Possibly ignorant question
- Thread starter I_like_andorians
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Galactic Basic Standard
Well, if it's all the same you and your doorman, I'll thank you to keep your frogs out of my video! Harrumph! But my hovercraft is full of eels...
Not exactly.
When Quark, Rom and Nog have to fix their UTs, we briefly hear them speak the native Ferengi language while they’re doing it.
When the scene shifts to the Ferengi characters’ POV, we (for dramatic license) hear them speak English, but we don’t hear the humans speak at all - they only make crude gestures (because of course they don’t speak Ferengi).
At no point during the episode do we ever hear the humans actually speak anything other than English.
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When they showed the Ferengi point of view there was distortions when the humans spoke:
QUARK: Don't be ridiculous. The bar was showing a profit.
(Enter two MPs followed by Wainwright, Nurse Garland and Professor Carlson.)
CARLSON: (carefully and with gestures) Welcome to Earth. We mean you no harm.
(The next is distorted, just as the Ferengi hear it.)
CARLSON: We're sorry we had to separate you from your ship, but I'm sure you can understand that we have lots of questions for you. ( I can't understand what they're saying here in native human without the UT point of view therefore it may not be real world English)
QUARK: Did you understand a word of that?
…
(And later, Quark is sitting on one of the examination tables while Nurse Garland takes his blood pressure.)
GARLAND: (distorted) Two fifty over one sixty seven. If you were human, I'd say you were due for a heart attack. ( I can't understand what they're saying here in native human without the UT point of view therefore it may not be real world English)
QUARK: Gran fat ari oo-mox? Ya ta fa.
GARLAND: I've given them every medical test I can think of, but the only thing I can tell you for sure is they're not human.
Then it's possible that real world (our world) English is not the same as in-universe English or whatever it's called that they're speaking there.
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We also see written English basically everywhere, through the eyes of all sorts of people not limited to our heroes. Even the utter aliens of "Blink of an Eye" write in English when no true English speaker is looking.
UTs in our television sets covers most bases but of course not all of them - why does it sometimes fail us, or only give us subtitles rather than voice translations? But UTs in every ear in the galaxy works fine as well. In which case one might think the whole concept of "language" would be dead. If mutual understanding is outsourced to this device, everybody probably just mutters something uniquely incomprehensible in a haphazard language he or she himself developed as the best means of triggering the UT...
OTOH, you are getting the UT point of view. It's just the point of view of a broken UT.
Timo Saloniemi
UTs in our television sets covers most bases but of course not all of them - why does it sometimes fail us, or only give us subtitles rather than voice translations? But UTs in every ear in the galaxy works fine as well. In which case one might think the whole concept of "language" would be dead. If mutual understanding is outsourced to this device, everybody probably just mutters something uniquely incomprehensible in a haphazard language he or she himself developed as the best means of triggering the UT...
OTOH, you are getting the UT point of view. It's just the point of view of a broken UT.
Timo Saloniemi
^ I'd chalk that up to simple dramatic license again. When the scene is from the Ferengi POV, we have to hear them speak English, even though they really aren't. So whatever the Americans are saying, they're obviously speaking English, but we aren't supposed to understand them (because the Ferengi can't).
It's like The Hunt For Red October where we hear Russian characters speak English among themselves. They're really speaking Russian, we just hear Englilsh because it's easier for the viewer. Same story here.
It's like The Hunt For Red October where we hear Russian characters speak English among themselves. They're really speaking Russian, we just hear Englilsh because it's easier for the viewer. Same story here.
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Even Klingons and Organians speak (and read) English!
http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x26/Errand_of_Mercy_118.JPG
http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x26/Errand_of_Mercy_118.JPG
Federation Standard. I think that is from the Starfleet Technical Manual.
over 2 billion humans of Han's descent...
They never should have installed that flux capacitor in the Millennium Falcon...
Hoshi invented it.
Yeah, I would. Slightly odd phrasing, but it's stll English. And of course the reason it's there is so we can see Chakotay gradually be converted to their cause.
No, she invented linguacode. The UT was adapted from slaver box technology.
TAS?
Some old novels from the 80's, possibly by Diane Duane, had "Anglish" as the dominant language of 23rd century humans.
The old Gold Key comics had the crew talking Esperanto
The old Gold Key comics had the crew talking Esperanto
If the universal translator was operational at the time or there's an unofficial universal translator in place for the sake of the audience she may have said "T'POL: I was instructed to speak [User's Language Here] during this voyage, and I'd appreciate it if you'd respect that. " for all we know.
I misremembered. Artificial gravity was discovered in a stasis box, per TAS. I don't know why I thought it was the universal translator.
[User's Language Here] brings up a problem of what to do when in a multi-lingual setting. How many languages did T'pol know? Which [User's Language Here] was she to choose if multiple users with multiple languages were present?
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