Ithkuil

The following article from The New Yorker has been making the rounds in conlanging circles. It's actually quite well-written, with some great information about conlangs. Well worth a read!

I intend to offer some commentary eventually, but for the time being, I'll let the article speak for itself.

Paiodd Numerals

I've just posted a page on paiodd.weebly.com that explains how the script is used to indicate numeric values. You can check it out here: http://paiodd.weebly.com/numerals.html

Adjectival and Adverbial Clauses in Paiodd

Sersen stulserss íagué. Gué císershía aejímai.

That's Paiodd for "Today is my birthday. I am thirty years old." And it was true yesterday. So today we could say:

Éuía (or Éwoía) sersan stulserss íagué.

Yesterday was my birthday.

goPST.REL(or go.PRES.PRF) day-that birth.NML-day POSS.I

Thus, literally: That day that went (or has gone) (was) birthday of me.

Struggling with how to say 'yesterday', particularly in this context, leads to a good discussion of adjectival and adverbial clauses in Paiodd. On the one hand, many entire phrases in English can often be rendered by a single word in Paiodd, thanks to the inflection system in nouns, with verbal inflection indicating a relationship to verbs, and nominal inflection indicating a relationship to nouns. Let's look at some examples of these single-word adjectivals and adverbials.

Verbal: Alevodía daemm lodd armas.

The man cut the bread with a knife.

Nominal: Daemm alevutía lodd armas.

The man with (or who had) a knife cut the bread.

In the first sentence, the noun alevudd is in verbal inflection, with the suffix -ía, which in this case has instrumental meaning. The word order is somewhat important as well, however, because of the verbal inflection of alevudd, it's clear that it is modifying the verb armas 'cut', which is the only verb in the sentence. As a result, we could move the word to almost any position in the sentence, and it would still maintain the same meaning. The only position that would be off-limits is between the subject, lodd and the verb armas. This is the most inviolable rule of Paiodd word order: the subject must be directly next to its verb.

In the sentence with the nominal form alevotía, this word is inflected to show that it is related to the closest noun, lodd. We know that it is most likely not related to daemm because of course it doesn't make much since for bread to have a knife (though it could, presumably, have a knife stuck in it), but also, and more importantly, adjectival forms typically appear before the noun they modify. This helps to preserve the inviolable rule of a subject appearing directly before its verb in the OSV word order that is most typical in Paiodd.

There is one other important thing to note before we move into clauses consisting of more than one word. That is the lack of copula in Paiodd. In other words, there is no word equivalent to 'to be' in English. Thus, in order to say something like 'The man is tall' or 'I am a doctor', we must place the words for tall and doctor immediately after the subject. No other change is necessary, although the word for tall is merely the word for 'height' in nominal form with the suffix -ía.

Lodd paisenía.

The man is tall.

(lit: The man is with height)

Gué acullodd.

I am a doctor (lit: healer).

Likewise, in the sentence that began this post, sersen 'today' comes immediately next to stulserss 'birthday'. Thus, in such equative sentences, the subject must be immediately next to its equivalent, or appositive modifier, just as in verbal sentences the subject must be immediately next to the verb. This same kind of order plays a role in forming adjectival clauses.

So, how do we make clauses, whether adverbial or adjectival? First, we should clarify what a clause is. The most basic units of the sentence in English are the subject and verb. As long as a sentence has those two, it can be considered a complete sentence (so long as it makes sense logically, of course). Often, however, sentences have more than one subject and verb, and in this case we have at least two clauses. Sometimes entire clauses can modify either the main verb (and consequently, in fact, the entire sentence), and sometimes they can modify nouns within the sentence. Some examples in English:

Adverbial: When the man went to the store, he bought more than he needed.

Adjectival: The man who went to the store bought more than he needed.

In the first sentence, the clause when the man went to the store is an adverbial clause, modifying the entire sentence by telling us the time at which the events in the main clause happened. That time was when he went to the store.

The second sentence, on the other hand, gives us the clause who went to the store. In this case, the clause is adjectival, modifying the subject, the man. Consequently, it gives us more information about the man, rather than the time at which the events happened.

Both of these are separate clauses, however, because they have a separate subject (the man) and verb (went) from the main clause.

In Paiodd, thanks to the verbal/nominal declension system and the lack of copula, many entire phrases in English can be rendered with a single word in Paiodd, as we saw above. However, in those cases, there is no separate subject and verb, or at least, there is no separate verb. I hadn't really dealt with too many cases where there were separate subjects and verbs until trying to decide how to say 'yesterday' this morning.

Since there are no participles, I couldn't say something like 'the gone/past day', but that did give me an idea. I could use 'go' with the relative marker -ía (when it appears on verbs, it marks relative clauses) and the noun serss with the demonstrative suffix -an. The verbal or nominal inflection of serss would be used as appropriate to the sentence. For example, in the verbal inflection:

Éuía sirzan nir gué oz.

Yesterday I saw you.

The nominal inflection is used instead for the sentence we have already seen:

Éuía sersan stulserss íagué.

Yesterday was my birthday.

Of course, a simpler, and more common way to render the same sentences would be to use the temporal suffix -é.

Éuía sirzé nir gué oz.

Éuía sersé stulserss íagué.

There may be some other ways to express the idea of yesterday, but this method allows a bit more freedom than I previously had with clauses. I intended to have the subjects of relative verbs only appear in verbal inflection themselves, since they are, after all, related to verbs. But this prohibits any sort of adjectival clause from being formed. This way, if the relative verb precedes its subject, that subject can then pull double duty as an appositive or adjectival modifier of a noun in the main clause. Said noun could be either the subject or object of the main clause, but I'll have to examine that further in a future post.

Thesis

While browsing the gritty underbelly of ancient Yahoo! e-mails, I discovered many of my old college papers and projects, including several drafts of my undergraduate research project on constructed languages. Here is the thesis of that project:

Constructed languages have the potential to explore currently held theories of linguistic phenomena and challenge, affirm, or present new evidence for these theories. Constructed Languages offer alternative definitions of Linguistic systems, and sometimes even alternative systems, which are helpful to achieving greater understanding of both natural languages and our classification of them.

Eight years and a Linguistics MA later, I think I would still agree with this thesis for the most part. It is certainly part of why I have begun this blog. Given the education and experience I have gained since then, I don't know that the original project proved this thesis as strongly as I would like. Then again, I'm not sure it's possible to prove this point as strongly as I would like. I think there is much more work to be done on the question of whether there is value to constructed languages as a valid field of inquiry, but I hope that the increasingly popular appeal of and presence of these languages thanks to films like James Cameron's Avatar and television shows like Game of Thrones will inspire more scholars to consider them as a serious field.

Why Conlang?

The following is a discussion on the purpose and usefulness of conlanging which took place last week on the facebook conlangs group. I have copied and pasted the original post, followed by comments below. All names have been removed, in the interest of anonymity and privacy for all concerned. If anyone would like to claim credit for their comments below, you are welcome to do so.

 I have included this conversation because it brings up the very questions I want this blog to explore, and there are some interesting responses that may help all of us ask and attempt to answer these questions. Here follows the post and comments:

This evening, while eating with my friends at the campus cafeteria, the topic of conlangs was brought up, yet again, after I spoke a sentence in Esperanto ("Chu vi parolas Esperanton?"). They immediately brought up the perennial issue among us that "Esperanto is not a language," and, furthermore, that conlangs "have no purpose." I have a few questions based on my part of the argument, so that I can be better-equipped for next time this comes around: 1. "Esperanto is not a language," according to them. They say that for a system of words, phonology, and grammar to be considered a language, it needs "significant amounts of use," presumably with a lot of native speakers. I want to know: how do you define language? 2. I brought up the topic of fictional-world conlangs (artlangs such as Quenya/Sindarin, Klingon, Dothraki). Their argument for that was that those have a "specific purpose" and that the people who strongly appreciate those particular franchises use it as "bonding," but nothing more. I want to hear your thoughts on the purpose of artlangs. 3. I also brought up the creation of languages for the sake of recreation (as I'm sure many people actually do). They again brought up the idea of "significant use," as mentioned in question 1. So, why do you conlang? Thanks for reading, and I look forward to your responses! 

 Because I need to create speech that is deeply personal enough to allow me to experiment with literary ideas and concepts I would not be able to express through a natural language without being vague. I need to express myself specifically even if nobody understands what the hell I am saying. 

tl;dr? Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. 

 Great questions! In my opinion, these are precisely the sorts of philosophical questions that conlanging raises. They are difficult questions, but "purpose" as a requirement for a language (or anything else, for that matter), is not a good argument. What is the purpose of art? Some art has a very clear purpose, but much of it doesn't, yet it remains valuable. Actually, I would argue that the purpose of any art form, including conlanging potentially, is to define, explore, and challenge our understanding of the world around us. Conlanging helps define, explore, and challenge our notions of what a language is, and what it is capable of. In creating P-, I wanted to try to do something different, that no natlang I knew of did, hence my noun inflection system, which is not a case system, not a gender system, but focuses on the relationships of nouns to other nouns or to verbs. The form of any given noun differs according to which it is related to. 

 Here are my answers: 1) Firstly, if your criterion for something being a language is "significant use", then Esperanto certainly is one. It has more speakers than many of the world's natural languages, including many native speakers. I do actually think that many of the languages created by the conlanging community (including my own) are "ghosts" in a sense, as they don't have much use outside of perhaps some solitary artistic expression, but that does not make them worthless. Just getting in and fiddling with bits of language can be valuable to the conlanger in learning about real languages and how they work -- or just in having a hobby. 2) As I noted above, the point of an artlang isn't really to develop a speaker community. There are many uses -- I am making artlangs that I hope to use in fiction, others create them entirely for the purpose of writing personal journals and the like. The reason they are called "artlangs" is that they are created for aesthetic reasons. Specific purposes and parameters are up to the creator. 3) I conlang for fun, and in the hope that my conlangs can be used in fictional worlds. I don't particularly care if anyone else learns my languages. They are flavor and set dressing -- very deliberate and thoughtful set dressing, but set dressing all the same -- for fictional worlds. If putting a realistic linguistic system into a fictional world is not valuable, than what about people who obsess over the biology of an alien species, or construct marvelously complex yet consistent magic systems? It's all part of the world. 

 I just had a similar conversation with a friend of mine. She does not understand conlanging (however, she admits that because she loves literature, she has an issue with the idea of making a language). She is of the opinion that constructed language is either useless as a practice, or pointless since one cannot truly capture the nuances of natural languages. I brought up the issue of planned languages as a counter, but she remains unconvinced. Also, isn't there a language somewhere in South Asia that is only spoken by a single family? As far as usage is concerned, that hardly constitutes wide distribution. 

 Also, I agree with G- about artlangs. 

 Expression, I guess. Conveying something in your own words while going beyond the limits that natural languages set on you. That's what it is for me at least. 

 Cetere, kio estas la problemo kun Esperanto? ;) 

 1) First off, Esperanto does have quite a few speakers. Secondly, I define a language as anything that can be used to communicate a satisfactory amount of ideas eligible for real life use of the common man. (High-tech/scientific/economic/etc. terms are not needed IMO to be classified as a language.) 2) The purpose of artlangs lies in the name. They are art. I agree that they do have a specific purpose which is to enhance that which they were created for. (Example: Sindarin enhances the LotR) 3) I conlang for entertainment. I also hope to make a language that could be easily spoken by friends as a way to communicate. Who knows, maybe one day I'll be asked to create an artlang as well! The main reason, however, is for pure unadulterated fun. To say that conlanging has no purpose unless it gets used sounds to me like saying that solving math problems when they don't apply to an actual situation has no purpose. This simply isn't the case. Both these activities exercise our minds and prepare us for practical situations (if not directly, at least through transferable skills). Tolkien didn't invent Sindarin and Quenya overnight with no background in conlanging, it took him years to develop these, and it may have seemed quite futile at the time. Little did he know the impact his conlangs would have.  

 Finally, just a general comment on the 'no purpose' idea. It's relativistic. Purpose needs a referent, nothing has absolute purpose, it's what purpose something holds to an individual that gives it meaning. So when people tell you that conlanging has 'no purpose', don't be insulted, read between the lines, they're really saying that it has no purpose for them. Their loss. :) 

 Wow S-. That was a very smart comment! I agree. 

 Well put S-! I may not be a conlanger, but i bump into the same thing as a conscripter. I would go even further to ask "so speakers alone constitute a language eh?.. well then I suppose dead languages.. like latin, are not considered langauges huh?" The fallacy of the logic of their arguments are easily exposed with reducio absurdum :) 

 All 3 of those arguments don't even need an very sophisticated answer :P Ask them to apply those arguments to English, then to a conlang, and objectively judge what the difference is. I reckon, in 9/10, you'll find a complete conlang will probably score better than English. And I'm pretty sure English is a language. 

 On that note, I've had someone tell me that comparing conlangs to art is just a sign desperation. I don't think I ever got through to him, but I said "yes, it is desperation. Desperation against people who just don't get that some people do some things for enjoyment". 

 But he's right. It's desperation too against ignorance and stupidity. If people just accepted languages as art, without thinking so high of their preconceived ideas about the world (I have no problem with people being high of themselves if they are actually open minded), we wouldn't need the word "artlang" used as much. It'd be damn obvious. 

 But really, to be frank, some people just ain't that trained in the noggin to think about these things at a level worth talking about. Others are, but just are too used to another worldview that it's a pain in the arse to convince them otherwise. 

 1. I hate to begin my response in an uncouth manner, but your friends' collective logical fallacy is infuriating enough to warrant it, I'm afraid. A language is only a language if it is used extensively, by loads of speakers? What a load of bollocks! A language is a complex system of communication that allows one to speak one's mind, voice one's emotions and connect with others. It has nothing to do with size or use. Is not a cat as much an animal as a lion? Is not a bungalow as much a building as a skyscraper? Is not a modest family house, home to three or four, not as much a building as a mansion that houses hundreds? Fluctuating patterns of who, and how many, speak languages does not take away from the fact that they are languages.  When the last native Akkadian speaker died, did a most expressive and beautiful language become a non-language? and did the masses of art and literature produced by its erstwhile speakers become a nonsense? Of course not. Language is not defined by who, or how many, speak it. Esperanto, whilst clunky and ethnocentric, is certainly a language; but so is my own principal language, spoken fluently by a dozen or so folk; and if a person can express themselves and communicate to a reasonable extent in their own conlang, it does not matter whether five hundred others speak it, or if they alone have mastered it - it is a language.  
 2. 'What is the purpose of artlangs?' Since when did art have to have a purpose? The purpose of artlangs is the purpose of art; the purpose of art is art. As an individual, I have produced nothing but artlangs over the years. My purpose was to make something beautiful and mellifluous,  rich and nuanced, and heavily influenced by the language's speaker community. Though I have had minor success when it comes to creative writing, it was never my intention to create a book or a screenplay - the idea of being able to box a universe that has been constructed over 15+ years into a few hundred pages is preposterous to me. I seek no acclaim, no pecuniary benefit, no community (indeed, I kept it as a personal language for many years), and never actively sought other speakers (though there are more than a few). It is sad if art is not enough as a rationale for anything, when I consider it a rationale for almost everything. Ars gratia artis. 
 3. I create and hone conlangs for enjoyment, pure and simple. I have always been intoxicated by languages and find them more beautiful than any concrete object in this world - so it stands to reason that I would be more than tempted to create languages myself. I find it a natural progression of glossophilia - if you love languages, then creating your own is bloody fun. As much as I love all the other languages that I speak, they are like suits bought in a shop - one's conlang is a garment tailored to oneself, where one can pick and mix from the amazing world of languages. I love everything about conlanging, particularly when it comes to my main language, whose import to me I would not be exaggerating were I to say that it was a syrthcelín (language of the soul). I love even the laborious things about conlanging - sitting down for two hours on a gloomy Wednesday night to create names for trees; creating worksheets to explain the intricacies of the language's syntax or subjunctive; (and best of all), creating hundreds of culture-specific idioms. I would give it up just as unwillingly as my other favourite pursuits. It's a lot of fun, an exercise of the imagination, and it hurts no one; so why the kvetching? For those who belittle conlinguistics and conworlding, I pity you - just because you lack the knowledge or creative vision to create a conlang doesn't mean that it is in any way a worthless exercise. 

 A- gave a deep answer. I created T- (and am working out the other languages) entirely for an artistic purpose. While Tolkien created Elvish, and therefore wrote an epic of Middle-Earth, I took the opposite approach: I created the languages of N- so to better write an epic of N-. The languages give the lost continent an added depth which I do not think would have been possible without them. So, for me, creating languages are a form of art, and I create them in order to write an epic, which is another art form. That is my reason. Like with other works of art, the epic of N- should be its own justification, the same as with Tolkien's epic. (Whether it turns out to be as good, you will have to judge.) Now, someone might still ask: "But why create a whole language in order to use it in limited ways? In particular, the majority of readers will probably learn no more of the languages than they absolutely must. Why go to all the trouble?" The shortest answer is that most listeners do not notice all the nuances of the music; but even a casual listener can tell when the drummer missed the beat, or the guitarist played the right note. And readers do not need to know any linguistics, or to speak any N- language, to see that they all have a pattern. So, no: all that work is precisely necessary, for the same reason that Olympic athletes practice for hours, for days on end, for years. All of that is necessary for a good performance. For creating languages, I think the same is true. 

 I conlang because it gives me space to explore. 

 Why do I conlang? Simple: to keep the monsters under my bed at bay. 

 Amazing question,... 1) Each language is a Universe in itself, the same way each Individual might be understood the same way. So, a language is the Way we use to understand the infinite possibilities of thought, emotion, art, science, faith, work, nature, and imagination, etc. There is no need to be a speaker community to have a language, as we can see in nature that all forms of life show language, independent from what we know about them, as human. 2) I agree with the "bonding" aspect of a language. But well, I don't conlang only for the Art of it, but also to be able to understand this "bonding" aspect, and I think conlangs have more to show then Art alone. They convey the needs and wishes of the speaker(s), actually whatever they be, and they're useful in a huge number of ways. 3) I conlang for Freedom. Once I've defined myself as a Free Thinker, I want to get myself free from the "jailing" aspect of the one-way-thinking given by (my) native language(s), or even by the English as (my) second language, or any other natlang, this way I invent languages to think out of the box.

A Virestian Folk Song

At the following link, you can find a Virestian folk song that I wrote some time ago, though I'm only now getting around to posting it on youtube and here. The lyrics, in English and in Paiodd, are at the youtube page. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-CMISeUaBg

History of English and Some Speculations

A couple of interesting articles dealing with the history of the English language:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19368988

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7911645.stm

The last one is just common sense to an Historical Linguist like myself - "What the researchers found was that the frequency with which a word is used relates to how slowly it changes through time, so that the most common words tend to be the oldest ones." Duh!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13049700

And some commentary on this one:

"We show that each of these language families evolves according to its own set of rules, not according to a universal set of rules," Dr Dunn explained.

"That is inconsistent with the dominant 'universality theories' of grammar; it suggests rather that language is part of not a specialised module distinct from the rest of cognition, but more part of broad human cognitive skills."

-At first I thought this article would argue against my ideas that the origin of language lies in the common materials with which humans are endowed - brains with the same potential, environments to observe and interact with, etc. But this quote indicates that it is concerned with the process of language evolution, not the origin of language.

Moreover, the latter part of it suggests precisely what I want to argue: that language exists because of the human ability to imagine, to create (the "broad human cognitive skills").

The paper asserts instead that "cultural evolution is the primary factor that determines linguistic structure, with the current state of a linguistic system shaping and constraining future states".

- Yes, I would argue, because of the fact that we're all working with the same tools when we create and use language.

The Omaya Language So Far

The Omaia are a tribal people who live in the forests of the Northern Mountains which form the northern border of Virestia. They have their own language, unrelated to the High Speech or any other known languages of the former empire. Below I have copied and pasted my notes of what is known about their language so far.

Pronouns

There are two sets of pronouns in omaya.

1. Subject, object pronouns, possessives

ay I, me, my

ow you, you, your

iy, y' he, she, it; him, her, it; his, her, its

There are no plural forms. To express the plural, if necessary, the prefix h' can be attached before the second pronoun, thus: ay'h'ow 'you and I (we)', ay'h'iy 'he and I (we)' and so on. But usually omaya speakers rely solely on context for plural meaning.

2. Subject pronouns of “suffix verbs”

he I

yi you

There is no third person pronoun. Instead, the suffixes applied to these verbs would simply be applied directly to the noun or adjective desired.

Ex: alya he't I am tall.

m'owehu yi'p You're going home.

inyawu'k He has a friend.

Perfective Tense pronouns

Unlike English, or Paiodd, for that matter, the Omaya language indicates tense in subject pronouns. The perfective pronouns are as follows:

(u)w' I

ah you

(e)r he, she, it

Examples: w'ow'ayihe. I saw you.

ah'ay'ayihe. You saw me.

ateli w'ayihe. I saw the warrior.

ateli ayu r'ayihe ta. The warrior saw me.

ayu r'ayihe. He saw me.

Note that we must use the pronoun (e)r even when the subject is expressed. This is the most common way to indicate the past tense.

The other way is only possible when the direct object is a pronoun. The object pronoun is formed from the perfective pronoun in the same way that one makes object pronouns out of the regular pronouns, that is, add the suffix -u and place it in the normal direct object position.

Examples: ateli wu ayihe. The warrior saw me.

ichiwu ru alhe. The chief called him.

olwu ah wune. The wolf bit you.

Suffix Verbs

As the examples above show, there are three so-called "suffix verbs", which can attach to the special pronouns he I, and yi you, or directly to a noun that they describe, or to an adjective that describes a third person pronoun. These suffixes are:

-'t to be

-'p to go

-'k to have

Examples:

he't I am he'p I go he'k I have

yi't you are yi'p you go yi'k you have

atelu't it is a war atelu'p he goes to war atelu'k he/they has/have a war

As you can see, the third person meaning requires another word to attach to.

Syntax

The most important thing to note about omaya syntax is that many stems have a basic meaning to which any of three suffixes can be attached to indicate whether the word is to be used as a noun, verb, or adjective.

-u indicates nouns.

-e indicates verbs.

-a indicates adjectives.

Thus, we can take the stem ruy and add each of these endings to get

ruyu truth

ruye be true, act truly, tell the truth

ruya true

Here are some other examples:

atelu battle, war inyawu friend wihu fish

atele do battle, make war inyawe make friends wihe to fish

atela warlike inyawa friendly wiha fishy (fish-like)

There is one more suffix, -i which indicates that the attached stem modifies a person, group, or thing, hence it shows up often in the name of tribes, or the most common word for the omaya themselves: omayi 'the people of the mountains'

Some other examples: ateli warrior, warriors wihi fisherman, fishermen

Word Order

The basic word order in an omaya sentence is subject-object-verb. This is the order, for instance, in sentences where the subject and object are both pronouns:

ay'ow'owe I love you.

y'ay'ayihe OR iy'ay'ayihe He sees me.

ay'iy'nohe I know him.

When the direct object is a noun, however, the fact that subject pronouns must be prefixed to the verb makes this order impossible. Thus, such a sentence would be:

umyu ay'ayihe I see the woman.

olwu y'ohunye He is hunting a wolf.

inu ow'owe You love the man.

In the opposite case, where the subject is a noun and the direct object is a pronoun, we run into trouble. We can't attach the pronoun without getting it confused with the subject. That is, if we simply attached the pronoun, we wouldn't know if

olwu y'ohunye means 'He is hunting a wolf.' or 'A wolf is hunting him'! Quite a difference, as you can see!

Instead, then, we separate the pronoun from the verb and attach the noun ending -u, and we use the normal subject-object-verb order, with just one catch. See if you can spot it below.

olwu iyu ohunye ta The wolf is hunting him.

Well, the meaning is much clearer now! But there is this strange word ta at the end of the sentence, isn't there? What do we make of that?

As it turns out, omaya uses a system of particles, usually coming at the end of a clause, to tell us what kind of sentence it is. The particle ta simply tells us that this is a normal omaya sentence, with the subject first, followed by the direct object, followed by the verb. There are several more particles, each defining different kinds of sentences or clauses, but we will get to them in due time.

For now, you need to know that ta is necessary at the end of a sentence where both the subject and the direct object are full nouns (or, like in the example above, where the subject is a noun and the direct object is a pronoun).

Notice, of course, that we didn't use it in such sentences as ay'ow'ayihe 'I see you'. Can you guess why? The answer is simple: The subject ay and the direct object ow are both pronouns. The first one is the subject, the second one is the object.

Similary in the sentence olwu y'ohunye 'He is hunting a wolf', we have no need of ta, because here the subject is a pronoun.

We only need ta when:

1. both subject and direct object are nouns, or
2. when the subject is a noun and the direct object is a pronoun.

How about some more examples?

inu umyu owe ta The man loves the woman.

umyu ayu owe ta The woman loves me.

Now that you've got that under wraps, let's introduce a few more particles.

pa is one you'll see a lot. It means that the sentence is a regular omaya sentence, but it's negative. In other words, it's kind of like the word not in English, with the added stipulation that the sentence is in subject-object-verb order. Let's look at this with some of our previous examples:

inu umyu owe pa The man does not love the woman.

umyu ayu owe pa The woman doesn't love me.

Easy, right? Unfortunately, there is a catch, but it's not too hard! Take a look at the following examples:

ay'ow'ayihe pa I don't see you.

y'ay'owe pa She doesn't love me.

Unlike ta, we can use pa with sentences that have all pronouns for subject and object. This is simply because there is no other way to make the negative in omaya, at least not in main clauses. But this actually makes things easier on you, since it means there's only one word to learn: pa.

The third basic particle is ka. This also means that the sentence is normal subject-object-verb order, but with an added element. ka tells us that the very first word (or phrase!) is used adverbially. Examples, please!

im onyuhi li ayihe ka The hunter sees the elk now.

w'eyu umyu oyu ohe ka The woman is cooking food today.

owar ay'iy'owe ka I loved her once.

Notice that in the last example, ka is used with a pronominal sentence (where the subject and direct object are both pronouns).

ti is the next particle. It makes the clause before it relative to the clause before it. It's very similar to the relative pronoun that in English.

ohunyi riya'li rihe ti ay'ayihe I see that the hunters bring fine elk.

ateli iyu nore ti ichiwu sihe The chief asks that the warriors salute him.

omaya prefers to have a stated subject and object wherever possible, and although the examples just given are perfectly correct, you will often hear sentences like the following:

riya'li iy'rihe ti ohunyi ay'ayihe I see the hunters, that they bring fine elk.

y'iy'nore ti ichiwu ateli sihe The chief asks the warriors that they salute him.

The important thing in these sentences, which are the preferred versions of the examples from the previous point, is that both clauses have subject and object.

What happens, though, if you have an intransitive verb (that is, one with no direct object)? If the intransitive sentence is all there is, then it's easy: simply write the subject followed by the verb, as in:

umyu ohe The woman cooks.

idreyu liwe The children are playing.

However, if there is another clause to be added, there's a particle for that:

ay'nohe ki idreyu liwe I know that the children are playing.

ichiwu nohe ki y'ateli riy'ola't The chief knows that his warriors are the best.

pi: negative subordinate

to: object phrase marker

ko: temporal or locative marker for nouns or noun phrases (i.e. the day when, the mountain where)

po: negative object phrase marker (not the day when, not the mountain where)

tu: object changes state, possession, or ownership to modifier (-a word), in other words, marks theme/ditransitive sentences

ku: instrumental

ki: intransitive subordinate clause marker

pu: negative of either of the above

[ni: imperfective (durative, progressive)]

[ŋi: imperfective with modifier]

[mi: negative imperfective]

[no: interrogative]

[ŋo: interrogative with modifier]

[mo: negative interrogative]

[ne: imperative]

[ŋe: imperative with modifier]

[me: negative imperative]

Note: The particles in brackets are not established yet, merely the result of some brainstorming. I considered a corresponding set of particles to indicate the perfective tense (na, ŋa, ma) but decided on pronouns instead, so many of these are likely to change as well.

You can find the dictionary of approximately 250 words so far here:
http://cd.langwiki.info/search/OM

The Making of a Conlang

I thought I would take this week's blog entry to unravel some of the thought processes that went into the creation of Paiodd, or as much as I can remember, since I've been working on this language for at least 15 years. Still, I am certainly still aware of a lot of the influences and events that went into creating my own language. I'll start by sharing the original motivation, and some of my early exposures to linguistics and other factors that made me want to create my own language. Depending on how long this ends up being, I may break it up into parts. For now, on with the show!

The First Cause

In reality, it may be more complex than this, because many things were happening at the same time. Nonetheless, one of the primary motivating factors in my conlanging was my first exposure to C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia. We read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in fifth grade, and, not content with that, I went to the local library and checked out the other six, one-by-one, until I had read them all. Having always been an avid reader, and interested in writing as well, I decided I wanted to write my own fantasy series. It was then that The Chronicles of Virestia and Holas were born. Originally a simple revenge story, of a boy from a tribal, Native-American-like people of the mountains, that has morphed into just a small part of a much larger story, in a world with a fairly complete history and mythology all its own. The first version may still survive in a notebook somewhere, written in faded pencil, and all of 20-something pages long.

After completing the Narnia series, my mom suggested I read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. I did so, and LOTR quickly became my favorite story of all time, as it is to this day. Of course, learning that J. R. R. Tolkien had invented his own language for his stories, I felt it was only right that I do the same for Virestia.

The Space Between Letters

Another important influence on my conlanging results from growing up in a christian family. Around the same time, or shortly thereafter, I was visiting my grandparents. They had a small wooden plaque which simply had the name of Jesus printed on it. However, the letters were printed in such a way that there were many interesting shapes between them, which seemed to compose the name. I thought it would be interesting to make an entire script based on the space between letters formed by combining them. This actually resulted in one of my first conscripts, which still survives, and I should probably post it here at some point. It's hard to say whether this was the first inkling of creating my own language, or if it was my desire to write a fantasy novel, or that first exposure to Latin.

Word Order is not the Only Way

Another milestone event happening somewhere around this time to influence my conlanging was my first exposure to Latin. It happened on another family visit, to a great aunt, the sister of the grandmother who had the Jesus plaque. Aunt Jeanette's house had a living room with a fairly large bookcase built into the wall, filled with all of these wonderful old books! Drawn to this bookcase, I pulled out Harkness's Easy Latin Method, and began to read the first several Lessons. I was absolutely enthralled to realize that Latin did with suffixes what English does with word order, particularly denoting subjects and direct objects. I began to wonder what other ways there might be to express these relationships and others.

It was when I got home from that visit that I first remember making genuine attempts to create my own languages. Fascinated by the idea of case, and potential other ways to express it, I came up with three different languages that had as many cases for as many functions as I could think of. Naturally enough, I also began reading up on case systems, and realizing how widespread it actually is, even in modern languages like German and Russian, I decided case wasn't exotic enough for me. I wanted something more, a way to express the relationships between words that was not case, exactly, but would be able to cover the important uses of case.

The first thing I tried was to have an article that inflected for case, rather than endings on the nouns themselves, but that wasn't satisfactory, either. I needed something still more exotic. Eventually, this resulted in the idea of the dual-inflection system that Paiodd has today, where nouns inflect to show whether they are related to verbs or to other nouns, with invariable suffixes to indicate more precisely how they are related. The actual form of this inflection, as well as that of verbs, is a result of the next influence I will discuss.

Making the Irregular, Regular

I had always been mystified and fascinated by the weird way irregular verbs like run had past tenses with internal vowel changes, eg. ran. So it was only natural that I would think to make these irregular forms the regular way to inflect verbs for different tenses. With this kind of vowel-alternation in place for the verbs, it seemed natural enough to extend it to nouns as well, and thus the vowel-change to indicate verbal or nominal inflection was born.

Just Add 'H'

Of course, there is another aspect of the verbal and nominal inflection in nouns besides the vowel-change in the stem. Final consonants change as well. I don't remember exactly the order of events in this case, but I had some awareness already that /b/, /p/, /v/, and /f/ were related, as were the alveolar stops and fricatives, and the velars (though I didn't know those terms at all; that wouldn't come until graduate school). And of course, English had the orthographic 'th', 'sh', 'ch', and more rarely 'ph'. In the original conscript that I intended for use with Paiodd - which didn't have a name for a long time, until I decided to name it for my middle name, calling it Kirkian - there were only independent letters for the voiceless stops. I decided the plural morpheme would be the letter for 'h' and the resulting sound would be what I later learned were called fricatives.

Double the Fun!

Similarly, the double consonants at the end of most nouns were originally because writing a consonant doubled turned voiceless consonants into voiced ones. This terminology I did know at the time, somehow, because the logic for double consonants being voiced was that, to my linguistically ignorant mind, 'voiced' meant that voicing had been added to the sound, therefore the voiced sounds were stronger. Of course I now know that, linguistically speaking, it is actually the opposite, and voiceless sounds are considered 'strong' because they impede the flow of air much more strongly than voiced sounds!

Adjectives? Adverbs? Who Needs 'Em!

Once I had established the verbal nominal inflection system, it soon became clear that an unintended consequence of this was the utter lack of need for separate word classes of adjectives and adverbs. After all, why do you need a separate part of speech for a word meaning 'big' when you can simply take the word for 'size' in nominal inflection (showing that it is related to a noun, not a verb) and add the suffix meaning 'with', or 'of', or even '-y', giving a word meaning '(a noun) with size' or 'of size' or 'size-y'. Perhaps a better way to think of it is 'sizeable', such that just like in English, saying 'a sizeable income' means a big one, a lot. habb 'size' becomes hapía 'with size, of size, sizeable, big'

Likewise, if there is a noun meaning 'quiet', if we put it in the verbal inflection and add the same suffix meaning 'with' or 'of', we would get '(an action) with quiet' or 'of quiet', or in other words, 'quietly'. Thus, Paiodd adjectives and adverbs are really just nouns in nominal or verbal inflection, respectively. The same process results in a natural form of compounding words. If we want a noun, for example, we can take the main noun (the 'head') and attach to it a nominally-inflected noun. If we want a verb, we can take the verb and attach a noun in verbal inflection. The word for 'to sleep', among many others, is formed this way, literally meaning 'to take sleep', with the verbal-inflection form of the noun 'sleep' followed by the verb 'to take'. ashedd 'sleep' attached to mré 'to take' becomes ashidmré 'to sleep'.

Word Order

One final interesting aspect of Paiodd is the word order. It is most usually OSV (that is, the direct object comes first, the subject next, and the verb next), another result of some linguistic ignorance on my part. To 15-year-old me, the relationship between subject and verb seemed extremely important, much more so than the relationship between the verb and objects that may or may not even be there. Thus, I decided that the subject would always be directly adjacent to its verb in Paiodd. Now, of course, I understand the concept of a predicate much better, and if I were creating Paiodd for the first time today, I probably would not make it OSV. Unless, of course, I liked it because of its exotic quality, which would be more likely. I now know, fifteen years and an MA later, that OSV languages do exist, although they are rare - which is why Yoda-speak sounds so alien to us, even though we can usually figure out what it means. 'Long have I watched this one.'

That's All, Folks!

I hope you've enjoyed this peak into the mind of a conlanger, albeit a rather immature, ignorant one when I started the process fifteen years ago or more. A huge motivation in my continued work with this conlang, and others is the desire to find more exotic or even completely innovative ways of expressing the relationships between words. A more recent idea, for instance, has been to have some sort of particle, either at the beginning or end of a sentence, that tells you what word is what, subject, object, verb, or other. I've tried to work this into the language of the Native-American-like people among whom my fantasy-novel's hero, Holas, was raised, and I've also considered using it in a language I've started in honor of my wife. These may never be as fully developed as Paiodd, but just experimenting with ideas like this one is its own reward, and most exciting of all to me is when a language I've created begins to take on a life of its own, such as doing away completely with adjectives and adverbs, something I never intended, but was a natural consequence of the structure of the language in other areas.

Canjom Virestia

This is the Canjom Virestía, The History of Virestia, in Paiodd script, transliteration, and English. I wrote most of it quite a long time ago, but this version was rewritten from scratch, and I tried not to refer to the original English too much. It was actually quite fun, since it showed me how much of Paiodd I remember, and was mostly a composition in Paiodd instead of a simple translation. Here is the link:
https://acrobat.com/#d=PLqpMZFp9DzdEVzxx510lQ

Should you need a refresher on Paiodd script, the link is here: https://acrobat.com/#d=CLHyICY0gGudMOp-ZaIC*g

And finally, if you want to try looking up the words, check out my dictionary at Conlanger's Dictionary: http://cd.langwiki.info/search.php?l=PO

Agents, Patients, and more

I was thinking this morning about the noun view in English, and what it means in a sentence such as:

My hotel room has a great view.

In this sentence, view is describing what is seen, or what is viewed. English is also capable of using nouns derived from verbs to indicate the agent, most often by the use of -er, or even the object of the action, sometimes with -ee, though this is a bit rare. For example, a payee receives funds from the payer. This -ee suffix is used fairly productively in colloquial speech, at least in certain parts of the US, even when the resulting word is never used in print or on official documentation. Theoretically, at least, one could take any verb and attach -ee to make a noun denoting the object of the action. In such a case, the verb that we take would be the takee.

Considering this made me think about conlanging, and how it might be used to explore such an issue, which is precisely what this blog is supposed to be about. Let's begin with a further explanation of the English case, particularly the agentive -er suffix.

This suffix is in fact, a little ambiguous at times, because viewer could technically mean the person or other being doing the viewing, but it usually refers to an instrument of some kind used to view specific things, like a kaleidoscope viewer, or software for viewing pictures, etc. Why the ambiguity? The short answer is to shrug our shoulders and chock it up to the fact that, sorry, it's just English, which is a very typical explanation I give to my ESOL students.

This is where conlangs could come in. Let's imagine a conlang that derives nouns from verbs corresponding to several semantic roles. This language will have a marker for agent, patient, theme, and instrument, which correspond roughly to the syntactic roles of subject, direct object, indirect object, and well, instrument, respectively. Each of these will be indicated by a different suffix (I suppose if we really wanted to be cool, we could use prefixes, infixes, or some sort of root mutation instead, but we'll keep it simple for now).

Let's use the following suffixes:

agentive: -(e)r

patient: -i

theme: -(e)n

instrument: -u

For the fun of it, and to make look a little less like English, let's make verbs by spelling them backwards from English, with simplified sounds and letters. In other words, we'll reverse the spelling of English verbs and turn complicated sounds like th, sh, ch, q, and x into simply t, s, s, k, and k, respectively. We'll also ignore any silent letters like k in kn, w in wr, and the silent e on the end of so many verbs. So let's take about 10 common English verbs and apply these transformations:

1. be - ib

2. see - is

3. go - og

4. write - tair

5. think - nit

6. do - ud

7. sleep - pils

8. love - vol

9. want - naw

10. have - vah

So, attaching the suffixes we would have the following words:

1. iber be-er, being, person

ibi what is, being, existence

iben something to or for which things exist

ibu something by or with which things exist

2. iser seer, someone who sees

isi something that is seen, a view, or perhaps a picture

isen something to or for which one sees

isu something by or with which one sees, viewer, spectacles, a telescope, etc.

3. oger someone or something that goes, goer, perhaps car or other vehicle

(ogi) not used, as go is an intransitive verb

ogen a person, thing, or place to or for which something goes

ogu something by or with which one goes, a vehicle, car, etc.

4. tairer someone who writes, writer, author

tairi something that is written, literature, a poem, or written story

tairen someone or something to or for which one writes, addressee of a letter, theme or purpose of a work

tairu something by or with which one writes, pencil, pen, or other writing instrument

5. niter someone who thinks, thinker, intellectual, scholar, philosopher

niti something that is thought, a thought, idea, belief, or philosophy

niten something or someone to or for which one thinks, the cause or theme of thought, the object of thought (perhaps especially a loved one)

nitu something by or with which one thinks, the mind

6. uder someone who does or acts, actor, agent

udi something that is done, action, act

uden something to or for which one acts, goal, purpose

udu something by or with which one acts, will

7. pilser someone who sleeps, sleeper

(pilsi) not used, sleep is intransitive

pilsen something to or for which one sleeps, rest, recuperation

pilsu something by or with which one sleeps, bed

8. voler lover

voli beloved

volen something to or for which one loves

volu something by or with which one loves

9. nawer/nawr someone or something who wants

nawi someone or something wanted

nawen/nawn something to or for which one wants, an intended recipient of a gift

nawu something by or with which one wants, desire

10. vaher someone who has, possessor

vahi something that is had or possessed

vahen something to or for which one has

vahu something by or with which one has

A system like this has two possible uses or results. In the first place, it could simply be used as a productive means of vocabulary building, such that isu, for example, would be used for optacle devices like spectacles or telescopes. On the other hand, this system could result in little need for the bulky relative clauses that English has to employ, unwieldy phrases like that by which (something) is seen, he who sees, that which I saw, and so forth. These could be reduced to one simple word each in such a language: isu, iser, isen.

Of course, there is no reason why both uses could not co-exist, but there could be ambiguity that results. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as it could be fruitful in producing puns and jokes, or clever poetic turns of phrase, but we might want some way of clarifying the meaning where necessary. Similarly, if we only had one of the two possible applications of this system, we would require other means to get the meanings that aren't covered. If we chose the first application of vocabulary building, we would probably have to have relative pronouns or particles to indicate the meanings covered by the second application. If we chose the second option of relativizing, we might have to have still more derivational suffixes to create words meaning lover and beloved, love, etc.

This is perhaps what interests me most of all about conlanging: devising various systems of grammar and testing their possible applications, and experimenting with the results of such systems, like lack of relativizers in the case of the example language here, or lack of adverbs in adjectives in my main conlang Paiodd. I find this stuff absolutely fascinating!

La mer est tout! Trilingual translation

Jules Verne, Vingt Milles Lieues sous les Mers

Traductions par Jeremy Graves

- Vous aimez la mer, capitaine.

- Oui! je l'aime! La mer est tout! Elle couvre les sept dixièmes du globe terrestre. Son souffle est pur et sain. C'est l'immense désert où l'homme n'est jamais seul, car il sent frémir la vie a ses côtés. La mer n'est que la véhicule d'une surnaturelle et prodigieuse existence; elle n'est que mouvement et amour; c'est l'infini vivant, comme l'a dit un de vos poètes. Et en effet, monsieur le professeur, la nature s'y manifeste par ses trois règnes, minéral, végétal, animal. Ce dernier y est largement représenté par les quatres groupes des zoophytes, par trois classes des articulés, par cinq classes des mollusques, par trois classes des vertébrés, les mammifères, les reptiles et ces innombrables légions de poissons, ordre infini d'animaux qui compte plus de treize mille espèces, dont un dixième seulement appartient a l'eau douce. La mer est la vaste réservoir de la nature. C'est par la mer que le globe a pour ainsi dire commencé, et qui sait s'il ne finira pas par elle! Là est la suprème tranquillité. La mer n'appartient pas aux despotes. À sa surface, ils peuvent encore exercer des droits iniques, s'y battre, s'y dévorer, y transporter toutes les horreurs terrestres. Mais à trente pieds au-dessous de son niveau, leur pouvoir cesse, leur influence s'éteint, leur puissance disparaît! Ah! monsieur, vivez, vivez au sein des mers! Là seulement est l'indépendence! Là je ne reconnais pas de maîtres! Je suis libre! »

Translation

- You love the sea, captain.

- Yes! I love her! The sea is everything! She covers seven-tenths of the globe. Her breath is pure and healthy. It is the immense desert where man is never alone, for it feels as if he trembles with life on her coasts. The sea is but the vehicle of a supernatural, prodigious existence; she is but motion and love; infinity alive, as one of your poets put it. And besides, my dear professor, nature manifests itself within her through the three kingdoms, mineral, vegetable, animal. This last is largely represented by the four groups of zoophytes, by three classes of articulates, by five classes of mollusks, by three classes of vertebrates, mammals, reptiles, and those innumerable legions of fish, infinite order of animals that comes to more than thirty thousand species, of which only a tenth pertain to known waters. The sea is the vast reservoir of nature. It is from the sea that the world is said to have begun, and who knows if it will not end with her! There, there is supreme tranquility. The sea does not belong to despots. On her surface, they still exercise their iniquitous rights, fighting each other, devouring each other, and carrying on all the horrors of the earth! But just thirty feet below their level, their power ends, their influence is extinguished, their might disappears! Oh, sir, live, live at the breasts of the sea! Only there is independence! There I recognize no master! I am free! »

Español

- Usted ama el mar, capitán.

- ¡Sí! La amo! El mar es todo! Cubre siete décimos del globo terrestrial. Su soplo es puro y sano. Es el desierto inmenso dónde el hombre no es nunca solo, ya que se sienta estremecer con la vida a sus costas. el mar no es nada sino vehículo de una existencia sobrenatural y prodigiosa; no es nada sino movimiento y amor; es la infinidad vivienda, cómo dijo uno de sus poetas. Además, señor profesor, la naturaleza se manifiesta allá por sus tres reinos, mineral, vegetal, animal. Este último está representado, en gran parte, por los cuatro grupos de zoófitos, por tres clases de articulados, por cinco clases de moluscos, por tres clases de vertebrados, los mamíferos, los reptiles, y los ordenes innumerables de peces, orden infinado de animales que ceunta más de treinta mil especies, de los cuales solamente un décimo pertenece a los aguas dulces. El mar es la reserva vasta de la naturaleza. Desde el mar el globo se dice comenzar, ¡y quien sabe si no acabará por él tambien! Allá es la tranquilidad suprema. El mar no pertenece a los déspotas. A su superficie, todavía ejercen sus derechas inicuas, pelearse, devorarse, y transportar todo horror terestrial! Pero treinta pies debajo de su nivel, su poder cesa, su influencia apaga, su fuerza desaparece! Ay! Señor! Vive, vive a los senos del mar! La independencia se encuentra solamente allá! Allá no conozco ningún maestro! Soy libre!