Re: Changes of conlangs and their speakers (was Re: Skerre Play Online)

Mark J. Reed wrote a fantastic tale that I'm snipping all of, so
that I may comment on the whole thing without a huge quote:

HA!  That's marvelous!  I love it!  Let me tell you, this day was
shaping up to be a stressful one, and I was feeling a bit down,
but reading your story has really brightened me up.  Long live
the Emerald!

------

Since it came up, I have an interesting tradition when it comes
to changing conlangs.

In the beginning, I created Megdevi, and after I played with that
for awhile, I created a bunch of "languages" that some on the
list may remember:

Gejdr
Sunshine
Dangelis
Mbasa
Zidaan

I still have these documents.  Gejdr was the largest, but all of
these had one thing in common: they were terrible.  Some time
after Zidaan I created Kamakawi, which was what I considered
my first real language (it still had a lot of problems, but they're
very slowly being ironed out).  Everything I created after Kamakawi
counts as a real language; everything before...not so much.

Because my languages were expanding in number, and not in
girth, I decided one day not to start anymore languages, and
just to work on the languages I'd already started.  The loophole
here is that if I totally rework a language I've already started,
it doesn't count as a new language...

(1) Gejdr > Gweydr: I kept the orthography (largely), kept the
*idea* of the vowel harmony (but made it realistic), kept the
*idea* of the large case system (again, but made it realistic),
and kept the plural suffix /-ks/ (with some added morphology).
I then decided to make it a distant relation of Zhyler (second
cousins thrice removed), and totally revamped the verb system
(but retained the infinitival /-S/).  To honor its memory, I
"borrowed" vocabulary from Gejdr where possible.

(2) Sunshine > Sheli: The other named for the Sunshine language
was Sheli.  I believe the only connection between the two is the
name...  Though, where possible, I did borrow lexical items, though
they're barely recognizable.  The Sunshine language really did
look like something that should have been on the Sunshine Flower
Hour.  I'm glad its gone.

(3) Dangelis > Tan Tyls: If you insert the schwas where appropriate
(and apply the necessary phonological changes), the name Tan
Tyls is pronounced [tan.d_j@ls], which is close, I guess, to
[d&n.dZ@.lIs].
These two languages don't bear any resemblance to one another.
The one thing I did was retained the pharyngeal approximant, and
tried my best to borrow lexical items.

(4) Zidaan > Sidaan: I really wanted to employ this new phonology
I had come up with, and the strategy for topicalization leading to
new word order that I'd come up with, so I had to revamp some
language.  Zidaan was it.  It was weird.  To form a plural, you flipped
the first and last consonants.  To put it into the genitive, you
palatalized
the first consonant.  To put a noun into the accusative you made
all the vowels up-step.  It was a mess.  The only thing I retained,
oddly enough, was the idea for palatalization.  It's realized in that
Sidaan has an alveolar series and a velar series, all of which, when
palatalized, are neutralized to a palatal series.

So this is how I set up a rule for myself not to create any new
languages and ended up creating four new languages.  And, of
course, I'm not blind to the fact that there's one more language
up there that could be "revamped".  I've resisted the urge so far...

-David
*******************************************************************
"sunly eleSkarez ygralleryf ydZZixelje je ox2mejze."
"No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn."

-Jim Morrison

http://dedalvs.free.fr/

Replies