Not a stupid question at all, I'll do my best to answer! It might help to think of the dragon language as you would another foreign language - let's take German for example. In German, the word for "dragon" is "Drachen". In Dovahzul, the word for "dragon" is "Dovah". Now maybe the German "Drachen" isn't exactly like the English word "dragon", and maybe the Dovahzul "Dovah" isn't exactly like "dragon" either, but "dragon" is the closest translation for the word "Dovah".

Why "dragon" is "Dovah" or why "guide" is "Aak" is harder to explain since it's a constructed language. Someone at Bethesda decided they sounded cool!

If by any chance the question wasn't about why the translations are as such, but rather *how* the translating is done, it seems to function in such a manner as to browse the dictionary for an exact translation of each word, and if there is no match it is left untranslated.

The translations are word-by-word, literal translations from my experience.

Kiin irl means people, but to simplify it he said Dovahkiin means dragon baby or dragon born made up, Tolaba Koomaba (your welcome in a random language)