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LCC5 CONLANG RELAY — ITHKUIL TEXT: AIFQLAL ÖMMOL Âmmël Tê
LCC5 CONLANG RELAY — ITHKUIL TEXT: AIFQLAL ÖMMOL Âmmël tê, iekawel tiö. Ikàmküz iam-mra ârtwail mmëu’a Ĝi smî’âškôx. Iefqlaromdi ük ho kai’ál. Š. Ailayël egbulak –çoe, aumrawelönar vyelíup qü. Iek’amtoçqár isvala Ħ qo ârtwel kî. Hmuqwat Ĝara č’ óext’ai’l. Hra Ŝnasar –qawe smâ’âškôx. Eswilúk xas –ça hmaigralî Ħ uqwot Ĝukt –č’içewa. Ke uqwat ĜaĦ ia Ńt’aluib eswolúk. Š. Epšal oqwas uqwêt Ĝ óek hwai’l. Aigrawelönar –qowe ocetip. Uqwat Ĝ vyaliup. Vyaliupi’m! Hmi čhal ko ârtwala Ħ lt heĜ mmêĜ. –Ça vyaliup. Ti xat hint. Aigrayëlint to uqwiat Ĝ óek hwai’l _ip’ayûluc’ar ek ho ítu’liu Ń ke. Âmmël tê, auntawél –ça: –aigrayëlar ko uqwet Ĝ óek hwai’l –ieçtraluc’ –qowe. Snalakir uqwat Ĝ áugrala řo. Âdhayëlilliud uqwit Ĝipt, augrayûluc’ eqolekt –qewe. Augrayûl qo –qewe. Az, âmmël tê, aukawél ârtwail kî áula’al ku ltweol. Ir! HELPFUL NOTES • Default word order is VSO or VOS. Placement of a noun before the verb gives it semantic focus. Placement of a noun at the beginning of a sentence topicalizes it. • Ithkuil nominal formatives (i.e., nouns) mandatorily inflect for eight morphological categories, while verbal formatives (i.e., verbs) mandatorily inflect for 22 categories. However, the majority of these categories are often in their default/baseline modes which are unmarked. In order to simplify the intralinears below, I have not indicated unmarked categories, and for default categories that are marked but do not impact the semantics, I have indicated these by empty brackets [ ]. • Many Ithkuil affixes are portmanteau in nature, i.e., combining many separate morphemes into a single affix. -
A Brief Introduction to Constructed Languages
A Brief Introduction to Constructed Languages An essay by Laurier Rochon Piet Zwart Institute : June 2011 3750 words Abstract The aim of this essay will be to provide a general overview of what is considered a "constructed language" (also called conlang, formalized language or artificial language) and explore some similarities, differences and specific properties that set these languages apart from natural languages. This essay is not meant to be an exhaustive repertoire of all existing conlangs, nor should it be used as reference material to explain or dissect them. Rather, my intent is to explore and distill meaning from particular conlangs subjectively chosen for their proximity to my personal research practice based on empirical findings I could infer from their observation and brief use. I will not tackle the task of interpreting the various qualities and discrepancies of conlangs within this short study, as it would surely consist of an endeavour of its own. It should also be noted that the varying quality of documentation available for conlangs makes it difficult to find either peer-reviewed works or independent writings on these subjects. As a quick example, many artistic languages are conceived and solely used by the author himself/herself. This person is obviously the only one able to make sense of it. This short study will not focus on artlangs, but one would understand the challenge in analyzing such a creation: straying away from the beaten path affords an interesting quality to the work, but also renders difficult a precise analytical study of it. In many ways, I have realized that people involved in constructing languages are generally engaging in a fringe activity which typically does not gather much attention - understandably so, given the supremacy of natural languages in our world. -
Why Esperanto?
Fiat Lingua Title: The Contemporary Esperanto Speech Community Author: Adelina Solis MS Date: 01-12-2013 FL Date: 01-01-2013 FL Number: FL-000010-01 Citation: Solis, Adelina. 2013. “The Contemporary Esperanto Speech Community.” FL-000010-01, Fiat Lingua, <http:// fiatlingua.org>. Web. 01 Jan. 2013. Copyright: © 2013 Adelina Solis. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ Fiat Lingua is produced and maintained by the Language Creation Society (LCS). For more information about the LCS, visit http://www.conlang.org/ The Contemporary Esperanto Speech Community by Adelina Mariflor Solís Montúfar 1 Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction 3 1.1 Definitions 4 1.2 Political support for a universal language 5 1.3 A brief history of language invention 9 1.4 A brief history of Esperanto 14 1.5 The construction, structure, and dissemination of Esperanto 17 1.6 Esperanto and the culture question 24 1.7 Research Methods 29 Chapter 2: Who Speaks Esperanto? 34 2.1 Number and distribution of speakers 34 2.2 Gender distribution 47 Chapter 3: The Esperanto Speech Community 58 3.1 Terminology and definitions 58 3.2 Norms and Ideologies 65 3.3 Approach to language 70 Chapter 4: Why Esperanto? 81 4.1 Ideology-based reasons to speak Esperanto 83 4.2 Practical attractions to Esperanto 86 4.3 More than friendship 94 4.4 The congress effect 95 4.5 Esperanto for the blind 100 4.6 Unexpected benefits 102 Chapter 5: Esperantist Objectives 103 5.1 Attracting new speakers 103 5.2 Teaching Esperanto 107 Chapter 6: Conclusion 116 Works Cited 121 2 Chapter 1: Introduction When we think about invented languages, we may think of childhood games. -
Edward Sapir's View About International Auxiliary Language
EMANUEL KULCZYCKI EDWARD SAPIR’S VIEW ABOUT INTERNATIONAL AUXILIARY LANGUAGE Introduction The search for common attributes of all languages is connected with the search for characteristics which differentiate languages. If some attributes cannot be found in every language, what is cause of this situation? Is it linked up with the origin of language or with users of the language? People inquire about such matters because the multiplicity of natural languages generates incomprehension and handicaps human communication. The minimum number of languages in the world has been set at 4,000 and the maximum at 8,000. In spite of this people can communicate over communication’s barriers which are generated by the multiplicity of mother-languages. But that diversity worries and disturbs. A Danish linguist Otto Jespersen wrote: „An American may travel from Boston to San Francisco without hearing more than one language. But if he were to traverse the same distance on this side of the Atlantic, he would have a totally different story to tell (…) he would then hear perhaps Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, German, Czecho-Slovakian, Hungarian, Rumanian, Bulgarian, Turkish, Greek, and then in Egypt Arabic and a little English (…) He would not have heard of the languages spoken in Europe. The curse of Babel is still with us”1. It means that we have to use more than one language to 1 O. Jespersen: An International Language, Allen & Unwin, London 1928; <http://www.geocities.com/ /Athens/Forum/5037/AILneed.html>. 66 Emanuel Kulczycki communicate with another man. So some universal language – an international auxiliary language could make whole social communication easy. -
Constructed Languages: ESPERANTO
Journal of Modern Education Review, ISSN 2155-7993, USA October 2015, Volume 5, No. 10, pp. 1017–1025 Doi: 10.15341/jmer(2155-7993)/10.05.2015/011 © Academic Star Publishing Company, 2015 http://www.academicstar.us Constructed Languages: ESPERANTO Sevda Huseynova Sohrab (Qafqaz University, Azerbaijan) Abstract: “What is language!?” The question has been answered differently at different times. V. Humbolt, A. Shleykher, H. Shteyntal, G. Paul, and other linguists put forward various considerations about the language. Language is creative and productive by nature, a person using it can set up an infinite number of sentences and express thoughts. Throughout history, numerous languages seriously impeeded the development of relations between people. People have searched ways for getting out of this problem. As a result, the idea of creating a universal world language has occurred. Universal world language refers to a language which can be easily understood by all individuals of different nations. As a way of solving this problem, linguists have proposed to create a substituting constructed language. The most common constructed language is Esperanto. This language posses simple phonetic, grammatical, lexical structure. The language created by Zamenhof can be studied and remembered easily. According to historical facts, Esperantists (Esperanto-language speakers) established a country called Amikejo. They even celebrate The World Esperanto Day as a holiday once a year. Key words: linguists, universal world language, constructed language, Esperanto, Zamenhof, Esperantist, Amikejo 1. Introduction “What is language!?” The question has been answered differently at different times. V. Humbolt, A. Shleyher, H. Shteyntal, A. A. Potebnya, G. Paul, F. F. Fortunatov, I. -
Complexlang: a Compact Logical Experimental Language
Complexlang: a COMPact Logical EXperimental LANGuage Kelvin M. Liu-Huang Carnegie Mellon University [email protected] Published in Proceedings of SIGBOVIK 2019 (15 March 2019) Informal revisions (27 March 2019, 29 April 2019) Abstract and learning barrier of natural languages, Natural languages trade compactness and mathematical expressions seem better in these ways. consistency for efficiency. Complexlang is an a priori, The tradeoff is, of course, that mathematical declarative, ideographic spoken/written language descriptions can be very elaborate or unwieldy. which attempts to construct/ground the semantic We attempt to address all these concerns by structure of both morphology and syntax from first constructing Complexlang. Language should ideally principles using tools provided by propositional logic, synchronize speech, writing, and comprehension in set theory, type theory, number theory, object- order to facilitate learning. Like aUI (Weilgart, 1979) oriented programming, metaphysics, linguistics, and and Arahau (Karasev, 2006), by infusing individual classical field theory. In doing so, we hypothesize letters with meaning and using phonemic that speakers may converse in Complexlang with little orthography, words have transparent and largely training and learn some math and science in the deterministic etymology; writing, speech, and process. meaning can all be inferred from each other, reducing ambiguity, speeding up learning, and even allowing efficient and deterministic creation of 1. Introduction neologisms. For simplicity, the orthography is simply Most previous constructed languages intended for the IPA symbols of the phonemes. Unlike aUI and human use set out to improve etymological integrity Arahau, Complexlang attempts to express semantics (Zamenhof, 1887), semantic clarity (Bliss, 1965; entirely through logic, specifically patterned after set Karasev, 2006; Weilgart, 1979; Quijada, 2004), theory, rather than metaphor, resulting in compact, consistency (Weilgart, 1979; Cowan, 1997; Quijada, transparent, and unambiguous expressions. -
1 Constructed Language and Linguistic Theory Marc Van Oostendorp To
Constructed language and linguistic theory Marc van Oostendorp To appear in: Klaus Schubert (ed.) Planned language: From plan to reality. Association Belgique de Linguistique Appliquée, 2000. 0. Introduction ‘Natural language’ is arguably the most central concept within linguistic theory —it defines its object of study —, but it is hardly ever discussed outside the first pages of introductory textbooks. It is usually taken for granted that everybody knows what the label means, and that it can be applied to American English, Yidiny and Eastern Javanese, but not to tonal music, the programming language Prolog, or the languages of the Elves in the novels of J.R.R. Tolkien. Many interlinguists — those scholars concerned with the study of consciously planned languages meant for international communication — follow this line of reasoning to some extent, if they defend the validity of their interest in Esperanto (cf. Schubert 1989, Tonkin and Fettes 1996 for fairly recent overviews). They argue that Esperanto is markedly different from other planned languages, because it has been used in a much wider range of communicative situations, because it has become associated with a separate ‘Esperantist culture’, or because it is learnt by children as one of their native languages. For this reason, Esperanto would have started to differ from its competitors: it would be the only ‘language project’ that has succeeded in becoming a ‘real (natural) language’. This line of argumentation is examined in this article. I study the relevance of some planned or constructed languages other than Esperanto, viz. Interlingua, Ido, Europanto and Spocanian. These have been made up in slightly different ways, all serve different goals and different philosophies have guided the construction of their respective grammars. -
In Praise of Fluffy Bunnies
In Praise of Fluffy Bunnies Copyright © 2012, Richard Forsyth. Background Reading John Lanchester's Whoops!, an entertaining account of how highly paid hotshot traders in a number of prestigious financial institutions brought the world to the brink of economic collapse, I was struck by the following sentence: "In an ideal world, one populated by vegetarians, Esperanto speakers and fluffy bunny wabbits, derivatives would be used for one thing only: reducing levels of risk." (Lanchester, 2010: 37). What struck me about this throwaway remark, apart from the obvious implication that derivatives were actually used to magnify risk rather than reducing it (doubtless by carnivores ignorant of Esperanto), was its presumption that right-thinking readers would take it for granted that Esperanto symbolizes well-meaning futility -- thus highlighting the author's status as a tough-minded realist. This is just one illustration that disdain for Esperanto in particular, and auxiliary languages in general, pervades intellectual circles in Britain today, as in many other countries. And if you dare to raise the subject of constructed international languages with a professional translator or interpreter be prepared not just for disdain but outright hostility. Of course professional interpreters are among the most linguistically gifted people on the planet, and can't see why the rest of us shouldn't become fluent in half a dozen natural languages in our spare time. (Not to mention the fact that a widespread adoption of Esperanto, or one of its competitors, would have a seriously negative impact on their opportunities for gainful employment.) Thus Esperanto has become a symbol of lost causes, to be dismissed out of hand by practical folk. -
Mutual Intelligibility and Slavic Constructed Interlanguages : a Comparative Study of Ruski Jezik and Interslavic
Mutual intelligibility and Slavic constructed interlanguages : a comparative study of Ruski Jezik and Interslavic ** Jade JOANNOT M.A Thesis in Linguistics Leiden university 2020-2021 Supervisor : Tijmen Pronk TABLE OF CONTENTS Jade Joannot M.A Thesis Linguistics 24131 words 1.1. Abstract 1.2. Definitions 1.2.1. Constructed languages 1.2.2. Interlanguage 1.2.3. Mutual intelligibility 1.3. Object of study 1.3.1. History of Slavic constructed languages Pan-Slavic languages (19th century) Esperanto-inspired projects Contemporary projects 1.3.2. Ruski Jezik & Interslavic Ruski Jezik (17th century) Interslavic (21th century) 1.3.3. Shared aspects of Ruski Jezik and Interslavic 1.4. Relevance of the study 1.4.1. Constructed languages and mutual intelligibility 1.4.2. Comparative study of Ruski Jezik and Interslavic 1.4.3. Historical linguistics 1.5. Structure of the thesis 1.5.1. Research question 1.8. Description of the method 1.8.1. Part 1 : Approaches to Slavic mutual intelligibility and their conclusions 1.8.2. Part 2 : Study of Ruski Jezik and Interslavic I.1. Factors of mutual intelligibility I.1.1. Extra-linguistic factors I.1.2. Linguistic predictors of mutual intelligibility I.1.2.1. Lexical distance I.1.2.2. Phonological distance I.1.2.3. Morphosyntactic distance I.1.2.3.1. Methods of measurements I.1.2.3.2. The importance of morphosyntax I.1.3. Conclusions I.2. Mutual intelligibility in the Slavic area I.2.1. Degree of mutual intelligibility of Slavic languages I.2.2. The case of Bulgarian 2 Jade Joannot M.A Thesis Linguistics 24131 words I.2.3. -
The New Yorker 11/9/20, 9:20 PM
Utopian for Beginners | The New Yorker 11/9/20, 9:20 PM Annals of Linguistics December 24 & 31, 2012 Issue Utopian for Beginners An amateur linguist loses control of the language he invented. By Joshua Foer December 17, 2012 here are so many ways for speakers of English to see the world. We can glimpse, glance, visualize, view, look, spy, or T ogle. Stare, gawk, or gape. Peek, watch, or scrutinize. Each word suggests some subtly different quality: looking implies volition; spying suggests furtiveness; gawking carries an element of social judgment and a sense of surprise. When we try to describe an act of vision, we consider a constellation of available meanings. But if thoughts and words exist on different planes, then expression must always be an act of compromise. Languages are something of a mess. They evolve over centuries through an unplanned, democratic process that leaves them teeming with irregularities, quirks, and words like “knight.” No one who set out to design a form of communication would ever end up with anything like English, Mandarin, or any of the more than six thousand languages spoken today. “Natural languages are adequate, but that doesn’t mean they’re optimal,” John Quijada, a "fty-three-year-old former employee of the California State Department of Motor Vehicles, told me. In 2004, he published a monograph on the Internet that was titled “Ithkuil: A Philosophical Design for a Hypothetical Language.” Written like a linguistics textbook, the fourteen-page Web site ran to almost a hundred and sixty thousand words. It documented the Quijada’s invented language has two grammar, syntax, and lexicon of a language that Quijada had spent seemingly incompatible ambitions: to be three decades inventing in his spare time. -
Information Entropy of Constructed Languages Megan Crossing
Information Entropy of Constructed Languages Megan Crossing Supervised by Professor Matthew Roughan The University of Adelaide Vacation Research Scholarships are funded jointly by the Department of Education and Training and the Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute. Contents 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Statement of Authorship . .1 2 Quenya: Its Brief History 2 3 Information Entropy 2 3.1 Shannon Entropy . .2 3.2 Zipf-Mandelbrot Distribution . .3 4 The Process 3 4.1 Text selection . .3 4.2 Pre-Processing . .4 4.3 Generating Results . .5 5 Results 6 5.1 Zipf-Mandelbrot Approximations . .6 5.2 Shannon Entropy . .9 6 Discussion 12 6.1 A Dichotomy in Languages . 12 6.2 Potential Extentions . 13 7 Conclusion 14 Appendices 16 A Zipf-Mandelbrot Comparisons 16 B Total and Unique Word Counts for Four New Testament Translations 17 i Abstract This project investigates entropic differences between natural and constructed languages, with a focus on the Neo-Quenya translation of the New Testament. Using the Natural Language Processing Toolkit in Python, we found the Shannon entropies and Zipf-Mandelbrot distributions of four translations of the New Testament. The translations used were the King James Version, the New International Version, the Biblia Sacra juxta Vulgatam Clementinam (Latin), and the Neo-Quenya. The study found that the entropies of the Latin and Neo-Quenya translations were generally lower than the two English translations, that the Zipf-Mandelbrot distributions of the English translations were near identical, and that the Zipf-Mandelbrot distributions of the Latin and Neo-Quenya were, whilst similar, less similar than the two English translations. -
In Search of a Universal Language Past, Present, and Future
Contemporary Postcolonial Asia Contemporary Postcolonial Asia RESOURCES TEACHING RESOURCE ESSAY In Search of a Universal Language After World War II, English became the Past, Present, and Future language of science, as well as business, By John F. Copper politics, and culture. ver since the Tower of Babel, humans have pursued developing a having no single universal language impeded scientific research and prog- universal language to use to communicate with more—ideally all— ress. With nothing promising in sight, they became multilingual, using En- people. However, they have been only marginally successful, as indi- glish, French, and German. That worked to some degree. E cated by both the history of a large number of failed efforts and the current On the other side of the world, in Asia, scientific research was done situation. primarily in a single language: Classical Chinese. At least, it was the uni- Also, these efforts have their detractors. A language becomes larger versal language in some of that part of the world in its written form; in its when it weakens or replaces another language. This often involves “lan- spoken form (written Chinese is not phonetic), it was not. guage genocide” and/or represents “language imperialism.” Attaining a Chinese was also to some degree the language of business and com- universal language may be this on a grand scale. merce in East Asia, but it waxed in importance only when China pros- In fact, many advocates of expanding the use of their language (and pered and engaged meaningfully in trade. Its usage waned beginning in their culture, which is connected) believe it is superior to others.