Klingon: does anyone actually use pIqaD, or is the Latin transliteration sufficient?

Question

Having just started the Duolingo Klingon course, I'm wondering if anybody is using the Klingon writing system (pIqaD) at all, or whether the Latin transliteration is always used?

As the characters look pretty hard to learn for someone with a Western background, I tend towards the transliteration only; I guess one issue is a cursive (ie handwriting) script, as the original characters seem hard to write by hand.

Answer 1

The official Klingon orthography according to the Klingon Language Institute is the Latin transcription. It is what Marc Okrand, the language's creator, developed and uses.

The Klingon script used in from Star Trek: the Next Generation on, known as the Okuda script (Michael Okuda was the set designer for Next Generation), is used, but it's worth noting that while the sounds of Klingon have been mapped onto these letters, the movies and shows just put random jumbles of letters on signs and things (this may not be true of Star Trek: Discovery, however -- I've heard they may actually have translated the signage). It's also not the only Klingon script to have been used -- according to an article in HolQeD, the Klingon Language Institute's journal, the 1980 U.S.S. Enterprise Officer's Manual (now out of print) featured a completely different Klingon script, though this one was a mere way of encoding English text rather than being mapped onto Klingon phonemes (Okrand did not publish The Klingon Dictionary until 1985, after all).

Given this sort of background, you can by no means take for granted that the Okuda script is the "real" Klingon pIqaD, even though it will be occasionally used to write Klingon. The Okrand transliteration is the only truly official orthography.

In any case, resources and activities written in Klingon are more often written using the official Okrand transliteration than with the Okuda script -- the Klingon subtitles on Star Trek: Discovery, for one example, are in the transliteration (can't make Unicode add new characters for such things, after all!) In general, you'll be fine with just the transliteration -- in fact, you may have an easier time, as the transliteration is easy to type. That said, no one will judge you if you use the Okuda script because you want the writing to feel less Terran or something.

Answer 2

pIqaD shows up here and there, but in my experience (which is 20 years old, but I haven't seen much to contradict it), its use is emblematic. People will put a word up here and there, and it will appear in T-shirts; but people do not read connected texts in it.

As is, pIqaD is indeed unwritable with a pen. I experimented in my time with ways of making it more writeable: see my handiwork at Klingonska Akademien, linked from the discussion of some pictures of pI­qaD.

Answer 3

Mark Shoulson revived the proposal to encode Klingon in Unicode, in a 2016 document called “pIqaD (Klingon) and its Usage.” In it, he gives several examples, including a comic book, Star Trek: [Manifest Destiny] #1, translated into Klingon and printed almost entirely in pIqaD.

The most recent example I’ve seen of someone using pIqaD in a context that has nothing to do with Star Trek is that some fans of the pro soccer player Meghan Klingenberg, of the Portland Thorns, bring this banner to all her home games in Portland, Oregon (photo by Molly Blue):

The Klingon Wiki has a list of fonts that support Klingon, including several that encode it in the region of the Private Use Area standardized by the Linux Kernel, and later, the ConScript Unicode Registry and adopted by the Klingon Language Instutute. There are, additionally, several TeX packages not listed there that support Klingon.

The font downloads and some other support files are on this page, although you might not necessarily want to install the registry entries, It’s usable; I got this image in LuaLaTeX with the KAG pIqaD font, complete with kerning:

Here is the same template with the font Klingon pIqaD vaHbo’ by Mike Neft:

Source code, in case the template is useful:

\documentclass[preview,varwidth]{standalone}

\usepackage{graphicx}
\usepackage{fontspec}

\makeatletter
%% Use the ISO 639 language code tlh as an abbreviation.
\newcommand\@tlhfontname{pIqaD}

%% Because many Klingon fonts do not contain a Latin alphabet, take the ratio
%% of the height of the H in the main text font to either the Latin H of the
%% the pIqaD font if it contains one, or the Klingon H if it does not, and
%% scale the pIqaD by that ratio.  This means pIqaD will match the height of
%% English.
\newlength{\@capheight}
\settoheight{\@capheight}{\normalfont H}

\newlength{\@tlhheight}
\settoheight{\@tlhheight}{{\fontspec{\@tlhfontname}
                           \iffontchar\font`H
                              H
                           \else
                              \symbol{"F8D6}
                           \fi}}

\newcommand{\@capratio}{\strip@pt\dimexpr 1.0pt *
                        \numexpr\@capheight\relax /
                        \numexpr\@tlhheight\relax\relax }

%% For symmetry with Polyglossia's \sanskritfont, \sanskrittext,
%% \devanagarifont, etc.
\newfontfamily{\klingonfont}{\@tlhfontname}[Scale=\@capratio]

\newcommand\klingontext[1]{{\klingonfont #1\relax}}

%% It's more consistent with LaTeX conventions to define strictly text-mode
%% symbols with names like \texttlhA than \klingonA, and this is a Very
%% Serious Project™.
\newcommand\texttlhA{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D0}}}
\newcommand\texttlhB{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D1}}}
\newcommand\texttlhCH{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D2}}}
\newcommand\texttlhD{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D3}}}
\newcommand\texttlhE{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D4}}}
\newcommand\texttlhGH{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D5}}}
\newcommand\texttlhH{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D6}}}
\newcommand\texttlhI{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D7}}}
\newcommand\texttlhJ{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D8}}}
\newcommand\texttlhL{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8D9}}}
\newcommand\texttlhM{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8DA}}}
\newcommand\texttlhN{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8DB}}}
\newcommand\texttlhNG{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8DC}}}
\newcommand\texttlhO{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8DD}}}
\newcommand\texttlhP{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8DE}}}
\newcommand\texttlhQ{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8DF}}}
\newcommand\texttlhQH{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E0}}}
\newcommand\texttlhR{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E1}}}
\newcommand\texttlhS{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E2}}}
\newcommand\texttlhT{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E3}}}
\newcommand\texttlhTLH{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E4}}}
\newcommand\texttlhU{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E5}}}
\newcommand\texttlhV{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E6}}}
\newcommand\texttlhW{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E7}}}
\newcommand\texttlhY{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E8}}}
\newcommand\texttlhGlott{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8E9}}}
\newcommand\texttlhZero{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F0}}}
\newcommand\texttlhOne{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F1}}}
\newcommand\texttlhTwo{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F2}}}
\newcommand\texttlhThree{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F3}}}
\newcommand\texttlhFour{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F4}}}
\newcommand\texttlhFive{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F5}}}
\newcommand\texttlhSix{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F6}}}
\newcommand\texttlhSeven{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F7}}}
\newcommand\texttlhEight{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F8}}}
\newcommand\texttlhNine{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8F9}}}
\newcommand\texttlhComma{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8FD}}}
\newcommand\texttlhStop{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8FE}}}
\newcommand\texttlhMumm{\klingontext{\symbol{"F8FF}}}

\makeatother

\newcommand\tlhIngenbergh{\texttlhTLH\texttlhL\texttlhI\texttlhNG%
\texttlhE\texttlhN\texttlhB\texttlhE\texttlhR\texttlhGH}
% Could also directly insert the Unicode PUA characters.
\newlength{\nameWidth}
\settowidth{\nameWidth}{\tlhIngenbergh}

\begin{document}

\resizebox{\nameWidth}{!}{\texttlhMumm} \\
\tlhIngenbergh

\end{document}