Thoughts on and Issues with Syntax, Vocabulary and Phonetics from a new Conlanger
Right now, I'm looking at some major over hauls of Fén. I think I've made a lot of mistakes and it might be in the interest of new conlangers seeking to make something from scratch [particularly Fantasy aimed] to hear me out and learn from my mistakes.
When I first started, it was a pretty amateurish thing that I intended to throw in the background for flavour. At that point I would have seen minor issues as something to potentially offer a quick fix around, but putting my conlang on a proper wiki has motivated me to try and over come a lot of these issues and make a consistant language which people could actually talk with. Considering I actually had/have a relatively well developed language save for a few rather deep difficulties or excep…
A New Bureaucracy - Voting
So, ever since the incident with Zelos, we're lacking bureaucrats on the wiki. I don't really like it, and we'd really need them to function.
This will, then, be a new voting. My idea is to structure it
like the previous vote, as to have it democratic.
The rules are the same as before, except where modified
appropriately:
- 1) Only admins can be nominated, but regular users can nominate only one person; admins can nominate one more admin in addition to themselves.
- 2) Anyone can vote. Every vote is worth one point.
- 2.1) Non-nominated people have one pro vote and one con vote.
- 2.2) Nominated people have one pro vote on everyone but themselves, and one con vote on themselves.
- 3) Votes and nominations should be elaborated with a comment.
Current nominat…
Creating a Writing System
As I was thinking of making a unique writing system for one of my conlangs, I came across that perennial question for anyone doing the same. What kind of writing system should I choose. For the language in question, Aelatha, I want something both aesthetic and functional. I want eye candy with a purpose. So, I decided to weigh the pros and cons of different types of writing systems together. The following is a list of pros and cons of different writing systems and shows only my opinion, please comment and leave your opinions.
- 1 Alphabet
- 2 Syllabary
- 3 Logography
- 4 Abugida
- 5 In comparison to my conlang
- 6 Conclusion
In an alphabet, each graph (letter) represents one phone (sound), though there's no way you should be reading this without knowing what an al…
Styles of Conlanging: An Observation
Browsing through some of the languages here, I've noticed three major approaches or "styles" to constructing a language...
1) The cryptographers - This appears to be the most liberal form of conlanging. In its most basic form, the creator of the language simply replaces a "real-language" word with a new one, while more advanced forms tinker with grammatical elements such as word order and conjugation. Essentially, the resultant conlang is merely a "coded" form of the original language. This is not necessarily a negative approach, but without care it can lead to a language that is difficult to learn and understand due to a relative lack of consistent structure.
2) The phonologists - This is the form most encouraged by the opening template for…
Print 24
According to the recent report, smell-o- vision postcards in upcoming years will bang the market. There will be food printer, a device that lets travelers share not only the sights but also the aromas of exotic flavors. These are the things of future, but it depicts how much popular these postcards are becoming in present populace.
When postcard printing struck your mind, the first thought that appears is choosing the best printing company that without hassle and bustle offer quality services. Obviously it’s a matter of status so taking risk in choosing right product for right audience is unacceptable. Because only these kinds of tools can offer hype to your business and assist to achieve all business goals.
It spreads your agenda and attrac…
New Admin Votes - Abandoned Wiki
Since the admins have abandoned the wiki and are bloody inactive, I've decided to get us a new leadership. To cut the story short, I will give the rules of voting:
- 1) Anyone can be nominated, but users can nominate only one person, in addition to themselves.
- 2) Anyone can vote. Every vote is worth one point.
- 2.1) Non-nominated people have one pro vote and one con vote.
- 2.2) Nominated people have one pro vote on everyone but themselves, and one con vote on themselves.
- 3) Votes should be elaborated with a comment.
Current nominations and nominators:
- Elector Dark (nominator: himself)
- Waahlis (nominator: himself)
Current tally:
- Elector Dark
(+2)
- Pros:
- Razlem: "I'm not really active here anymore, but I vote for Elector Dark." (23/8/2012)
- Wattman: "Elector Dark…
- Pros:
Introducing irregularities in a conlang
I've been wondering how most natural languages produce irregularities. I've been having trouble seeing how I could make a verb or noun in Behru cesik irregular because there seems to be nothing in the phonology that would make the root irregular (most are ccvc or ccvcv).
Looks of the Conlang wikia
Personally, it looks to me like fresh poop :P I liked the old style better
Voynich Manuscript
Ever since I discovered the Voynich manuscript some months ago, I've been reading text about it, but it bugs me that I cannot read the thing. I am going to make a decyphering attempt some time soon, hopefully together with some linguistics-crazy friends. I know that I am attempting something damn near impossible, but if I do succseed, that will give me some in-depth attachment to languages, and some fame (A kid and his pals decyphered a secred language with no known relatives when all attepts before failed) :) Rostov-na-don 02:40, July 24, 2010 (UTC) Assumptions and Facts:
- The symbol that is simmilar to 'α\\\Ɔ' is most likely one glyph.
- It is most likely not isolating.
- It is most likely not polysynthetic.
- Due to the amount of words and the div…
Random Phonology
I just recently found a page ([1]) that generates random
phonologies out of seed numbers. This is one of my results:
Consonants
Bilabial
Bilabial
Dental
Palatal
Velar
Rounded
velar
Glottal
Palatalised
glottal
Nasal
m͡ɲ
m
n̪
ɲ
ŋ
ŋʷ
Stop
p͡c
p͡cʼ
b͡ɟ
p
pʼ
b
t̪
t̪ʼ
d̪
c
cʼ
ɟ
k
kʼ
g
Fricative
s̪
h
hʲ
Approximant
l̪
j
w̥
w
Vowels
Front
Back
High
i
u
Mid-low
ɛ
ɔ
Low
ɑ
/l̪ɑpɑn̪/
[l̪ɑpɑ̃n̪]
/t̪ʼɔŋʷw̥jɛŋʷ/
[t̪ʼɔ̃ŋʷw̥j̃ɛ̃ŋʷ]
/d̪ɔn̪pʼɔ/
[d̪ɔ̃mpʼɔ]
/pʼun̪ɑ/
[pʼũn̪ɑ]
/wupʼɑn̪/
[wupʼɑ̃n̪]
/hɑn̪l̪ɔŋʷ/
[hɑ̃n̪l̪ɔ̃ŋʷ]
/d̪jun̪w̥un̪/
[d̪ũn̪w̥ũn̪]
/t̪ʼɑw̥ɑn…
Adopting the Wiki - Adminship Votes
So, since our former admin, Emperor Zelos, "relocated" the wiki to be hosted under the domain of wikkii.com, and since Wikia doesn't delete wikis, I have decided to begin the process of creating a new government for this wiki.
Since I am the most senior still active member on the wiki (I presume), and have significant linguistical experience and resources, I will begin the adoption of this wiki to under mine, or someone else's, leadership.
This blog post will be the central position of it all.Here, you can comment, nominate and vote for alternate adopters, give their pros and cons (self-nomination allowed, self-voting disallowed - votes should have a logical basis) and discuss the process of adoption and our future.
As to prevent accidents, c…
Errors/Impossibilities of some Conlangs
I've been looking around the net looking for conlangs when I saw a major error: the language had seven cases: Nominative, Accusative, Ergative, Absolutive, Transitive, Oblique and Partitive :P
Have you noticed any major errors? Rostov-na-don 03:03, July 10, 2010 (UTC)
Question on Proto-Indo-European
Hello, I've been recently very moved by the movie Prometheus, in which the android 'David' learns from an monitor on the linguistics of 'Proto-Indo-European' or 'PIE', this is the language of the 'Engineers'. Do any of you know of an English to PIE translator, because I've googled several and it won't even allow we to access the ones at the top of the search. I've also been looking around on Conlang, and I couldn't find any PIE pages. I really like the sound of this language, can anyone help me?
Thank You!
---Sunkist- 09:16, June 24, 2012 (UTC)
Not leaving
Apperently people think I am going to just disappear, but I am not. I will still be here to ensure it is atleast not being vandalized The Emperor Zelos 11:30, June 4, 2012 (UTC)
Enjoy the show!
I hope you all will enjoy the show, and perhaps partake in it...!
Now, the new prototype Main page is up, and has been accordingly updated. I would like to thank all my friends for making this possible... and blah, blah, blah. A special thanks to Mamûnám ontā́ bán, though.
The current Main page is, as mentioned, preliminary. Any advices on it are welcome, as well as all criticism! It currently looks absolutely the best with Firefox (size 16 and Calibri) though!
Thus, I will move on to my new projects:
- Improving the Community portal. And community...
I have begun "sketching" a layout similar to that of the Main page.
- Improving and introducing the wiki Forum. Last used in March 2011...
Actually, not much needed to be done. May I ask if we maybe should …
Your attention, please!
Now that I have your attention, please be seated.
I have at an earlier instance complained on the structure and design of this wiki, and started a smaller redesign by myself. However, since I've worked almost completely by myself, my work is rather subjective. I would like any critisism, good as well as bad, on my ideas and creations.
The names are preliminary as well.
- This is my preliminary outline for the main page . Compare it
with the . It might currently just seem like a very long list, but
I will need the space available on the Main page to structure it
fully.
- The current Main page
- The proposed Main page.
- Secondly, I've improved the "Conlang Info"-template (according
to me), which is now called the "Definition"-template.
- The current Conlang…
Introducing Complexity
One aspect of Shabkiuza that bothered me was its regularity. In particular, the verbal system was far too regular, with only one verb with any irregularity, and that only in one form. Clearly that's not realistic, even with a language academy to maintain order.
Originally, all words had stress of the first syllable, no matter what the morphology. So gamma- became gammat, gammanat, gammanatet, etc. For the most part, this is still the case, although the last example has secondary stress on the penult. I started running into problems with my gerand form, which uses -kko as the ending.
Since consonant length is phonemic, I got forms like gammakko, which two double consonants in a row. It dragged down the pronunciation, and it just didn't sound r…
Productive and Unproductive Word Generation
As I've mentioned before, Shabkiuza has a high degree of regularity, but I don't want it to be completely regular. This dichotomy is emerging, at the moment, in my attempts to build a vocabulary.
I downloaded a list of the word base of Simple English, and I have been assigning words to it. I have also found a list of all English language words, which includes not just root words but every plural form, every -ing and -ed on the end of the verb, as a separate entry.
When I enter a gloss in the simple list, it appears automatically in the full list. I can then visit it, fill in the glosses for the morphological forms. But that doesn't address the other associated words. For example, -ness and -ive and -tion and -ful and -ly endings. These…
Beyond Tense and Case
One of the most challenging, and almost most fun parts of Shabkiuza for me has been the development of complex grammatical structures: relative clauses, other subordinate clauses, if/then constructions, why and because, etc. In the initial stages of a language, attention so often falls on simple declaratives, and perhaps interrogatives. Grammar books may direct us towards paying attention to command forms or vocatives or many of the other uses that language has.
However, I feel that subordinate clauses often get neglected. In my language, which uses particles to indicate relationship between noun and verb, the system emerged quite naturally. Normally, these markers behave like prepositions, introducing a relationship between the verb a…
Developing Vocabulary
Like many conlangers, when confronted with the task of building vocabulary, I turned to the idea of a generator. However, I did not like any of the extant choices, and so I built my own.
It was not such a difficult task--I built the whole thing in Excel. I have a fairly simple syllable structure in Shabkiuza, with a limited number of syllables per word. I made a list of which sounds could fit into each place, then assigned each a percent chance of occurring. Some of the results were not sounds at all, but rather zero values, duplication of a following consonant or preceding vowel, or assimilation of N to the following consonant.
Each letter gets its own random seed, and the results are concatenated in one of several combinations. For ea…
Evidentiality
Another topic that fascinates me in language is that of evidentiality. Since the Wikipedia link puts it better than I could myself, I won't go into detail, but to summarize, evidentials are a category of grammar that marks the source of information.
Once again, I used existing world languages as a jumping off point. I decided to make this category in the form of an optional pre-verbal modal. Aside from information sources, such as direct observation or secondhand knowledge, I also included elements of the speaker's opinion about what he or she has seen. For example:
(1) He opened the door.
(2) I saw him open the door.
(3) I heard he opened the door.
(4) Obviously he opened the door.
(5) I felt him open the door.
(6) I hope he opened the…
Sources of Inspiration
Noting exists in isolation; a language least of all. Here are some of the real-world languages that inspired parts of Shabkiuza.
- Phrasal verbs: These were my starting place. I became interested in the idea that English has hundreds of verbs consisting of a verb and a particle (preposition or adverb) that formed a unit; for example, "to look up (something)" or "switch on (something)." In Latin, however, the same thing was accomplished through the use of a prefix. For example, the Latin postpōnere, to postpone, meant literally "to put after." Thus, I conceived of a language in which both positions were possible, as a verbal prefix and as an adposition.
- Cases: Since nouns are invariant, there is not a true case system in Shabkiuza. As far as a…
The Start of Shabkiuza
Shabkiuza is a great example of connecting the dots. I had an idea for a language, but didn't have a culture for it to be spoken by. I had written a story which featured a constructed language, but I had not developed it beyond a handful of phrases. The conclusion should have been obvious, but in fact it took a lot longer than it should have... they were tailor made for each other.
In creating this language, I'm more interested in features that are interesting rather that features that are natural. I haven't set out to specifically violate any language universals, but nor am I insistent that there exist any real-world language which instantiates the features I'm using. My in-world explanation is that the language is highly regulated by…
Help? -- How to create a language
I have been reading " The Language Construction Kit". I sort of understand the basics.. I am just stuck on vowels and consonants.
If anybody could please tell me the steps you yourself took to creating your language-- I could probably figure it out..
I am very excited to create the lexicon. I am good at making things up. I just want my language to be realistic and
usable. Its for a book I am writing. How do you pick vowels? I understand that its based off of how you want your
language to sound-- but how do you know which vowels to pick? I need some help on this.. Maybe even how-to
steps.. I wish there was " creating a language for dummies" book.
Is this thing on...?
Consider the posting title a deeper joke!
I have been thinking since a while, somewhat loudly, should this cold-hearted wiki need some more interaction? Currently, the commitment and dedication to the wiki is at it's lowest point since before GoldeEagle. This is by no means a desperate wailing, but rather a plea, to encourage the spirit of the wikia.
Imagine how some cooperative work would help the wiki? A long time ago, before my time there were vivid discussions regarding the main page and wiki logo, soon fading into archived posts...
If we tidied up a bit amongst the conlangs, the featured ones - all languages would get the attention and consideration they deserve! A welcoming main page would encourage further influx of conlangers, and str…
Post, the first
So... hi...
I've been working on Nanyse off and on (and under different names) for about... 13 years now? My father gave me two blank word templates (one for regular phrases, the other for slang phrases) called Conlang and I thought that it would be so incredibly cool to have my very own secret language. I had already been collecting words that I thought were cool (don't remember when I started doing that) and the templates gave me ways to order them and ideas of what other words I should look for.
About a year or two ago, I decided to merge my Nanyse project with an idea for a sci-fi story I'd had bouncing around my head since I was 13 years old. I knew that if I was going to be using it as an actual language (and if I wanted it taken serio…
I'm Back
Hey, I decided to look back here after awhile. So how's everything going? Seems like not much has changed, including the main page ;) I would participate more, but it seems that Conlang Wiki redirects to Wikipedia on mobile devices so it's impossible to contribute. Anyone else have the same problem?
I might return to conlanging, I'm just without the muse right now. I've been conlanging every so often when I get the chance. Overall here are my ideas:
World language combining five main lingua francas in history: 1) Latin, English, French 2) Old Chinese, Mandarin, Japanese 3) Classical Arabic, Arabic, Hebrew 4) Bantu, Swahili, Shona 5) Sanskrit, Hindi, Urdu
The first language is a proto-language that would be used as a base for some root w…
Colouring Voabulary
While I have already said it once This one will be a little more detailed.
A languages vocabulary is coloured by and reflects the history of its speakers, their beliefs of the world, thier needs of what was in the world, what they considered to be important and our inherent ability and desire to use imagery to describe things (Which I'll assume (like all really does) includes all sorts of sapient life)
Let me describe first what I mean with them and provide some examples and after I shall provide ways to do this.
History of speakers includes all of the previously mentioned factors but this one can still show itself, I am currently unable think of a single word example but I can from my experience here in sweden, a former norse mythology count…
Rant of the Day
I've been working on my conlang Minhast for some time now. When I posted my first contribution, the major portion of the grammar had already been written (easy to do, I cut and pasted from my old conlang site to this wiki). Had some interesting stuff in it, like polysyntheticism, applicative formation, and antipassivation. Until that point in time, nobody had these features in their conlangs.
Something interesting happened just a couple of months ago, Dec. 12 2010 to be exact. One of the conlangers on this wiki, a long-time member whose language had been one of the first languages on this wiki, made a major revision of his language. Applicatives suddenly appeared in his verbs, along with antipassives. His language had been a nominative-accu…
Letting go!
When I was working on my conlang... because I am a beginner, I was very systematic about it. I was following the steps and completing them as I went. I finished the very basics of the syntax and grammar, got my phones all listed and organised. But when I finally started to form sentences... it was really hard. It didn't sound natural to me at all. It was very very difficult to say the sentences naturally because they sounded ugly and disorientating. I could've taken those mistakes and used them to improve it, but I didn't find that quite appropriate.
Instead, I'm going to change the phones completely. I shall record myself speaking gibberish, whilst expressing what I intend to say. When I looked on youtube for research, I found a few conlan…
Why do you study languages?
Some conlangers I know develop languages to be used in sci-fi/fantasy novels, others just for knowledge's sake.
I'm studying (rather, want to study) linguistics so I know how people communicate and hopefully bridge the gaps between different languages (hence all my IAL work).
So, for what reason did you decide to start studying linguistics? Is there a particular goal or product you wish fulfilled by it?
Just curious :)
Razlem 20:55, December 7, 2010 (UTC)
My Blog??
I’m really glad I’ve got a blog on this site.
It just rocks.
Anyway....
I’m Chris Boyd.
My first (posted) language, Hëtṿa (pronounced /‘hətwa/) is now available for viewing.
Please leave some comments on how to improve the language, or if there are any features (not already included) that you’d like to see, such as numbers 1-10 or whatever.
I will accept comments on either my blog or on my talk page (NOT ON THE LANGUAGE PAGE).
Thanks a bunch,
Crjboyd 04:13, September 26, 2010 (UTC)
Words
Quick Discussion about words in a language
Most common words
1: the
2: of
3: and
5: a
5: to
6: in
8: is
9: be
9: that
9: was
10: he
11: for
11: it
14: with
15: as
15: his
17: I
17: on
18: have
19: at
20: by
20: not
21: they
21: this
22: had
24: are
25: but
26: from
27: or
28: she
29: an
30: which
30: you
31: one
32: we
34: all
34: were
35: her
35: would
36: there
40: their
40: will
41: when
41: who
42: him
43: been
44: has
44: more
45: if
45: no
47: out
48: do
49: so
50: can
50: what
52: up
53: said
54: about
54: other
55: into
55: than
56: its
57: time
59: only
60: could
60: new
60: them
62: man
62: some
65: these
69: then
69: two
71: first
71: May
72: any
72: like
74: now
75: my
75: such
76: make
78: over
79: our
81: even
81: most
82: me
83: state
84: after
84: also
85: made
87: many
88: did
88: must
89: before
91: back
91: see
91: …
Language and Logic
Logic is such a common word used these days to properly deduce things from one or more premises. There are certain rules to it and more but I will go through a few and how they can be applied for language and distinctions in it, or lack of them. For easyness I will be using a table like
X
A
1
0
B
1
0
where A and B represent the two options possed and X will be replaced by the function. If it shows 1 in the box it means that option is applied in that situation and 0 means it isnt.
- 1 Or
- 2 Xor
- 3 And
- 4 Xand
- 5 Adj-and
- 6 Not/No
- 7 No Logic
- 7.1 Nor
- 7.2 Nand
- 7.3 Not Xor/Xand
- 8 Implies/Follows
This is a common word and logical function, It usually represent where A can be the option or B can be, but also both can be valid at once.
Or
A
1
0
B
1
0
This is the commonly spoken "O…
Orthography
Currently working on my own I have decieded to talk some about orthography and various ways a language can be written, the options and general guidelines.
- 1 Types
- 1.1 Logograph
- 1.2 Syllabary
- 1.3 Abugida
- 1.4 Abjad
- 1.5 Alphabet
This is where graphs represents ideas, concept, items and other concrete things. They do not show any pronounciation or anything but merely give of an idea. Their major problem is the "failure" of being able to draw abstract items or grammatical things. How would one draw "love" for example? Most people think a heart but is that really how that culture percieve it? Is it really a good way? Words such as "And" "up" "down" "above" etc, words giving grammatical information, are also a huge problem because they are not easy drawing ev…
Cases and aspects
Considering their richness what would everyone say about having a page with a list of cases aspects and other thigns to assist in the creation process so one can pick from the list rather than looking? (And make up our own ones with names and everything)
Features or lack of
Many elements that constitute a language are actually special features rather than linguistic requirements, so I've decided to go through the features I've come across so far. If someone knows any other special features, tell me and I'll add them.
- 1 Definite
- 2 Plural
- 3 Dual
- 4 Trial
- 5 Paucal
- 6 Gender
- 7 Cases
- 8 Tenses
- 9 Aspects
Among the most "Natural" features for many western IE speakers are the definite of a noun. It is a feature that indicate the item in question is either already mentioned or you both have a pre-existing knowledge of what specific one you are refering to. But most languages dont have it and just refers to "the car" and "a car" simply as "a car" in all instances. It isnt needed nor common outside of western european languages (even non-IE) …
A question of categorization
I find it strange that a wiki on conlangs doesn't have an article on Quenya, Klingon or any other famous and successful languages. Is there a good reason for this? Is this wiki too new to assume that content should already be here? Or is it rude to create articles about languages one hasn't authored?
At the very least, there should be some acknowledgement of the conlang greats. It would be cool to be able to quickly compare the inner workings of D'ni to Na'vi. I see no need to completely reproduce the language definitions here; but an external links to the best tutorials would be handy. Short histories about authors and creation of Esperanto and Loglan can provide excellent inspiration to aspiring conlangers such as myself.
There should prob…
How do you prefer to learn a language?
For example, do you prefer a natural approach like Rosetta Stone or LiveMocha, or do you like to learn the structure of the language first? Is a teacher always preferable?
I'm a visual learner with an audiographic (is that a word?) memory, so pictures with audio work best for me. But I always feel restricted when I don't have access to the nitty-gritty grammar. I hear that immersion classes are effective, but I've never had access to one.
Razlem 04:51, July 9, 2010 (UTC)
Orthographies
I've been looking around quite a bit lately, and I can't help but notice, an orthography is distinct just like a language, don't you all agree? I mean... one sees rings over a's and knows it's probably a Nordic language. One sees háčeks and knows it's probably a Slavic language, and one sees funky combinations in languages you don't know much about, and they manage to look erotic. I was wondering, really, and over the past few days, I've done quite the renovating with Adwan. I'm literally thinking of getting rid of háčeks, which brings me to this question: what are your opinions on orthographies? Do you like them phonemic and shallow (quoting Wiki here!)? Or do you like having those little perks in orthographies that make them deep and, we…
Old Elvish Challenge
Welcome to the Old Elvish homepage, where we can challenge each other to translate passages of Old Elvish so the language can expand indefinitely. First I would like to start off by entering in a few small English sentences, and will give the bare necessities needed to translate them into this ancient language. If you are interested, please try your best translation and send the answer back to my email oldelvish@gmail.com. If you have the correct answer (which I assure you, you will, because the sentences are quite easy), you can make a sentence in English and post it on this page for another person to translate and send back to me, and so on.
Please feel free to add your own words to Old Elvish. If you want to do so, please email me the wor…
ciao
ciao
non so cosa dire e non so cos'è wikia.
mi sono iscritto (o forse no)per sbaglio arrivederci e torte alla panna
Relativization
Thought I would make another blog as this is something easily forgotten for people and it is about relativization, adjective clauses.
Adjective/Relative clause is a clause that act as an adjective to describe a noun, for example in the sentence "the woman which i like" the "which" initiates the clause and "i like" marks that its a woman i like. But the position of relativization can change dramaticly and in english it is always fronted. I´ll give example in english of the 4 general types that do exist, the "__" marks where the noun originally was before being relativized
- Subject: The woman which __ walks
- Object: The woman which I like __
- Indirect object: The woman which I gave __ the flower
- Oblique: The woman which i gave the flow to __ / The wo…
Docs on Language Change.
Language Change
I was studying language change and variation today in Linguistics
and thought it would be a great idea to put some of my lecture
notes on here so those who were interested could leanr, but I don't
know how to upload files that are not images, and typing it all
takes a long time, so that was an epic fail. I will leave this here
in case i scan the docs and upload them, or unless someone has any
ideas.
Cheers.
Language evolution
Yet another one :P I decied to bust yet another myth people think is true but really isnt
It is about how languages developes, the myth goes that languages over time always simplify getting rid of unneccisery stuff. This could not possibly be further from the truth, languages CAN simplify over time but this is not its natural tendency at all. The natural tendency for languages is to accumilate more dirt, more features, more everything to get ever more complicated reaching complexity levels people in the west cant think is possible. Why is this the case and not the original idea? why does it exist and why have languages acctually been simplified? I will first explain why it gets more complicated with time and explain why it also simplifies i…
Copying old stuff
Pressing the random language button i found a conlang that was a copy of my own in its early stages XD
Promotion
In general, how does one promote a constructed language?
The internet is one way, obviously, but languages like Esperanto and Ido didn't have that luxury. How did those languages spread all over the world?
I assume snail mail as far as the transportation of information, but were there pamphlets advertising the language?
Just curious.
Razlem 03:33, May 1, 2010 (UTC)
Semantics
From my previous blog where I gave some simple minor tips on general stuff i thought i would give more indepth of semantics to avoid replicating english dictionary again.
the first and probably most important thing to think on is to never EVER say "with in X is Y" because "with" or other structural words (prepositions, adpositions etc) often contain more than 1 meaning so you are dragging with you a ton of meanings in such a case. Instead you shall with such structural words rather mix and match the meanings around that is different. Hebrew got a word i cannot remember now that contain "with" "in" and such as a meaning that we would find odd. Sure it is to us but not for them. your langauge should be the same and mix it in ways that is diff…
Methods of Filling a Lexicon
One of the main problems faced by conlangers everywhere is an inability to fill out a lexicon. They are difficult things to do, but done in a systematic way, they become a snap. Here are some pointers on how to achieve said approach:
- Firstly assess your conlangs setting and theme. Was it originally, or is it still spoken by a religious culture? Is it a modern Auxillery language? Is it a language of magic? Once you have this sorted it will all be a lot easier.
- With the concept in hand, flesh out the basis for it first. In the first example, you should figure out some of the religion it came from, including a few myths from said religion (if you are using a real world religion, read up on it, specifically the religion's holy text). In the seco…