> 00:42:24,420
just hiring them to do all
the Klingon in the future.

689
00:42:25,700 --> 00:42:29,540
And do you feel confident
about them carrying it forward?

690
00:42:30,490 --> 00:42:31,140
Oh, yeah.

691
00:42:31,141 --> 00:42:32,141
Yeah.

692
00:42:32,360 --> 00:42:36,900
I mean, they're doing, I mean,
Paramount is doing that already.

693
00:42:36,901 --> 00:42:40,820
So, so certainly they'll,
they'll continue to do that.

694
00:42:40,821 --> 00:42:44,860
But in terms of the, the, the continued
growth and development of the language,

695
00:42:44,960 --> 00:42:48,820
uh, you know, one of these days
it's not going to be me for sure.

696
00:42:49,420 --> 00:42:53,380
Um, and it's good to these other
people and it's, I'm not sure exactly how.

697
00:42:53,730 --> 00:42:59,460
that's going to work itself out,
but there's, there, there's incredibly.

698
00:43:00,210 --> 00:43:03,300
good hands, uh, to, to put it into.

699
00:43:03,301 --> 00:43:05,060
So I'm not, I'm not concerned at all.

700
00:43:05,061 --> 00:43:05,340
Yeah.

701
00:43:05,341 --> 00:43:05,860
Okay.

702
00:43:06,060 --> 00:43:08,140
That's, that's really amazing.

703
00:43:08,465 --> 00:43:12,780
You know, and more and more and
more people, I would say right now, there's

704
00:43:12,781 --> 00:43:16,460
more and more Klingon being done for
things other than Star Trek, the Klingon

705
00:43:16,461 --> 00:43:20,460
speakers are producing a lot more stuff
in Klingon than, than is needed for, you

706
00:43:20,461 --> 00:43:25,340
know, an episode here and there of, of a
TV show or a movie or something like that.

707
00:43:25,341 --> 00:43:29,740
So people are translating things and
writing novels and songs and poetry.

708
00:43:29,741 --> 00:43:34,180
There's, um, videos on
YouTube, all kinds of stuff going

709
00:43:34,181 --> 00:43:35,701
on, on in Klingon that has
nothing to do with Star Trek.

710
00:43:36,050 --> 00:43:38,020
So it's, it's, it's, it's
going and growing.

711
00:43:38,021 --> 00:43:43,260
Oh, I've seen, I've seen some Klingon
music videos and I've seen it, you

712
00:43:43,261 --> 00:43:49,060
know, incorporated into other properties
even, and it's, it's really interesting.

713
00:43:49,700 --> 00:43:57,180
Um, I would say it's, it's, it's amazing
to see that this one particular language

714
00:43:57,181 --> 00:44:05,460
has, has sort of transcended and even
it's like there is also a Klingon culture

715
00:44:05,461 --> 00:44:11,340
on earth almost because
you have the opera,

716
00:44:11,341 --> 00:44:12,780
you have music videos
and all that stuff out.

717
00:44:13,580 --> 00:44:19,940
Um, what was I, where
was I going with that?

718
00:44:20,140 --> 00:44:22,540
Um,

719
00:44:23,540 --> 00:44:29,220
you know, that's the, from a, from a
conlanging point of view that that's,

720
00:44:29,370 --> 00:44:33,900
that's, that's interesting too, because,
because when you make up a conlang, one

721
00:44:33,901 --> 00:44:39,460
of the things you do, I think, is
think about who is this conlang for?

722
00:44:39,610 --> 00:44:40,940
Why, why am I doing this?

723
00:44:41,090 --> 00:44:41,980
I'm going to make up a language.

724
00:44:41,981 --> 00:44:42,980
Why am I going to do this?

725
00:44:42,981 --> 00:44:45,301
You know, who's going to
speak it or assuming it's spoken?

726
00:44:46,270 --> 00:44:52,020
Um, so you have some kind of, uh, culture
in mind, a fantasy world, an outer space

727
00:44:52,021 --> 00:44:58,100
world, whatever it is, uh, some,
some lost, uh, population on earth.

728
00:44:58,101 --> 00:45:01,940
I don't know what, whatever people
are going to be speaking this thing.

729
00:45:02,890 --> 00:45:09,060
Uh, or you're doing it to,
to test the, you know, how

730
00:45:09,061 --> 00:45:11,380
far you can stretch
particular grammatical things.

731
00:45:12,100 --> 00:45:16,300
Um, and so on, um, so there's all
kinds of different reasons to do it.

732
00:45:16,575 --> 00:45:21,660
So for Klingon, the reason for doing it
initially is it was the language spoken

733
00:45:21,661 --> 00:45:25,100
by these outer space people doing their
outer space things, and it's some planet

734
00:45:25,101 --> 00:45:28,820
that's not earth and they're mean and
tough and warrior-like and all that, but

735
00:45:28,821 --> 00:45:32,061
they're their own society and talk about
whatever it is they talk about up there.

736
00:45:34,045 --> 00:45:37,246
But the people who are interested in the
language happened to be people on earth

737
00:45:37,460 --> 00:45:42,500
in the 20th, 21st century, and
they talk about earth things.

738
00:45:43,000 --> 00:45:48,861
And initially there wasn't enough vocabulary
to do that in any, in any smooth way.

739
00:45:49,250 --> 00:45:57,460
Uh, and the growth of the language more
and more and more is, uh, vocabulary-wise

740
00:45:57,461 --> 00:46:04,700
anyway, is earth, earth
things, things that humans talk

741
00:46:04,701 --> 00:46:06,900
about, uh, and stuff like
that, not, not dilithium crystals.

742
00:46:07,380 --> 00:46:07,700
Right?

743
00:46:07,701 --> 00:46:09,820
It's sugar crystals that
you put in your coffee.

744
00:46:10,520 --> 00:46:13,706
So it's a whole, it's a whole different,
whole different direction that it's going.

745
00:46:13,730 --> 00:46:16,860
So it's a, it's a, you know,
so who is this language for?

746
00:46:16,861 --> 00:46:17,780
Who's speaking this thing?

747
00:46:17,781 --> 00:46:20,341
Is it these outer space people
or is it everybody here on earth?

748
00:46:20,500 --> 00:46:24,660
It's just another language
like Spanish, French, and

749
00:46:24,661 --> 00:46:25,780
Esperanto, for example, you
know, is another language.

750
00:46:26,130 --> 00:46:27,820
It's a, it's an interesting
thing that's going on.

751
00:46:27,821 --> 00:46:29,100
Yeah.

752
00:46:29,460 --> 00:46:38,420
I think that's going to be a thing for
all, all, all the conlayers that do stuff

753
00:46:38,520 --> 00:46:45,260
for like these, these properties is from
now on thinking about the potential for

754
00:46:45,261 --> 00:46:53,780
that, because I mean, I think often, I
think nowadays it, it's going to always

755
00:46:53,781 --> 00:46:58,460
depend on like contracts and stuff and
whether like the studio allows you to do

756
00:46:58,635 --> 00:47:06,020
further building or whatever, but, um,
any one of these could catch on with the

757
00:47:06,021 --> 00:47:12,860
audience and now you've got to
think about the, the culture that you're

758
00:47:13,010 --> 00:47:14,940
building this for in world.

759
00:47:15,415 --> 00:47:21,020
And then you've got to think about the
real world audience of the thing, which.

760
00:47:21,570 --> 00:47:24,780
most conlayers are not thinking about
it because we're doing it for ourselves.

761
00:47:25,120 --> 00:47:28,500
But like when you're
doing it for the properties

762
00:47:28,501 --> 00:47:30,140
now, I think that's
going to be a factor.

763
00:47:30,790 --> 00:47:33,260
Um, exactly.

764
00:47:33,261 --> 00:47:33,660
Yeah.

765
00:47:33,661 --> 00:47:40,860
And, you know, and this is, this is not,
as you say, this is, this is not unique

766
00:47:40,960 --> 00:47:46,020
to Clingon, there was a very
interesting gathering about

767
00:47:46,021 --> 00:47:47,980
a year ago, uh, at MIT in, in
Cambridge, Massachusetts.

768
00:47:48,930 --> 00:47:54,220
Um, the, they were doing a study, they
were doing brain scans on speakers of

769
00:47:54,221 --> 00:47:58,940
conlangs to see if when you, when
you process a conlang is the same part of

770
00:47:58,941 --> 00:48:03,140
your brain firing, uh, as, as when
you process whatever your, your native

771
00:48:03,141 --> 00:48:05,660
languages or a natural
language or something like this.

772
00:48:06,235 --> 00:48:12,020
And so there was a speakers of Clingon
and Navi and Esperanto and Dothraki and,

773
00:48:12,170 --> 00:48:15,060
uh, and then probably
something else that I'm forgetting.

774
00:48:15,610 --> 00:48:20,100
Um, sort of all, all together in
the same place at the same time.

775
00:48:20,101 --> 00:48:25,420
And then, and the speakers talking
to each other learned about the other

776
00:48:25,545 --> 00:48:27,220
languages or the other
language communities.

777
00:48:27,221 --> 00:48:30,740
And although there are differences,
there are certain commonalities.

778
00:48:30,741 --> 00:48:34,860
And this, this one about making use of
a, of a language that's created for one

779
00:48:34,861 --> 00:48:39,460
culture, but using it for another
one, uh, was kind of across the board.

780
00:48:39,461 --> 00:48:45,620
So for example, uh, in, in Navi, the
language from Avatar, the Navi people

781
00:48:45,621 --> 00:48:49,460
don't sit down because that's something
about their, their bodies or whatever.

782
00:48:49,890 --> 00:48:52,020
So there's, you know, so
there's no word for chair,

783
00:48:52,021 --> 00:48:53,780
but of course the Navi
speakers on earth do sit down.

784
00:48:54,730 --> 00:48:56,660
What are they going to
do for a word for chair?

785
00:48:56,661 --> 00:48:59,940
And so I had to deal, deal with this,
the Navi speaking community on earth

786
00:48:59,941 --> 00:49:05,340
had to deal with it, the Navi
speaking world in, uh, on

787
00:49:05,341 --> 00:49:06,780
the, on the Pandora planet
did not have to deal with it.

788
00:49:06,781 --> 00:49:09,220
Yeah.

789
00:49:10,170 --> 00:49:12,140
That, that's, that's interesting.

790
00:49:12,141 --> 00:49:13,460
Yeah.

791
00:49:13,660 --> 00:49:17,420
Because the tail would prevent them
from sitting the way a human would.

792
00:49:17,470 --> 00:49:18,180
Right.

793
00:49:18,181 --> 00:49:19,460
Okay.

794
00:49:19,690 --> 00:49:21,540
That's, that's interesting.

795
00:49:21,690 --> 00:49:26,060
And it is interesting now that
like, there's this cross pollination.

796
00:49:26,061 --> 00:49:29,780
And that's another interesting,
interesting thing too about, about,

797
00:49:30,730 --> 00:49:31,780
yeah, yeah.

798
00:49:31,781 --> 00:49:36,340
That it sparked another thought about,
about making up a language for, for

799
00:49:36,341 --> 00:49:44,900
other, other beings, other
creatures is, um, you know,

800
00:49:44,901 --> 00:49:47,540
typically for years and years
and years up until Klingon.

801
00:49:47,541 --> 00:49:50,541
And it's not because Klingon is so
wonderful, but chronologically speaking,

802
00:49:50,695 --> 00:49:55,220
uh, if you go traveling around outer
space, encounter any kind of creature,

803
00:49:55,221 --> 00:49:58,260
whatever they look like, look like
sort of human, like, or look like a lizard

804
00:49:58,261 --> 00:50:02,700
or look like anything,
they, they talk generally,

805
00:50:02,701 --> 00:50:04,020
if it's an American movie,
they talk English, right?

806
00:50:04,820 --> 00:50:11,420
Um, but their, their mouths
don't necessarily want to do that.

807
00:50:12,020 --> 00:50:13,980
If there's some kind of
another, other sort of creature.

808
00:50:13,981 --> 00:50:16,660
So I've, I've worked on a couple
of languages where I looked at the

809
00:50:16,661 --> 00:50:20,740
character, at what the character looks
like, what their face looks like, what

810
00:50:20,741 --> 00:50:24,700
kind of appliance they're wearing as
part of a make and say, okay, you know,

811
00:50:25,150 --> 00:50:28,660
making this kind of a
sound would be something

812
00:50:28,661 --> 00:50:29,661
that would be
difficult for them to do.

813
00:50:30,180 --> 00:50:33,700
So whatever their language is,
wouldn't have that sound, right?

814
00:50:34,500 --> 00:50:36,260
Isn't that kind of thing, paying it,
paying it in the same way you're

815
00:50:36,261 --> 00:50:39,540
talking about the, the, the
Navi and sitting down in the tails.

816
00:50:39,541 --> 00:50:40,020
Yeah.

817
00:50:40,021 --> 00:50:42,260
If your lips don't go together
in a certain way, maybe

818
00:50:42,261 --> 00:50:43,661
you can't make rounded
vowels, that kind of thing.

819
00:50:44,190 --> 00:50:47,860
Oh, that's a, that's, that's
a huge thing to think about.

820
00:50:47,861 --> 00:50:52,580
Um, I just recently
started making a language.

821
00:50:52,581 --> 00:50:58,460
It's my version of the draconic
language that's listed in D&D, right?

822
00:50:58,461 --> 00:50:59,820
So it's for dragons, right?

823
00:51:00,670 --> 00:51:05,820
And so like one of the first decisions
I'm doing this on a stream and going

824
00:51:05,821 --> 00:51:10,780
with over it with my audience, and we
kind of decided that they would be able

825
00:51:10,781 --> 00:51:16,540
to do bilabials, but,
but, but, but, but, but like

826
00:51:16,541 --> 00:51:18,380
their lips wouldn't be
quite flexible to do rounding.

827
00:51:19,380 --> 00:51:22,460
And I don't know if
that's the right, like, right.

828
00:51:22,560 --> 00:51:23,560
Okay.

829
00:51:23,660 --> 00:51:24,860
I didn't, I didn't know that.

830
00:51:24,960 --> 00:51:26,620
Cause the example I just gave.

831
00:51:26,720 --> 00:51:27,660
Yeah.

832
00:51:27,661 --> 00:51:30,620
Like, I mean, I don't know if that's right.

833
00:51:30,621 --> 00:51:31,820
I'm not a herpetologist.

834
00:51:31,821 --> 00:51:38,540
I don't know exactly how capable
something with reptile lips would be of

835
00:51:38,690 --> 00:51:41,980
pronouncing different things, but
that was the reasoning that we had.

836
00:51:43,180 --> 00:51:50,540
And you, you gotta think about if you're
doing stuff for aliens that are not like

837
00:51:50,541 --> 00:51:57,980
humanoids, like Klingons
are, they could have

838
00:51:57,981 --> 00:51:58,540
beaks, they could
have like no nasal cavity.

839
00:51:58,690 --> 00:52:03,100
They could have all kinds of differences
that would restrict what sounds they

840
00:52:03,101 --> 00:52:07,500
could do, or they could
have differences that make

841
00:52:07,501 --> 00:52:08,540
them able to pronounce
things that humans can't.

842
00:52:08,640 --> 00:52:12,620
In which case, if you want to do that,
then you've got to bring in the sound

843
00:52:12,621 --> 00:52:17,580
guys and teach them some linguistics,
which I don't know if anybody's done.

844
00:52:17,730 --> 00:52:18,730
Right.

845
00:52:19,190 --> 00:52:24,700
Um, I think, I think, uh,
they've taught them linguistics.

846
00:52:24,850 --> 00:52:25,820
They've certainly brought them in.

847
00:52:25,821 --> 00:52:28,140
Yeah.

848
00:52:28,141 --> 00:52:28,940
Yeah.

849
00:52:29,090 --> 00:52:34,060
The sound effects languages
tend to just be sort of gibberish.

850
00:52:35,230 --> 00:52:38,620
Um, I would say.

851
00:52:38,621 --> 00:52:39,900
Not always.

852
00:52:39,901 --> 00:52:46,620
I made up a language for, for discovery,
uh, which, which is a language that, that

853
00:52:46,621 --> 00:52:49,500
from a, from a phonological
point of view, I really liked.

854
00:52:49,750 --> 00:52:50,860
I really liked the way it sounded.

855
00:52:50,861 --> 00:52:55,100
They actually did a great job, but when
they, when they produced it, when they did

856
00:52:55,101 --> 00:52:59,020
the post-production for it, they, they
electronically did something or other to

857
00:52:59,021 --> 00:53:03,420
it to make it echoey or
different pitched or something.

858
00:53:04,080 --> 00:53:07,340
So it sounded very strange to it and was
effective for the television show, but you

859
00:53:07,341 --> 00:53:10,620
couldn't hear the keen
phonology that I made up anymore.

860
00:53:10,621 --> 00:53:10,860
So.

861
00:53:10,861 --> 00:53:12,860
Oh, that's unfortunate.

862
00:53:13,110 --> 00:53:17,420
But, uh, yeah, it's, it's.

863
00:53:17,421 --> 00:53:18,460
And then they killed the character.

864
00:53:18,461 --> 00:53:19,420
So we're never going to hear it.

865
00:53:19,421 --> 00:53:19,820
Oh, well.

866
00:53:20,370 --> 00:53:24,220
Yeah.

867
00:53:24,345 --> 00:53:30,060
Well, I guess they, they didn't, they
didn't think that that was an important

868
00:53:30,210 --> 00:53:33,900
part of it to preserve,
but, uh, that's interesting.

869
00:53:34,750 --> 00:53:35,740
Well, right.

870
00:53:35,741 --> 00:53:39,820
And that's, and that's another thing to
think about when, when, when working on

871
00:53:39,821 --> 00:53:44,300
the films and the TV and stuff like that
is, is what the writers and the producers

872
00:53:44,301 --> 00:53:49,020
and the director and all
those people are primarily

873
00:53:49,021 --> 00:53:49,580
concerned about is
what does it sound like?

874
00:53:49,581 --> 00:53:50,780
Yeah.

875
00:53:50,930 --> 00:53:54,860
Cause what it means is what the subtitles
say, and they're not all that concerned

876
00:53:54,861 --> 00:53:59,100
about, about grammar or specifics
of vocabulary and stuff like that.

877
00:53:59,101 --> 00:54:01,020
They are very concerned
about what it sounds like.

878
00:54:01,021 --> 00:54:01,980
Right.

879
00:54:01,981 --> 00:54:05,580
And you just have to understand that as
a, as a, as a conlanger in this field, if

880
00:54:05,581 --> 00:54:08,940
there's a field, that's something
that you just have to bear in mind.

881
00:54:09,690 --> 00:54:16,060
And from what I've talked to other people
who have worked on like these conlanging

882
00:54:16,160 --> 00:54:18,322
projects, they care
about what it sounds

883
00:54:18,334 --> 00:54:21,980
like, but they're not very good at
describing what it should sound like.

884
00:54:21,981 --> 00:54:29,580
A lot of describing things as harsh or
guttural and things that a linguist don't

885
00:54:29,705 --> 00:54:30,780
know what that means.

886
00:54:30,781 --> 00:54:31,340
Right.

887
00:54:31,341 --> 00:54:31,580
Yeah.

888
00:54:31,581 --> 00:54:32,780
Klingon in the script.

889
00:54:32,980 --> 00:54:35,500
Exactly.

890
00:54:35,501 --> 00:54:35,980
Exactly.

891
00:54:35,981 --> 00:54:39,660
In the script for Star
Trek three, it says

892
00:54:39,661 --> 00:54:40,140
explicitly that Klingon
is a guttural language.

893
00:54:40,340 --> 00:54:41,500
All right.

894
00:54:41,501 --> 00:54:42,060
What does that mean?

895
00:54:42,061 --> 00:54:43,181
You have to figure that out.

896
00:54:44,570 --> 00:54:47,580
So we'll stick a uvular African in.

897
00:54:47,630 --> 00:54:52,540
Yeah, exactly.

898
00:54:52,541 --> 00:54:52,780
Yeah.

899
00:54:52,781 --> 00:54:54,380
That's what I did.

900
00:54:54,630 --> 00:54:58,460
Well, I think, I think we can wrap up.

901
00:54:58,510 --> 00:55:01,420
Thank you so much for coming on, Mark.

902
00:55:01,870 --> 00:55:06,220
And as a last thing.

903
00:55:06,221 --> 00:55:06,780
It's been fun.

904
00:55:06,781 --> 00:55:07,180
Thank you.

905
00:55:07,181 --> 00:55:15,340
Do you have any like general advice to
all of the conlangers out here who they may

906
00:55:15,341 --> 00:55:24,460
have been inspired to get into conlanging
by you or just anything, any sort of little

907
00:55:24,461 --> 00:55:28,060
nugget of advice you'd like
to give as a parting thought?

908
00:55:28,061 --> 00:55:29,061
Yeah, do it.

909
00:55:29,120 --> 00:55:30,140
Just keep doing it.

910
00:55:30,215 --> 00:55:38,620
It's fun, you know, and you're going to
learn so much about the language that you're

911
00:55:38,621 --> 00:55:41,820
making up, but also about other
languages, including natural languages.

912
00:55:41,821 --> 00:55:43,660
Just an incredible field.

913
00:55:43,661 --> 00:55:44,661
Yeah.

914
00:55:45,185 --> 00:55:47,500
I concur with that.

915
00:55:47,501 --> 00:55:53,900
I will say I started
conlanging in high school

916
00:55:53,901 --> 00:55:54,540
and then I ended up
getting a PhD in linguistics.

917
00:55:54,541 --> 00:55:57,260
So that could be the future.

918
00:55:57,420 --> 00:55:58,420
See?

919
00:55:59,070 --> 00:56:00,070
Yeah.

920
00:56:00,925 --> 00:56:03,260
Um, well, thank you.

921
00:56:03,335 --> 00:56:05,340
Thank you so much for being on Mark.

922
00:56:05,815 --> 00:56:14,620
And I was very happy to
have you on and, uh, and thank

923
00:56:14,621 --> 00:56:16,700
you all for listening or
watching as the case may be.

924
00:56:16,701 --> 00:56:21,500
And I'm going to say happy conlanging.

925
00:56:23,310 --> 00:56:26,140
Special thanks to my patrons on Patreon.

926
00:56:26,165 --> 00:56:30,700
If you go over there right now, you
can get early access to episodes.

927
00:56:31,425 --> 00:56:38,700
You can get access to scripts
for my solo episodes and you

928
00:56:38,701 --> 00:56:41,580
can go get access to exclusive
polls for tongues and rooms.

929
00:56:42,930 --> 00:56:52,380
Thank you to Cassandra Woodhouse,
Miles Ranovich, Jake Penny, Artifexian,

930
00:56:53,280 --> 00:57:00,620
Nicholas Norblog, Viren Patrick, Eloy
Varyana-Mentuleum, Sigourney Hunter,

931
00:57:01,520 --> 00:57:09,980
Sylvia Sotomayor, Connor Stewart-Roe,
Jeremiah, Anthony Dosimo, Jack Keens,

932
00:57:10,690 --> 00:57:15,548
Graca Grunk, Grammar
Antifa, Kay, Kenan

933
00:57:15,560 --> 00:57:21,180
Kigunda, Mintaka, Alexis
Hugelman, and Jesse.

934
00:57:25,505 --> 00:57:30,540
Conlangery's theme music is by Null Device.

935
00:57:30,541 --> 00:57:38,780
Conlangery is distributed under
a Creative Commons Attribution

936
00:57:38,781 --> 00:57:43,500
Non-Commercial Share
Alike 4.0 international license.

937
00:57:45,600 --> 00:57:56,380
[Music].