05-16-2024, 08:01 PM
Let's discuss conlangs.
What are your favourites? Do you speak any? Do you think a conlang will ever rival natural languages for number of speakers?
I speak beginner Esperanto (me parolas komencaton Esperanton), but am more interested in the construction side. In addition to my Neo-Pictish/Prythonek, I am working on and off on a version of PIE with much-simplified grammar and some influence from Esperanto and other IE-derived conlangs, and a language that combines IE grammar and particles with Sino-Tibetan core vocabulary. And, of course, I have a number of conscripts including Romanes-lekhipen. As for existing conlangs, my favourites include Klingon (for how authentically "alien" it sounds to human ears, although Marc Okrand was an expert in Native Californian linguistics and took cues from the languages he studied), various Esperantidos (a particular favourite of mine is Poliespo, created by a native Cherokee speaker and containing much Iroquoian vocabulary), Sambahsa (another recreation of PIE, albeit with much vocabulary derived from non-IE languages), Cumbraek (a recreation of Cumbric which is a massive influence on Neo-Pictish), palawa kani (a zonal conlang based on what we know of the Tasmanian Aboriginal languages) and Uropi (yet another recreation of PIE, but explicitly Eurocentric in its intentions).
The only conlangs I can see ever rivalling natural languages are zonal auxillary languages. Already, we see N'ko in West Africa with a sizeable userbase, although the associated script is far more popular for writing Manding languages. However, zonal auxlangs are very rarely spoken as an L1, even in cases where two parents speak different languages of the same family. In the case of N'ko, it is worth noting that it has developed over decades as a standard literary form. Comparatively few speakers of natural languages are raised speaking the standardised form; most speak the dialects of their parents and/or surrounding community. As such, N'ko is more likely to be transmitted through the educational system than at home.
What are your favourites? Do you speak any? Do you think a conlang will ever rival natural languages for number of speakers?
I speak beginner Esperanto (me parolas komencaton Esperanton), but am more interested in the construction side. In addition to my Neo-Pictish/Prythonek, I am working on and off on a version of PIE with much-simplified grammar and some influence from Esperanto and other IE-derived conlangs, and a language that combines IE grammar and particles with Sino-Tibetan core vocabulary. And, of course, I have a number of conscripts including Romanes-lekhipen. As for existing conlangs, my favourites include Klingon (for how authentically "alien" it sounds to human ears, although Marc Okrand was an expert in Native Californian linguistics and took cues from the languages he studied), various Esperantidos (a particular favourite of mine is Poliespo, created by a native Cherokee speaker and containing much Iroquoian vocabulary), Sambahsa (another recreation of PIE, albeit with much vocabulary derived from non-IE languages), Cumbraek (a recreation of Cumbric which is a massive influence on Neo-Pictish), palawa kani (a zonal conlang based on what we know of the Tasmanian Aboriginal languages) and Uropi (yet another recreation of PIE, but explicitly Eurocentric in its intentions).
The only conlangs I can see ever rivalling natural languages are zonal auxillary languages. Already, we see N'ko in West Africa with a sizeable userbase, although the associated script is far more popular for writing Manding languages. However, zonal auxlangs are very rarely spoken as an L1, even in cases where two parents speak different languages of the same family. In the case of N'ko, it is worth noting that it has developed over decades as a standard literary form. Comparatively few speakers of natural languages are raised speaking the standardised form; most speak the dialects of their parents and/or surrounding community. As such, N'ko is more likely to be transmitted through the educational system than at home.
Avatar: The obverse of a coin of Kanishka I depicting the Buddha, with the Greco-Bactrian legend ΒΟΔΔΟ.
Follow my attempt at reviving Pictish.
Romanes-lekhipen- the Romani alphabet.
Follow my attempt at reviving Pictish.
Romanes-lekhipen- the Romani alphabet.