Re: CHAT: t-shirt

The Gray Wizard wrote:

> Well, I don't think we need please those in Auxland who are not also on this
> list.
Very true!  How many auxlangers are on this list, anyway?
Or have they all left what they might consider a "playpen of nerds
wasting their precious linguistic skills on toy languages"?

>       Since this list is predominately an artlang list, I can't imagine
> anyone here being offended by Tolkien.
Quite hard, indeed.  BTW: What was Tolkien's opinion on auxlangs?
I have read that he took some interest in Esperanto, but wasn't he
quite sceptical about that matter?

> > Exactly - my own feeling is that we ignore the quarelsome pettiness of
> > auxlangers.  Let them design their own T-Shirt (if they can ;)
>
> The image of herding cats comes to mind.
;-)  I wonder which comes first: the auxlangers agree on which languages
to put on an AUXLANG t-shirt, or the UN General Assembly votes to adopt
Quenya as its official language?

> > My own opinion is that we include a conlang because it is a _conlang_ and
> > meets the criteria by which we judge any conlang, irrespective of any
> > classificatory label, to be worthy of inclusion.
>
> I fear this is the gate that caused the flood that resulted in the drowning
> of the last attempt at a conlang T-shirt.
It is true that the lines between auxlangs and artlangs are not too
clearly defined (ISTR several third-party proposals of Quenya as an
IAL),
but we should not have a project brought down by the mindless bickering
of zealots who believe they have the One True Solution of One of
Humanity's
Worst Problems [TM].  Artlangs and auxlangs are entirely different
matters,
no matter whether there are borderline cases or not.  The design goals
are different, and thus also the languages.  Most artlangers probably
agree that Esperanto is a pretty unimaginative, boring design, and not
a particularly beautiful at that - and it also lacks an interesting
concultural background.  To me (and probably to many, many other
conlangers), all the proposed IALs I have seen seem lifeless,
much unlike well-designed artlangs because it lacks a cultural history
of its own.  I find it easier to imagine people
speaking Quenya or Sindarin as their vernacular, than Esperanto or
Volapuek.  On the other hand, no auxlanger would ever dare propose
a language like Telek, with switch reference and all that, or Amman Iar
with ergative case marking plus active head marking.  Auxlangers would
cringe at Sindarin with its initial consonant mutations, or Quenya with
its ten or something cases, was anyone ever to seriously propose them
as IALs.

> > >No Lingua Ignota, no
> > >SolReSol, no volap¸k, no Esperanto, no Glosa. No Novial, Speedwords
> >
> > I agree on no Glosa, no Novial & no Speedwords.  Their inventors
> > are not on
> > this list and these languages are little known outside of the
> > conlang/auxlang worlds.
>
> Well, I don't think Hildegard ever intended that Lingua Ignota would be an
> auxlang, but not enough is known about it (its not called Lingua Ignota for
> nothing! :-)) for anyone to construct a coherent sentence anyway, so that
> point is moot.
Is there anything more known than merely a list of words?

>       A shame, however, as she may well have been the first
> documented conlanger, making Lingua Ignota interesting from an historic
> perspective.
Not to forget John Dee's Enochian, which is another hot candidate for
the title of the world's first known full-fledged conlang.
AFAIK, we have several short texts in Enochian, with translation.
And while we are at strange historical conlangs, one should not forget
the Voynich Manuscript which, until someone proves that it is written
in a yet-unknown natlang, must also count as an example of historical
conlanging.

>       SolReSol certainly has an aesthetic appeal and would surely
> garner inquiry.
Is SolReSol taken seriously by *any* auxlanger?  I think not.

>       I fear the inclusion of either Esperanto or Volapuek would
> open the floodgates, however.
Yes.  Well, it is difficult *not* to offend auxlangers, but:

If we include auxlang X but not auxlang Y,

(1) the disciples of auxlang X might be offended because their language
    shows up among all those "stupid toy languages";

(2) the disciples of auxlang Y are likely to be offended because
    the "stinking proposal X" made it onto the shirt but
    the "one true IAL" did not.

If we include no auxlang whatsoever, no auxlanger finds a reason to
bicker
about other auxlangs chosen over the one he supports.

> > Esperanto is one of the few conlangs that many a "person in the
> > street" has
> > actually heard about.  Whatever one thinks of it, it is a 'conlang
> > classic'.  IMHO omitting Esperanto is to let the auxlang bigots win.
>
> Perhaps, but this sentiment resulted in the demise of the entire project
> last time.  Which is preferable, a T-shirt with many conlangs from this list
> as well as Quenya, Sindarin and perhaps SolReSol, or no T-shirt at all
> because we couldn't agree which of the auxlangs ought to be included?  I
> think the auxlang bigots win in the latter case as well.
I think the auxlang bigots win only in the latter case.  They may
*believe*
they have won when we make a T-shirt with no auxlangs on it, but if we
fail to make a T-shirt because we can't agree on a policy on auxlangs,
they *have* won.  Anyway, what's relevant is not whether the auxlangers
see the result as a victory or as a defeat, but whether we have our
T-shirt
or not.  It is a well-known fact that whatever you do, some of your
enemies
will celebrate your action as their victory (and be it merely because
you
could have chosen an alternative that would have been even worse for
them),
unless of course you have no enemies at all.

> > I state my view to show as clearly as I can that my own consideration is
> > simply this: "What are the conlangs that non-conlangers may have come
> > across or heard about?" As I see it, they are: Esperanto, Quenya, Sindarin
> > & Klingon.
>
> I think Quenya, Sindarin and Klingon could meet this requirement without
> controversy.
100% agreed.  None of them is better known to the general public than
Esperanto, sure, but it is pretty well known (at least among those who
take an interest in fantasy and science fiction) that Tolkien invented
languages and that the Klingon language exists.  These three classics
must not miss!

> > I admit the "person in the street" is unlikely to have heard of SolReSol -
> > but it does seem to me a loss not to see a language written solely in
> > musical notation  :)
>
> Agreed.
>
> > >or
> > >NGL either, even though some list members may be working on them.
> >
> > Again I disagree.  I in no way agree with the main aim of NGL, but it is a
> > conlang that some members of this list helped to create and,
> > therefore, IMO
> > ought to be included.
>
> If we were capable of making rational distinctions among auxlangs, we would
> already have a shirt.  We couldn't accomplish this last time.  If cooler
> heads prevail this time, I'm all for giving it a try, but I think we should
> resolve to exclude all auxlangs as soon as a flammable controversy raises
> its ugly head.
Yes, the best answer to the question "Which auxlangs go onto the shirt?"
is: no auxlangs.  This way, no auxlang is preferred over any others.
And I am repeating myself when I say that many, if not most auxlangers
either don't care about their lang appearing on a T-shirt full of
artlang example, or would not like their language mentioned among
"all those toy languages".

And anyway, it is the auxlangers' own fault when we exclude them because
of their soul-wing-lame bickering.  And - do they really care?

> > >Lojban is a special case --- I don't see it as an IAL project myself
> >
> > Nor was it - and as some members of this list worked on the creation of
> > lojban, it should IMNSHO be included.
>
> Yes, I agree that Lojban is a special case not least because of John's
> involvement and the fact that he has been one of the cornerstones of this
> list for so many years.
Surely, Lojban is a much more interesting project (from the conlanging
viewpoint, that is) than the typical EuroClone IAL.  Sure it has been
proposed as an IAL, but as I said above, I have seen people proposing
Quenya as an IAL, too.  AFAIK, no auxlanger ever took the Quenya
proposal
seriously.  How much interest is there in Lojban in AUXLANG?

Just my humble opinions.

Greetings,
Jörg.