Qapla’! A Klingon Guide to Intellectual Property

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Paramount Pictures Corporation v. Axanar Productions, Inc.[1]  was filed by the studios that own the Star Trek franchise against an independent studio producing a fan-made faux-documentary about a pivotal event in the fictional Star Trek chronology.  The case, asserting various claims for copyright and trademark infringement, took an interesting turn last week.

Among the items over which Paramount claims ownership is the artificial language developed for the television and movie series for the fictional Klingon race.  This claim prompted the Language Creation Society (“LCS”), through its attorney Marc Randazza, to file an amicus brief arguing, inter alia, that the Klingon language, though artificial, was a real language over which ownership could not be asserted, anymore than it could be asserted over any other language. 

The LCS originated from the UC Berkeley student group, also named the Language Creation Society (UCB-LCS). It is a nonprofit corporation dedicated to assisting with the construction of artificial languages for fictional works and other uses.

The brief itself is as elegant and sharply pointed as a bat’leth:

In 1984, Marc Okrand invented the Klingon language. Before that, when actors played Klingons in Star Trek television programs or movies, they simply uttered guttural sounds or spoke in English (Federation Standard). Given that Paramount Pictures commissioned the creation of some of the language, it is understandable that Paramount might feel some sense of ownership over the creation. But, feeling ownership and having ownership are not the same thing. The language has taken on a life of its own. Thousands of people began studying it, building upon it, and using it to communicate among themselves. As the Klingon proverb says, [“we succeed together in a greater whole.”]

The greater whole is a living community of Klingon speakers. In fact, there are groups of people for whom Klingon is their only common language. There are friends who only speak Klingon to each other. In fact, at least one child was initially raised as a native speaker of Klingon. Now that Klingon has become an actual living language, Paramount seeks to reach out and stake its ownership by using copyright law. But, as “Klingons do not surrender”, neither do those who speak Klingon. Star Trek: The Next Generation, “The Emissary” (orig. air June 29, 1989) (stardate 42901.3).

Plaintiffs claim copyright over the entire Klingon language, not any particular words or portions of dialogue from any episodes of Star Trek, but in the entire vocabulary, graphemes, and grammar rules of Klingon. [“A fool and his head are soon parted.”]

Plaintiff Paramount Pictures Corporation (“Paramount”) has claimed this copyright interest for many years, but has not actually asserted it in court before now – most likely because the notion of it [“lacks reasons”].

Various organizations such as the Klingon Language Institute, as well as individual linguistic scholars, have studied and used the Klingon language for years. Although various licensing arrangements were made at times, they could not have truly imagined that the day would come that Paramount would seek to claim ownership over their work, and to potentially threaten their intra-personal communication. It is not that they were [“pathetic or arrogant”] when it comes to intellectual property rights. It would not take a Vulcan to explain their logic – even the Pakleds would know that nobody can “own” a language.[2]

Indeed, the Klingon language has evolved from its original novelty purpose. Classic works such as Hamlet, The Epic of Gilgamesh, and Much Ado About Nothing have been translated into Klingon. The Klingon Language Institute has created a large body of new words for the language independently of its creators or Paramount and its affiliates.

Klingon is hardly the first constructed language to enjoy popular enthusiasm.  In the late 19th century, L.L. Zamenhof and his followers proposed Esperanto as a new international lingua franca and a key to world peace (it’s estimated that Esperanto has as many as 2 million speakers worldwide).  J.R.R. Tolkien, a philologist by training, famously constructed a number of languages for use in The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and related works.  And George R.R. Maritin’s Song of Fire and Ice series and its wildly popular televised adaptation Game of Thrones contain a number of constructed languages, at least two of which (Dothraki and Valyrian) have been sufficiently developed to be used for dialogue.

While the tone of the LCS brief is whimsical, and its subject matter entertaining, the outcome is likely to be of significant importance in the entertainment world.  If the court holds that Paramount may claim ownership over the entire Klingon language, the many people who have been making use of the language for over thirty years may be subject to significant liability.  Conversely, a contrary holding would create opportunities for the creation of a myriad works in constructed languages like Dothraki, which may in turn dilute franchise owners’ right to direct the evolution of languages created specifically for their works.



[1] Paramount Pictures Corporation v. Axanar Productions, Inc., Case No. 2:15-cv-09938-RGK-E (C.D. Cal.) (Amicus Br. Apr. 27, 2016).  Herein, “Am. Br. at __” refers to the brief filed by the Language Creation Society as amicus curiae.
 
[2] Am. Br. at 2-3 (some internal citations omitted).  The original brief, which should be savored like fine bloodwine, contains maxims written out in the artificial Klingon script, with transliterations and translations set forth in footnotes.  The bracketed quotes in this excerpt are the translations provided by LCS in its brief.

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