Re: HELP: Is this sensible?

From: "Henrik Theiling" <theiling@...>
Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2004 10:34 PM
Subject: Re: HELP: Is this sensible?


Hello!

> Carsten Becker <post@...> writes:
> > I'd handle the verbs in the examples like English, yes. I guess I
still
> > stick far too much to the IE systems I'm used to.
>
> That's quite normal. :-) My first language (and I had to do it without
> the help of any other conlanger at that time) was very IE at first and
> then moved towards Finnish, then X, then Y and finally was something
> very unique. :-)
The "depressing" bit is, Ayeri is my third attempt. OK - I'm conlanging
only since about Spring 2003, so about for a year.
I gave up "Ve Segelm A Laighödhét" because it was an ugly sounding mess
and was bored of Daléian's very IE grammar and only [i] [a] and [e] as
vowels (but I managed to create a nicely looking writing system for it).
Ayeri is supposed to be more exotic because I wanted to broaden my mind
a bit. Simple and ear-pleasing phonology.
As for being so smart to think about phonology first, I read Pablo David
Flores' and Mark Rosenfelder's Language Kits several times. And
concerning my - I think farily good *) - knowledge of German and English
grammar: My German/English teacher loved grammar more than anything
else. It *was* boring and I did not like to learn it all, but somehow I
managed though. Besides, my mother is translator for English and French
and my father speaks it both quite fluently, although he has not studied
it. So in a family of people having lots to do with language, it's no
wonder I am also intersted in language.

*) At least better than some of my classmates.

> > Yes, I'm addicted to case ;)
>
> That's a very, very good thing! :-) Learn Hungarian or Ithkuil! :-)))
LOL! Finish or Estonian would also be considerable. Ithkuil is
unpronouncable if John Quijada hasn't simplified it since I had a look
at his pages when he mentioned Ithkuil the first time.

> > *sigh* I thought I would have understood what triggers are about
> > ...
>
> When I read the Tagalog book (the one I quoted the examples from) for
> the first time, I could not believe people can handle that kind of
> structure while speaking. :-) It took a while to see the difference to
> voices in IE languages.  But it is not too different on the other
> hand.
Well, as Markus Miekk-oja (aka Miekko) said, "a good conlang cannot be
created in one summer". That's right. Heh, for a good example see Quenya
...

> **Henrik
>
> PS: Your homepage says: 'Leider stie"s dieses Interesse an Linguistik
>     nur auf wenig Verst"andnis bei meinen Eltern und Klassenkameraden
>     :(' Haha!  Start inventing a script and put signs in that script
>     everywhere in the house, especially a sign with your name on your
>     room's door.  They'll get used to it.  My parents and friends got
>     used to it, too. :-)))
Oh well, so have a look at the Daléian alphabet! I also made a nice
looking True Type font for it. Besides, when I showed a piece of Oriya
writing that fell into my hands some weeks ago to some of my classmates,
they found it intersting and really nice looking. When I was writing
something in Tengwar (Elvish) and Daléian on my desk during a boring
lesson I also had to explain them briefly the writing systems in the
break. They found it quite cool I think, a bit freaky though, but it was
accepted. Phonology and grammar stuff is much too theoretical for many,
especially the latter. These people only experienced that *learning* a
language can be really painful and thus stamp me as a geek or how you
may call it. If they knew how intersting *inventing* grammar can be ...
and after all, you do not need to learn your language so that you can
speak it fluently. But nevertheless I think it's easier to learn a
language that you invented yourself and thus fully understand yourself
in its structure etc. than learning a natlang or someone else's conlang.

I guess it should be better to discuss this off-list privately? It's
getting off-topic, that's why.

Carsten

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