Categories
Analysis English Language

To What Extent do Constructed Languages Serve an Important Purpose in Media?

Eva Caston Bell is a student of English Literature, Spanish, and History, with these studies having shaped her interests in both the linguistic and contextual elements of constructed languages. She is also interested in fandom and pop culture and how it can be used for intellectual and academic purposes, especially on platforms of predominantly young users such as TikTok and Twitter. In her spare time, Eva enjoys playing the guitar, listening to Oh Wonder, and singing with her school choir.

Abstract

This research project explored the extent to which Constructed Languages serve an important purpose in media. The study focused largely around the combination of prior research conducted by language constructors and the experiences of those who consume constructed languages within the types of media they exist in, such as film, television, and literature. These experiences were collected through primary research in the form of a survey which compiled the sentiments of over 200 conlang enthusiasts, and covered the questions their own perspectives on learning a constructed language, their varying effectiveness dependent on the medium they existed in, and the constructed languages with which they were most familiar, in order to gauge the way in which constructed languages have the most extensive effects on those the reader or audience. Through the combination of these differing perspectives, the project was able to investigate the prevailing function that constructed languages serve within pop culture and media, and how this role has differed since the establishment of online communities in the field. The most popular trend offered by both conlangers and their fans was that constructed languages offer a sense of community and collaboration between those who would not otherwise associate, while also providing academic value to fiction and pop culture, a sentiment established more by those that construct languages, rather than those that receive them. This therefore demonstrated the role of the constructed language as a unifying presence of media, both commercial and social, and a mode of expression for everyone involved in or affected by their presence.

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English Language Essays

Designing an Artificial Language: Metaphor

Rick Morneau is a long-time language creator who lives in rural Idaho. In the early 1990s, he wrote a series of essays on language design that proved to be quite influential in the early language creation community. Their quality has endured since their original publication, and continue to be read and enjoyed by language creators the world over.

Abstract

This essay is about the use of metaphor in ALs, why they should be avoided, and how they can be avoided.

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Conlang Descriptions English Language

Presentation of the Duišan and Kven language

Sébastien Thomine just completed a master in Indigenous Studies at the university of Tromsø in Northern Norway. Currently enrolled in a second year bachelor in Kven, a minority language from Northern Norway, he is also a PhD applicant in the field of cultural representation in education and has a great interest in the revitalization of endangered languages.

Abstract

This paper is a revised version of the final exam of the course Constructed Language of the University of Tromsø. It compares the particularities of the constructed language Duišan with the particularities of Kven, a minority language derived from Finnish and spoken by less than 2,000 individuals in Northern Norway.

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Categories
Conlang Descriptions English Language

Kala Grammar

Carl Buck is the creator of Kala, a personal constructed language. He works in the national security field and has worked in the US government most of his life. He enjoys cooking, spending time with his children, camping, and generally relaxing next to his fire pit in his yard. He has been a conlanger since long before he knew there was even a name for it. He created his first cypherlang around age 9 and has been creating and learning various types of languages from that time on. He lives in rural Pennsylvania.

Abstract

This grammar is Carl’s attempt to create a fully fleshed-out and functional conlang. The author claims it has become bulky, unwieldy, and far too convoluted to continue. He has plans to start with the same basic concepts and refine the grammar so that, while functional, it is easy to follow yet creatively distinct. Kala was initially influenced by Nahuatl, Japanese, and various languages that Carl has studied over the decades. The grammatical goals were initially to clone Japanese grammar with Nahuatl sounding words. This proved overly simplistic and evolved to encompass grammatical features from languages such as Quechua, Swahili, Romance, and Semitic languages. There has been a concerted effort to provide copious examples so that the reader is able to fully comprehend the rule or aspect of Kala and therefore be able to use it as quickly as possible.

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Categories
Conlang Descriptions English Language

Wóxtjanato: A grammar

Jessie Sams is a Professor of Linguistics at Stephen F. Austin State University. She generally teaches courses rooted in linguistic analysis of English, though one of her favorite courses to teach is her Invented Languages course, where students construct their own languages throughout the semester (she was even able to get Invented Languages officially on the books at SFA with its own course number). Her research primarily focuses on syntax and semantics, especially the intersection of the two within written English quotatives; constructed languages; and history of the English language and English etymology. Since 2019, she’s worked as a professional conlanger on the Freeform series Motherland: Fort Salem. In her free time, she enjoys reading, hosting game nights with friends, baking (especially cupcakes), and, of course, conlanging.

Abstract

This is the full grammar of Wóxtjanato, a language spoken on a planet that was affected by the sudden appearance of a second moon.

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Categories
English Language Literature Toki Pona Language

Alrond and the Magic Fox

Dr. Evgeny A. Khvalkov, Associate Professor, Higher School of Economics, Dept. of History Promyshlennaya Ulitsa 17, Saint Petersburg, Russia.

Abstract

This is an original fairy tale by Evgeny A. Khvalkov translated into English and Toki Pona.

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English Language Essays German Language

Die Wichtigkeit von Conlangs in Medien

Jonah Behring is a conlanger and worldbuilder from Germany who recently graduated high school. He started worldbuilding early on and later started making languages for a fantasy world about which he also has written a novel and short stories, following a huge interest in history and ancient languages. His best known language is Käntwo, but he’s currently working on a family of hunter-gatherer languages for a new worldbuilding project. During his leisure time he likes to worldbuild, roller skate, and make conlang-related YouTube videos. In the future he wants to study historical linguistics.

Jonah Behring ist ein Conlanger und Worldbuilder aus Deutschland, der vor kurzem sein Abitur gemacht hat. Er hat schon früh mit Worldbuilding begonnen und später Sprachen für eine Fantasy-Welt entwickelt, über die er auch einen Roman und Kurzgeschichten schreibt, was einem großen Interesse an Geschichte und alten Sprachen folgt. Seine bekannteste Sprache ist Käntwo, aber er arbeitet derzeit an einer Familie von Jäger- und Sammlersprachen für ein neues Worldbuilding-Projekt. In seiner Freizeit mag er Worldbuilding, Rollerskaten und das Erstellen von Conlang-YouTube-Videos. In der Zukunft möchte er historische Linguistik studieren.

Abstract

Fantasy and Science Fiction shows and movies have been gaining a lot of popularity recently. Thus the authenticity of fictional cultures in media is more important than ever: being a prop it has to be both fully functional and authentic. Suitable conlangs in media are essential, especially in a globalised society like ours to avoid cultural appropriation.

Fantasy- und Science-Fiction-Serien und -Filme haben in letzter Zeit stark an Popularität gewonnen. Daher ist die Authentizität fiktionaler Kulturen in den Medien wichtiger denn je: als Requisite muss sie sowohl voll funktionsfähig als auch authentisch sein. Geeignete Conlangs in Medien sind essentiell, besonders in einer globalisierten Gesellschaft wie der unseren, um kulturelle Aneignung zu vermeiden.

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Conlang Descriptions English Language

Aramteskan Grammar

Lauren Gawne is a linguist and senior lecturer at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. She is the co-host of the Lingthusiasm podcast and writes the Superlinguo blog on language and linguistics.

Abstract

This document provides an overview of the grammar of the Aramteskan language, created by Lauren Gawne for P. M. Freestone’s Shadowscent series (The Darkest Bloom and Crown of Smoke). This represents the state of completed work on the grammar at the conclusion of these two books. This is by no means a complete or detailed grammar, and some sections may contain more information than others.

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Conlang Descriptions English Language

Complete Grammar of the Yajéé Language

P. A. Lewis is a professional classical oboist and produces conlangs as a hobby. He has been interested in conlanging since 2018, and has been a member of the conlang community since 2020. His primary interest in language is in historical linguistics, and thus his conlangs are all spoken in a single conworld, Omnia (website coming soon). Some conlangs he has created include (in order of how proud he is of them): Yajéé, Andva, Radoza, and Chiset.

Abstract

This is a complete grammar of the Yajéé language, featuring an extensive overview of its phonology and morphosyntax in its current state. The grammar includes a robust discussion of the pitch accent system employed by the language. Other notable features include: a telicity-based derivational system which impacts the semantics of the aspect under suffixes, umlaut and other phonological changes which result in multiple stems for nearly every noun and verb, and rampant pronoun dropping despite having no verb agreement.

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Categories
English Language Europeze Language French Language Literature

Esis Vinter

Francisco ACP Andrade is a Professor of Law at Universidade do Minho Law School. Having Portuguese as his native language, he is quite fluent in French, Spanish, and English. He studied in France (Poitiers), England (Sheffield), and in the US (Seattle). He has also studied some Italian, German, and Russian. Being very interested in European languages, he started, as a hobby, to create an auxiliary language that could be understood as really European. That was the beginning of the project of the language Europeze, an auxiliary language derived from the main European languages, based mainly in Romance and Germanic languages, but with some elements of other European languages (mostly, but not only, Slavic languages and Greek).

Abstract

“Esis Vinter” is a story based on the life of a foreign student in Sheffield (England) in 1994-1995. It is told as a surrealistic tale, and it shows the difficulties arising from cultural differences and the friendship established with some of the international students. The story is mainly developed around the friendship of the narrator and a French girl. Cultural references to differences and similarities between Portugal and France in contrast to the English way of life are a constant of the tale. The story is presented in Europeze, French, and English.

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