Entry tags:
... what?
So after spending my walking time in the last couple of days cooking up potential explanations for how language translation works on SGA (because we've got multiple languages on Earth, but only one set of aliens who use a spoken language other than English, yet we keep seeing alien writing systems that we're told explicitly not everyone can read), I went and checked Gateworld to make sure that what I'd come up with didn't contradict the available canon on the universal translator.
There was no article. Okay: so I Googled. Wikipedia provided this:
In the television shows Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis, there are no personal translation devices used, and most alien and Human cultures on other planets speak English. The makers of the show have themselves admitted this on the main SG-1 site, stating that this is to save spending ten minutes an episode on characters learning a new language [...] In the season 8 finale of SG-1, “Moebius (Part II),” the characters go back in time to 3000 B.C. and one of them teaches English to the people there. Fans have speculated that the language could have been secretly adopted then and carried on from planet to planet, leading to today’s situation in which most planets speak English. This interpretation is severely strained, to say the least; it entirely lacks any sort of scientific credibility, especially considering the fact that almost every alien race encountered in every Stargate series speaks nearly perfect, modern English, when a language would almost certainly change beyond recognition in that length of time [...]
Given that the Asgard and the Ancients were existent in the same 'Alliance of Four Great Races', it is possible that English was used as the universal language mentioned in "The Torment of Tantalus". Considering also that both races play or played a pivotal role in the interplanetary relations of several galaxies, as well as dealings with the Goa'uld, this could be the explanation of the existence of English as a semi-universal language.
Seriously? I mean, I'd been bemoaning the universal translation tech in the stargates as shitty and logically slap-dash even by the standards of SGA's bullshit science, but now you're telling me that there is no universal translater? That it's complete fanon, apparently embraced to fill the gaping logical void left in canon?
Seriously? I'm asking for actual confirmation here. This is honestly hard to wrap my head around.
There was no article. Okay: so I Googled. Wikipedia provided this:
In the television shows Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis, there are no personal translation devices used, and most alien and Human cultures on other planets speak English. The makers of the show have themselves admitted this on the main SG-1 site, stating that this is to save spending ten minutes an episode on characters learning a new language [...] In the season 8 finale of SG-1, “Moebius (Part II),” the characters go back in time to 3000 B.C. and one of them teaches English to the people there. Fans have speculated that the language could have been secretly adopted then and carried on from planet to planet, leading to today’s situation in which most planets speak English. This interpretation is severely strained, to say the least; it entirely lacks any sort of scientific credibility, especially considering the fact that almost every alien race encountered in every Stargate series speaks nearly perfect, modern English, when a language would almost certainly change beyond recognition in that length of time [...]
Given that the Asgard and the Ancients were existent in the same 'Alliance of Four Great Races', it is possible that English was used as the universal language mentioned in "The Torment of Tantalus". Considering also that both races play or played a pivotal role in the interplanetary relations of several galaxies, as well as dealings with the Goa'uld, this could be the explanation of the existence of English as a semi-universal language.
Seriously? I mean, I'd been bemoaning the universal translation tech in the stargates as shitty and logically slap-dash even by the standards of SGA's bullshit science, but now you're telling me that there is no universal translater? That it's complete fanon, apparently embraced to fill the gaping logical void left in canon?
Seriously? I'm asking for actual confirmation here. This is honestly hard to wrap my head around.