Re: old clothing (was: Re: Language superiority...)

On Thu, 15 Oct 1998, Matt Pearson wrote:

> Nik Taylor wrote:
>
> >Well, for one, natlangs have evolved for thousands of years, there are
> >traces of earlier stages, features which made sense at some earlier
> >time, but are illogical now.  There are inflections that were once
> >regular, but are no longer regular (e.g., the strong verbs of English,
> >or the stem-changing verbs of Spanish), borrowings, formerly productive
> >derivations, re-analyzed forms, syncretisms, etc., which may be absent
> >from a conlang (unless it's intended to be naturalistic).  Natural
> >languages have been compared to old clothing, with patches and stains.
> >A conlang is a new garment which has never been worn.
Speak for yourself, Nik! <G>  I agree with Matt (this is an "I agree Matt
day").  Teonaht has been invented to appear as though it is an old city
full of different types of architecture from different periods.  I say as
much on my busy Teonaht homepage, I'll remind all of you!

>
> Some of us, though, have deliberately 'distressed' our conlangs so that
> they look as if they've been worn.  Tokana, for example, is chock full of
> derivational irregularities, unproductive affixes, archaicisms, roots whose
> meanings are no longer recognisable, and obscure or mysterious lexical
> relationships.  All part of the desire to make it as 'naturalistic' as
> possible...
You know, this is great concept... a "distressed conlang."  We'd do the
same if we were building model cities.  If you wanted it to be completely
believable, as fake as it were, wouldn't you give it old areas and new
areas and areas under construction and areas down by the boondocks?

Sally
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Sally Caves
scaves@frontiernet.net
http://www.frontiernet.net/~scaves/teonaht.html