Re: Back!

On Sun, 18 Jul 1999, Adam Parrish wrote:

>         I'm curious as to how other conlangers have solved the problem
> of cosmic location, since it does seem to be rather vital to an
> important part of a language's vocabulary.  It seems to me that most of
> us have languages set in an Earth with a different social history
> (extreme: Tokana, where civilization never took place; less extreme:
> Brithenig, where history diverged hundreds of years ago; even less
> extreme: Elet Anta and Teonaht, which make no modification to history
> except to suggest the presence of secretive subcultures).  An almost
> equal proportion have chosen to locate their creations on distant
> planets (the Kolagian languages, many of Nik Taylor's creations, and the
> ubiquitous Star Trek languages).  I'm not satisfied with either of these
> options.  Have I missed anything?  Is there a middle ground?
Well, Valdyas is in "the world" and *I* don't care whether this is an
alternate earth, a distant planet, something in the past or the
future, or anything else; I don't think it's any of those things, and
it's not relevant anyway because it's an imaginary world (even
started out as fantasy), to be taken on its own terms, not as related
to anything that we know. There was never a problem to solve; it's no
question of a middle ground, there's no compromise because there are
no opposing options.

Eek, it looks as if I'm defending myself or my inventions, but most
of this thread seems to assume that a culture *should* be on "a
planet" or at least have some connection with Earth. If Valdyas is in
an alternate universe, I don't know where the gates are (except for
the little one in my imagination).

The Valdyans know that the world is round, that the stars are beyond
the sun, the sun beyond the planets, the planets beyond the moon;
they think that the world is in the centre of the universe, and for
all I know that may be factual truth *for that universe*.

The world is perhaps an alternate Earth; the same plants grow there
(with very few exceptions), the same animals live there (though some
animals counted as mythical in our culture are normal, if not common,
there; unicorns live at woods' edges in Velihas, much like deer, and
can interbreed with horses).

They've had an Ice Age, slightly more recently than our last one; the
climates are cold for their latitudes. Essle, at the latitude of
Alexandria, has a wet mediterranean climate like Venice; Valdis, at
the latitude of Venice, has a temperate continental climate like
Prague; Rizenay, at the latitude of Prague, has a sub-arctic
continental climate like St.Petersburg; and the gods only know what's
in the frozen waste at the latitude of St.Petersburg.

Of course the surroundings have influence on the language. But where
*exactly* it is doesn't make a difference. Does it for us, except
those of us who are astronomers (or science fiction writers for that
matter ;-) ?

   Irina

            Varsinen an laynynay, saraz no arlet rastynay.
                     irina@rempt.xs4all.nl (myself)
       http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt/irina/index.html (English)
    http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt/irina/backpage.html (Nederlands)