system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[Doctor Who] Do Daleks have an oral tradition?

In the recovered Satellite 5 security report code named *The Parting of the Ways,* the enigmatic man called the Doctor claims that the Dalek race as a whole is deathly terrified of him. He even goes so far as to say that in the old Dalek legends, he's referred to as "The Oncoming Storm."

I've seen the recordings. Daleks aren't big on poetry. They roll in with their light bulbs flashing, screaming "EX-TERM-IN-ATE" at their prey before gunning them down on sight. Even when they've been recorded talking to one other, they're observed barking curt orders at each other, with no time devoted to chit-chat.

My question: how does a race so singularly devoted to ruthless logic and senseless murder spare the time for telling stories and legends? How did these cold, almost mechanical beings come up with a name like "The Oncoming Storm"? Do they have an oral tradition--even fables and fairy tales?

[](/changeling) If anyone asks, this is for my xenoanthropology paper.
gpt
my guess is issues wth how the TARDIS translates things from Gallifreyan to Dalek and then back into English. You forget these are three very different species talking in three very different languages.

The TARDIS has to take languages that are extremely literal and translate languages that are mostly complex metaphors.

Gallifreyan might be very poetic and it uses such phrases as "oncoming storm" to describe a concept. This concept in Dalek is "giant ball of angry fuck thats coming your way", which in Dalek actually sounds like "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAKAAAAAAAGH!!!!!!"

Daleks dont really say the word Exterminate. Thats a human word to describe a Dalek concept. They probably speak in some form of Binary and sound like buzzers or a squawking megaphone.


If you want an example of how this works in Canon. At the battle of Demons Run, Amy's Daughter Melody Pond was looked after briefly by a soldier from the Gamma Forest. She had put a prayer leaf in the childs' cot as per their traditions, however,  the name was mistranslated and the order reaaranged, it was written River Song. As these were the Gamman words that best matched the Name. When Kovarian and the Silence took it, they transliterated it without the TARDIS and her name stuck.