The Library of Congress has an official standard for abbreviations of different languages. It's a long list, because, well, there are lots and lots of languages that might be mentioned in the Library of Congress. In fact, the standard is so thorough that it includes Klingon. (Via Hilary Mason)

  • danimagoo

    I’m disappointed none of Tolkien’s languages are listed.

    • IamInnocent

       Congress still resist the British Islands overlords.

    • pKp

      OMG, you’re right. Who lists Klingon and not Quenya ? That’s ridiculous, especially when there must have been a lot more references to the latter…

    • renke

      in ISO639-2 Quenya is included in “art” (artificial languages). But take a look at ISO639-3! http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=qya LoC should use the more comprehensive standard, imo

      • Antinous / Moderator

        Are Noldorin, Telerin, etc. all lumped in together?

        • renke

           yes, ISO639-2 uses some collective language codes; not only art (artificial languages) but also conglomerates like “aus” (Australien languages) and “cel” (Celtic languages)

  • MattLeidholm

    The Library of Congress is only listing the languages categorized by ISO 639-2, which defined Klingon (or tlhIngan Hol) as well as other constructed languages. Because Klingon has a formally defined but unusual syntax–created by linguist Marc Okrand–it is studied as much by fans of constructed languages than by Trekkies.

    • heckblazer

      Indeed, IIRC Klingon has more speakers than Navajo.

      • http://twitter.com/loghaD loghaD 

        You’re probably thinking of this article by The Onion: http://www.theonion.com/articles/klingon-speakers-now-outnumber-navajo-speakers,709/

        In reality, there are probably fewer than 50 Klingon-speakers (with a decent degree of conversational fluency), and probably more than 120 000 Navajo-speakers.

        It’s true as MattLeidHolm says, however, that many of us are more interested in language than we are in Star Trek.
        When I started studying Klingon, I still thought Klingons were the pointy-eared guys, and I thought Captain Picard was Captain Kirk.

  • show me

    Last I checked, Klingons are not our Galactic Overlords. All they have on us is cloaking technology, and they always attack before they are ready, and are usually easily defeated.

  • http://www.facebook.com/neowolfwitch Wolf Ilandl Butler

    No Na’vi. Very disappointed. 

  • Paul Renault

    No Chiac?   WTF?

    Dano Leblanc’s Acadieman – Au Call Center.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGTcM4xKUUo

  • eldritch

    Qapla’!

  • Timmy Corkery

    Wait — ALL the Salish languages are lumped into ONE listing?! Uh… hm.

  • http://twitter.com/loghaD loghaD 

    The Library of Congress contains at least one text in Klingon: “The Klingon Hamlet”, published by the Klingon Language Institute.
    They also have a copy of HolQeD (Volume 1, #1), the KLI’s formerly quarterly journal, as well as at least two of Marc Okrand’s books on the subject.

    Their standard also includes Esperanto, Lojban, Volapük, Blissymbols and Ido.

  • Brian_Barker

    For those who want Klingon, rather than Esperanto, as the international language see http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=8TQGVh025E4