Re: vocab #2.2 - KuJomu

>From: "Gracie V." <the1@...>
>
>Roger Mills wrote:
>
> > >Was I supposed to have done a formal introduction, or somesuch?
> >
> > That would be nice.  But we're glad to hear from you anyway. Welcome!!
>
>Many thanks :)
>
>Never really knew how to do the intro thing so I just kinda jumped in.  I'm
>from
>DC (small city on the eastern coast of the US) and my linguistic background
>is
>primarily spanish (my first but not best language) and english.  My
>language is
>called KuJomu (which means "True Language").  I started it around
>1986/1987,
>making the writing first for a culture I was writing stories about, and
>then
>toying with the language.  I like to call it more of a "melting pot
>language"
>than a conlang, because I've borrowed from just about every language I
>could
>find.  Some of it is pretty much pulled out of thin air, but much of it has
>definite roots somewhere in the current and ancient world.
>
>So yes, you did notice some Bahasa Indonesia there :) At least half the
>language
>is "borrowed" from here and there rather than completely made up; I think
>of it
>as being a lot like English.  I'm trying to avoid too much of a european
>sound/feel, though there are some remnants I haven't been able to get rid
>of and
>still feel right about it.  I'd really like it to sound more Africanish,
>but I
>don't want to do away with too many different sounds.  Does that make
>sense?
>
> > Looks like an interesting and well-developed language.
>
>Thank you!
>
> > More, more!!
>
>Oh dear - where to start?  I've worked out a constantly-changing "textbook"
>but
>it's in .xls (MS Excel spreadsheet) form and it's kind of big (747kb).
>I've
>also scanned a sample of the writing I developed, if anybody wants to see
>it
>(having scanner problems so it's actually an image embedded in a .doc,
>about 50k
>or so).  The writing is something I'm very proud of; it's completely
>phonetic,
>and should work so that if one reads it out loud they should even be able
>to
>hear the writer's accent/how they would say it if they were speaking aloud.
>I've used it instead of the roman alphabet for writing just about
>everything for
>the last decade+, so I'm pretty comfortable with it.
>
>I would love to share, if anybody's interested - in 15 years I haven't
>really
>shared with anybody and've had very little feedback, especially from
>linguist
>types.
That is fantastic! I would love to hear about this language. Will you do a
website? I am just in the process of putting by conlang stuff on the net
myself. If you get a website with some people you could include your
textbook on there as a download. In fact it should be possible to convert it
to a different format fairly easily.

BTW re African languages and sounds? Lots of African languages have loads of
sounds, including some that no other continent has.

Mat


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