I have a question...

[conuly]

Occasionally, in latin, people show up asking for some translation for a tattoo. Why? Do you really want a cheesy sentiment (most of them are) forever on your body in a dead language you don't even speak? Do you honestly want to spend the rest of your life not only translating your tattoo to everyone but explaining that no, you don't actually speak Latin, some people in a Livejournal community translated it for you? Is it worth the risk that somebody will deliberately tell you something profane/funny just for the laugh (like the Japanese tattoo artist did with stupid white kids who wanted "something cool in Japanese" on their bodies...) I mean, what's the point? Why not just get it in English? That's the language you speak, after all.

Comments

[morganne13.livejournal.com]

Case and Point in favor of repeating things when you don't know what they mean.....

A guy my friend knew and didn't think much of asked her to tell him a pickup line in elvish. I told her that she should teach him something humiliating. She ended up teaching him..."I hunt for myself in the dark, and I am small." And he had no clue. She told him it meant something different. I'm not sure if he uses it, but if he ever does around someone who actually speaks elvish.......to be a fly on the wall at that moment.....

[catsluvdmb.livejournal.com]

Anybody who came up to me claiming to know Elvish, regardless of whether they were actually telling the truth or not, would automatically get shut down in my book.

That is a person spending too much time learning something useless and not enough time learning something that could propel them in the world^_~

[conuly]

That is a person spending too much time learning something useless and not enough time learning something that could propel them in the world^_~

So? I'm learning Latin, that's fairly useless. So is music history, but I enjoyed that, and I intend to start up with the piano properly sometime soon. Also, learning any language makes it easier to learn other languages, and it's fun. Why do things have to be useful?

[catsluvdmb.livejournal.com]

Actually, Latin is immensely useful if you plan on going into the sciences. I wish I had some working knowledge of Latin when I was studying zoology. It would have made understand scientific and medical terms much easier. Some colleges even MAKE you learn Latin if you're going into medicine.

Also, I think all history is useful, regardless of its specialty. If people didn't study history, then we'd forget it, and you don't want that happening.

I have a friend who went to the trouble of learning Elvish, and dropped out of college, got a shitty job, and can barely pay her bills. But she can speak Elvish! It just seems to me there's a lot of other languages that you can learn and then utilize to get a job other than in the retail/service industry.

[conuly]

See, your friend had other issues going on than the elvish thing. But as a part time conlanger, I don't think that learning elvish is wrong.