Khajiit's pronoun in Elsweyr, anyone notice "this one"?

opaj

Dracheimflug wrote: »

I'll try again.

Is there some lore explaining the use of the third person? It could be that it was a side effect of them being so relatively successfully subjugated, particularly in the future in the timeline of the single player games. In Elsweyr the invasion is only very recent and they are not yet subjected, so they are still talking first person.

The main quest giver at Senalana in Reaper's March, Centurion Burri, has something to say to this.

Burri notably speaks only in first person, and you are given the option to ask her about this. She admits that she was raised in Imperial culture and does not have the patience to speak "properly" as a result. Depending on your choices during the quest, she will speak "properly" and say "this one" out of respect for a certain character who heroically sacrifices himself.

Of course, there are a couple of things to keep in mind here.

1. She is far from the only Khajiit who neglects third person speech. This can often be attributed to writing errors, I think. (And not "being lazy"--this kind of mistake is a result of how unusual their speech is in combination with the sheer quantity of it, and would not result from people just not putting the extra work in!)

2. Though she refers to it as "proper speech", this doesn't necessarily mean that there's a specific cultural importance attributed to this speaking style. She admits that she was raised outside of normal Khajiiti culture, and this idea that there's a proper way of speaking may stem from her own misunderstanding.

Pevey

dazee wrote: »

A khajiit without THIS ONE is not a Khajiit. an Argonian who doesn't sound like they smoke 10 packs an hour is not an Argonian.

Ten packs a day, ouch. But also true. So true.

Dracheimflug

opaj wrote: »

Dracheimflug wrote: »

I'll try again.

Is there some lore explaining the use of the third person? It could be that it was a side effect of them being so relatively successfully subjugated, particularly in the future in the timeline of the single player games. In Elsweyr the invasion is only very recent and they are not yet subjected, so they are still talking first person.

The main quest giver at Senalana in Reaper's March, Centurion Burri, has something to say to this.

Burri notably speaks only in first person, and you are given the option to ask her about this. She admits that she was raised in Imperial culture and does not have the patience to speak "properly" as a result. Depending on your choices during the quest, she will speak "properly" and say "this one" out of respect for a certain character who heroically sacrifices himself.

Of course, there are a couple of things to keep in mind here.

1. She is far from the only Khajiit who neglects third person speech. This can often be attributed to writing errors, I think. (And not "being lazy"--this kind of mistake is a result of how unusual their speech is in combination with the sheer quantity of it, and would not result from people just not putting the extra work in!)

2. Though she refers to it as "proper speech", this doesn't necessarily mean that there's a specific cultural importance attributed to this speaking style. She admits that she was raised outside of normal Khajiiti culture, and this idea that there's a proper way of speaking may stem from her own misunderstanding.

It just seems backwards. 'This one' comes across as submissive, merely 'this one,' no name, no one special, not really an individual. Very non-cat-like. Even 'This Khajiit' would be stronger.

Nemesis7884

"this one" made them unique, loveable, cute...they sould stick to it

BrightOblivion

To be honest, it's more realistic that many of them, especially those in positions where they regularly interact with rigid Imperials and members of other cultures, to forego their linguistic idiosyncracies in an effort to not appear like bumpkins.

For instance, if you are dealing with a company or customers and want to be taken seriously, are you going to use words like "ain't" and sound like the flowerseller at the start of "My Fair Lady," or would you make an effort to speak properly? Yes, there might be a certain "folksy charm" to the former (to an extent), but does it make you seem intelligent? Trustworthy? Like someone who should be taken seriously?

This one suspects that, for the Khajiit, it is not so different.

Robo_Hobo

I've still noticed a lot of Khajiit using "this one", but they also still use "Khajiit" and "<Name>" to refer to themselves too. Moreso the latter than the former, but that makes sense, saying This One too often just feels repetitive. It works when Khajiit NPCs are far and few but in cities where they're the majority, the developers probably limit it so it doesn't get annoying for some people.

Personally I've always seen these mannerisms as more "slips" than concious word choice anyway - you even see Raz in some quests when he's using magic to disguise as an Altmer accidentally still say "this one" before he corrects himself to fit the cover.

It could stem from Ta'agra possibly having a more complex system for first person pronouns, wherein "This One" in Ta'agra could be a formal way to refer to yourself to unkown company, and "Khajiit" could be informal, and then when they use their name, it could be the respectful way to refer to themselves if they know you (since they probably wouldn't say their name if they don't want you to know it).

Anytime they use "I" would then just be because they just didn't happen to slip the Ta'agra mannerisms in, or they're more learned in Common.

Different Khajiit could make different levels of effort to conciously use Ta'agra mannerisms more, or less, too, for their own reasons - maybe one who uses it more conciously does so because they find it amusing how it annoys outsiders, and one who conciously uses it less could be in an effort to be more understandable for outsiders.

Dracheimflug

BrightOblivion wrote: »

To be honest, it's more realistic that many of them, especially those in positions where they regularly interact with rigid Imperials and members of other cultures, to forego their linguistic idiosyncracies in an effort to not appear like bumpkins.

For instance, if you are dealing with a company or customers and want to be taken seriously, are you going to use words like "ain't" and sound like the flowerseller at the start of "My Fair Lady," or would you make an effort to speak properly? Yes, there might be a certain "folksy charm" to the former (to an extent), but does it make you seem intelligent? Trustworthy? Like someone who should be taken seriously?

This one suspects that, for the Khajiit, it is not so different.

This is what I mean about it sounding submissive. If it really is the Khajiiti cultural norm, then it may even have originally been submissive to Azura.

gepe87

Maybe because its more appealing to skyrim fanboys.

Mageri

I’ve always felt that the use of “this one” was an adoption from Khajit time in slavery.
Slaves not being referred to by name but as “this one” started using the term themselves when learning the language?

Will be glad to be wrong though.