Re: LUNATIC SURVEY: 2005

Manáyang!

On Thursday 24 February 2005 19:41 +0100, Sally Caves wrote:

 > LUNATIC SURVEY 2005, by Sally Caves
 >
 > There are four parts (A through D) of about 22-24
 > questions each.  These surveys have aided me in my
 > ongoing research on conlanging, but they are also for
 > YOU.

It is lunatic if I may say so ;)

 > You need not answer every question; if you do, please
 > keep most of them fairly brief, although I don't want to
 > deny you a chance to effuse!  I would like all the
 > questions answered for A, 1-17, though, even if you took
 > the survey in 2003.

OK.

 > Firrimby. :)

I assume that means "Thank you" in Teonaht?

 > ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 >
 > A. PROFESSION, DEMOGRAPHICS, INCLINATION:
 >
 > 1. Who are you, and what is the name of your invented
 > language or languages? Pseudonyms allowed. (Are you using
 > one? asked "Sally Caves")

My name is Carsten Becker (which is my real name). As for my
languages, my current main conlang is Ayeri, my other first
tries are Ve Segelm A Laighödhét (which I won't work on
further anymore) and Daléian (which I might revive in the
future).

 > *2. Are you new to the Lunatic Survey or have you filled
 > out a version of this survey before?

I am new to Lunatic Survey, but I have alrady participated
at the "Conlang Census" survey in early 2004.

 > 3. Do you have a website for you language/world(s)? If
 > so, please list the URL address.

http://www.beckerscarsten.de/?goto=conlanging

 > 4. What is your email address? name at hostsite dot
 > whatever.

For the list I am currently using _naranoieati at
beckerscarsten dot de_

 > 5. What is your age? (vague answers allowed, but it is an
 > important demographic)

18 (born 08/26/1986)

 > 6. What is your gender?

male

 > 7. What is your nationality?  Where do you live now?

German; 50km east of Kassel

 > 8. What is your native language?

German

 > 9. What natural languages foreign to you have you studied
 > or do you speak?

English, French

 > 10. What is your level of education? i.e., your highest
 > degree achieved or sought?

I'm preparing for the A-Level exams. So I've B-Level at the
moment.

 > 11. What is your profession? Are you a professional
 > linguist? If so, what also makes you a conlanger?

Student.

 > 13. If you are a student, what is your major or your area
 > of study?

My advanced courses are German and English. I'm also
interested in Music and Computer Science. History is also
OK. German, English and Music are the subjects where I
usually get the best marks. French marks are usually
between 60%-70%, though.

 > 14. How long have you been developing your invented
 > language(s)?

Ayeri:    ca. 1.25 years
Daléian:  ca. 0.5 years
V.S.A.L.: ca. 0.25 years

 > 15. At what age did you first start inventing a language?
 > Can you briefly describe your early efforts?

I started in spring 2003, when I was 16. My first language
was mostly a cipher of German, with a quite inconsistent
sound of the words. Daléian was better already, borrowing
from French and bits of Japanese. Actually I quite like
Ayeri, which borrows some common features of Austronesian
languages, i.e. case morphology and phonetic inventory.

 > 16. What drew you to start inventing a language and/or
 > constructed world? What was the inspiration?

I'm a victim to Tolkien I guess, having appreciated the work
he has put into his languages. I stumbled over Ardalambion,
from there to Mark Rosenfelder's "Language Construction
Kit" and Pablo Flores' "How to invent a language". I
thought it'd be a funny idea, though a bit weird, but in
any case I gave it a go.

 > 17. Did you start inventing before you had heard of the
 > list or after? Before you had heard of Esperanto or
 > Tolkien? (I name the two most common inspirations)

I didn't know anything about this list, but I've heard the
names Esperanto and Tolkien before.

 > 18. Tolkien calls it a "shy art" and a "secret vice"; but
 > that was before the Internet. How secret do you keep it
 > from others outside this list for much the same reasons?

My parents and some people I in my year know about it.
People are often ignorant about conlanigng or Linguistics
and that's why I usually don't mention it in public that
often. My website has an easily accessible "conlang" area,
though.

 > 19. Yaguello has called it "pathological," influenced,
 > unfortunately, by a lot of psychiatric writings such as
 > _Le Schizo et la langue_. To what extent have you
 > encountered such reactions by outsiders you had taken
 > into your confidence?

Some find it weird, others cool because it's different and
some others just don't care. Nobody has said up to now that
I'd be a "psychopathic" nutjob.

 > *20. Do you consider it nerdy to be doing this? This is a
 > term that gets tossed around a lot. Or actually
 > sophisticated? Do you need to get a life, or is this your
 > life? What is a life?

It's a little nerdy because Linguistics is not so widely
spread, respectively people often don't know anything about
it. When you're doing something others don't do that
involves much theory, you're automatically said to be a
nerd I guess. Yet there are few people in my environment
that absolutely do not like me.
As for my life, I am quite introverted, not liking very much
to go out for drinking or partying at the weekend --
compared to others, I think my life is a bit boring.
However, I feel awkward among many people. My psychartrist
says it couldn't be wrong to get to know better some people
and go out more often.

 > 21. There has been a connection noted between linguistic
 > and musical ability. Are you musically inclined? Do you
 > sing and/or play a musical instrument? Do you compose
 > music?

Yes, I'm playing the classical guitar for 8 years in March.
According to my teacher(s), I am quite talented.

 > 22. There has been a connection noted between linguistic
 > and mathematical ability. Are you mathematically inclined
 > or inclined towards computing in any way?

Programming is OK, I know how PHP and VB, though OOP kind of
scared me a bit but I understood it after a while. It's
similar with Maths. I'm not too good in Maths (50-75%), but
once I understand the important thing of a topic, it's not
*that* difficult.

 > 23. What other passions do you pursue that give you
 > creative pleasure? (painting, drawing, sculpting,
 > calligraphy, model-building, novel or story-writing,
 > role-playing games, map-making, book-making, poetry,
 > web-designing, star-gazing or other?)

As I said, I'm playing the guitar. I also do a bit of
programming and web-designing. I enjoy mapmaking and
reading as well. Since I'm not that skilled at
drawing/painting, I prefer photography.

 > B. FEATURES OF YOUR INVENTION
 >
 > 1. Pick the best term for the invented language you are
 > currently invested in: auxlang, artlang, engelang,
 > loglang, lostlang, philosophical language, or "other."
 > etc.

Artlang

 > 2. Is your conlang a priori (devised from scratch) or a
 > posteriori (based on an existing natural language or
 > drawing from a language class such as Semitic)?

Actually both. It's more or less intentional ANADEWISM.

 > 4. Do you have a script for your conlang? What is it
 > called? Could you provide me at a later date with a
 > sample of it?  Is it on Langmaker's "neography" site?

Search for "Daliian" (should have been "Daléian" actually,
but they somehow messed it up at langmaker.com) and "Ayeri"
in the neographies area. I don't know the exact URL. For
the Ayeri Ornament Script (aka "Vine Script" aka "Tahano
Nuvenon"), you can also look at omniglot.com in the "Your
conscripts" area. The examples given there are fairly
recent.

 > 5. Briefly describe the outlines of your invented
 > language (syntactical structure--VO, OV, etc.; class or
 > type--analytic, synthetic, agglutinating, incorporative,
 > accusative, ergative, active, trigger, other,
 > combinations, etc.), noting what you have done with it
 > that is innovative in your opinion.

Since Ayeri is currently my main conlang, I'm only
describing this one:

Ayeri is mostly synthetic, and it's a trigger language.
There is nothing very innovative IMO. If it weren't an
anadewism, I'd say it's interesting that there are only a
few "true" adpositions (location itself, motion, motion to,
motion from) while all the specifications are done using
nouns. Adjective comparison is only done using verbs.

 > 7. How extensive would you say your invented language is,
 > now? How big the vocabulary? Do you provide a vocabulary
 > list or taxonomy on your website if you have one?

Ayeri can express most things, though sometimes it's a
little difficult because its structure is a bit different
from the natlangs I know sometimes. The vocabulary
currently officially counts 510 words, but new words are
steadily made up. A dictionary as well as a grammar and a
grammar tutorial are available on my website.

 > 8. How do you build vocabulary? Some people pull words
 > out of the air; others build up a base of root words and
 > affixes. Many do both.

I usually handcraft my words, which means that they're
either made from scratch or derived from other, already
existing words.

 > 3. Does a constructed world accompany your invention(s)?
 > What is it called?

I'm having some unfixed ideas about a conworld, Areca
(meaning simply "world" or "earth"), but I have not enough
will and patience to work more on it and actually fix my
ideas.

 > *9. Has your language and conworld ever served in a
 > role-playing game or a world shared by other conlangers?

No.

 > *10. Briefly describe your conculture (is it within the
 > bounds of this world? on another world, etc.?)

It's on this other planet, Areca (has also been spelt
Aréqa). The Ayeri are living in a tropial area. They're
mostly agricultural oriented, i.e. pre-industrial. The
state of where this people lives in is a kingdom ("United
Western Kingdoms"). I'm currently thinking about whether it
shall be a monarchy or rather a constitutional monarchy.

 > *11. Are the beings who speak your invented language
 > human or alien? If alien, what features have you given
 > the language to make it alien or how have you restricted
 > or expanded its phonology? vocabulary?

They're humanoids. Call it humans with some modifications in
appearance if you want -- A heavy bias of Star Trek I
guess.

 > 12. What do you write in it? Poems? chants? lullabyes?
 > prayers? history? stories? recipes? Are any of these
 > exhibited on your website?

I haven't written anything conculturally relevant up to now.
I'd prefer history and stories, though, now that you
mention it. The other kinds of literature only if
necessary.

 > 13. Can you speak your conlang? Are you fluent in it? Is
 > this a goal for you? Have you tried to teach it to an
 > intimate? a companion animal? :)

I know most of the grammatical particles, but I'm far from
being fluent in it. I have thought about using Ayeri as a
"private language", but it takes so many words to be made
up and after all, it's a different culture. Also, I don't
see the reason why I shouldn't use German for my notes.
Maybe I could use Ayeri only for the stuff that is *really*
private.

 > 14. Have you made any soundbytes of your language? Could
 > you provide me at a later date with a sample of them?

See my website.

 > *15. If you use Roman script, how recognizably "phonetic"
 > is your writing system? In other words, do you use
 > unconventional letters or letter combinations to
 > represent sounds? Why or why not? I'm thinking, of
 > course, of Etabnannery, for those who remember it.

No, it's quite phonetic. Similar to German.

 > 16. How many of you sing in your language and have
 > invented songs for that purpose?

I cannot sing well and I haven't written any songs in Ayeri
yet because the language is not far enough developed for
that. Additionally, Ayeri is due to its analyticness and
its preference for bisyllabic morphemes very longwinded.

 > *17. How many of you, for entertainment or any other
 > reason, resort to gibberish? (This is in response to
 > Adrian Morgan's question in December). Does it give you
 > ideas for conlanging? (Have you ever fooled anyone?) How
 > many of you have sung gibberish?

The stuff I invent should make sense. I have only resorted
to "gibberish" for names up to now. I think it's not that
hard to make up etymologies for them afterwards, though.

 > *18. What on-line games do you play? (or devise?)
 > Translations, Babel-text, Relays, etc.

None. If you consider Babel-Text a game, I've posted one to
the list recently. Translating things into your conlang is
a nice way to get to new words and to encounter problems in
your grammar.

 > 19. Which do you prefer doing: devising phonology?
 > script? structure? building vocabulary?

Phonology and scripts. Inventing grammar is also OK. Making
up vocabulary is tiresome and the worst aspect of
conlanging for me.

 > 20. Do you start and stop several different conlangs, or
 > do you tend to stick with one and develop it over years?

I'm sticking to Ayeri for more than one year now. I don't
plan to give it up in the near future. Instead, I rather
want to make daughter languages, but I am too stupid to
make up sound changes as it seems :-P

 > 21. What do you think makes a "complete" conlang, if a
 > conlang can attain completion? What are your goals for
 > completion? When do you grow "tired" of your conlang, or
 > don't you?

You should be able to express also more difficult concepts.
Of course it's nice to have your language fit into a
language family. When I'm tired of Ayeri, I simply don't
work at it for some weeks. Then I feel like translating
something and do so ...

 > *22. Which came first: the conlang or the conworld?

The conlang.

 > C. PHILOSOPHY AND AESTHETIC:
 >
 > 1. What aesthetic features do you value in inventing
 > language? Be specific as to phonology, structure, script,
 > etc.

It should be fluent with some, but not too many, 'rocks' in
between. Its structure shouldn't be too dificult so that I
am able to understand my own work and do not necessarily
need a computer program to do things (Gell, Henrik? Nimm's
mir nicht übel!). The script respectively the romanisation
should fit to the language.

 > 2. What commonly applied aesthetics have you ever tried
 > to avoid in your invention? This has been an oft debated
 > question, especially when it comes to Tolkien.

Too much tolkienism, i.e. stereotypes.

 > 3. Is difficulty or obscurity a goal in inventing a
 > language?

No, see above. I kind of prefer minimalism in some ways.

 > 4. Is efficiency a goal in inventing a language? This
 > question needn't cancel out the previous one.

Kinda. Ayeri is not that efficient, though, and this is one
of the few thing that disturbs me. Still this
longwindedness is part of the language's character and this
is why I keep it.

 > 5. How natural do you wish to make it, or is that a
 > concern? Or rather, how unnatural do you wish to make it?

Quite natural. Ayeri is too regular and logical IMO, which
is another thing that I don't like about it.
Of course, conlangs cannot be "complete", only nicely worked
out.

 > 6. Can conlanging be sexy? sensual? obsessing? how does
 > it heal or harm you?

It doesn't harm me. And yes, langs can be sexy and
obsessing.

 > *7. How many of you have developed a rich vocabulary of
 > obscenities?

The only obscene word I have ATM is "crap" respectively
"fucked-up". I had to make it up when I translated a song
recently.

 > 8. Can it be mystical? To what extent does conlanging
 > fulfill a spiritual purpose for you? Or a magical one?
 > Did it ever start out that way?

No.

 > 9. How many of you have developed a rich vocabulary of
 > magical, religious, or incantatory terms?

Still on my to-do list.

 > *10. How many of you have striven to invent words that
 > express novel ideas, or are not expressed in any natural
 > language that you know?

Not up to now.

 > 11. Name a few of the words in your language(s) that you
 > are most pleased with and are the most original to you.

ayon, banta, capan, garan, gebisan, manga, mato, nahang,
prantan, serantay, tenya, venon, yivaco

You see, the sound is intended to be slightly SE-Asian
style. Some Elvishness (presumably from Quenya and Spanish
which I appreciate as well?) crept in.

 > 12. How do you sense that a word is "right" for its
 > meaning? How much do you labor at fitting a sound to its
 > sense? Or don't you care?

Oh! The quest for words! No, words should fit. There are
some words that I don't like, though, but I keep them
because I'm too lazy to change translations I partly needed
them for.

 > *13. Do you ever rely on a software program to build
 > vocabulary? Do those who don't think that's cheating? :)

I actually only use a word generator to try which patterns
are possible and which I prefer. Generating your dictionary
with a generator is very impersonal and boring. It's too
sterile and cannot convey an atmosphere to me.

 > *14. Is conlang a hobby, a craft, or an art in your mind?
 > This has been hotly debated, so the question is not as
 > weird as it seems. Can conlanging be considered an art?
 > Why or why not?

It's a bit of all. It's a hobby for me like model building
for other people (mentioned recently). It's a craft because
you have to put in some (reading) work that can be tiresome
to some extend -- understanding the stuff you read. It's an
art because it's boring to make one cipher of your natlang
or other natlangs you know after the other. For me,
inventing languages is there to get to know other
(grammatical/syntactic) ways of transporting information.
This of course involves creative thinking sometimes to
understand a concept. As I have pointed out before,
translating into or from a conlang needs creativity as well
sometimes. An artist aims for something that he is
satisfied with, so I am with conlanging. He puts in work,
setting the right brush/pen stroke or note here and there,
and so does a conlanger by playing with sounds and
morphological rules.

 > *15. If it is, who do you think are its consumers?

Only people that are interested in languages. Ah well, and
then of course you need langs for sci-fi and fantasy
sometimes. I'm always asking myself, though, if these langs
are really structured like Tolkien's ones for instance or
if they're just a bunch of random utterings that fit a
phonetic pattern. But most people don't think about
languages anyway.

 > *16. This question is directed as well at any auxlangers
 > on the list. Is it an art, a political tool, both? And
 > who do you think could be its consumers?

IMO, conlanging is an art. For being political, it lacks
faaaaar to much power. It's not an accepted kind of art,
this is why. Also see 14).

 > *17. There has been some exciting talk recently (and over
 > the years) about what a conlang is or is not. If you
 > could pick a metaphor or write a descriptive phrase
 > defining "conlang," what would that be?

Phew, that's a difficult one. For me, it's getting to know
other concepts of conveying and organising information.

 > *18. Why or why not would you eschew the metaphors
 > "miniature" or "model"?

As has been pointed out last week, conlanging can only model
a language because it can never be as complex as a real
language. It would take you far longer than a lifetime to
archieve comparable results. Today's languages developed
due to interaction with each other during the course of
millenia.

 > *19. Is a conlang more like a glimpse of something
 > lifesize? (Irina's suggestion in 2001)

As I said, a conlang is only trying to model reality, so I
think I can answer this question with "yes".

 > *20. There has been some invigorating discussion lately
 > about what a conlang can do that most natural languages
 > don't (such as produce OSV structure, or eradicate verbs)
 > What experiments have you made with your artlang(s) along
 > these lines?

Having more cases and moods than the languages I know have,
doing comparison with verbs only, handling adjectives as
verbs and having a trigger system. Abs/Erg and active stuff
is also on my to-do list.

 > *21  What do you think distinguishes a conlang from a
 > natural language, if you think so at all?  What would it
 > take for a linguist to be fooled into thinking a conlang
 > was a natural language?

Conlangs cannot *really* be as complex as natlangs. People
like Tolkien have put a lifetime into their langs, but
still there are parts missing. See 18).

 > *22. How much do you study other languages in order to
 > discover what is natural in language? Or to discover how
 > you can stretch the boundaries of language to make it do
 > things that are unnatural?

Too less I guess. Reading linguistic papers is not that easy
if your native lang is not English, you are still young and
you don't know all the technical terms.

 > *23. Can such a language function?

Of course it can. As long as you don't make it too difficult
to understand your stuff yourself.

 > *24. There has been quite a bit of fascinating debate
 > about the relevance of conlanging to linguistic study. We
 > all know that linguistics can aid conlangers, but in what
 > ways can conlangers aid linguists? Or does it matter?

No I don't think that conlangers can help linguists. On the
list, there are frequently anadewisms debated. Linguists do
fieldwork, publish their work, conlangers find it
interesting and reuse stuff for their own languages. Or, if
your name is H.S. Teoh, you think of other sensible ways
that languages could work ;-) But still, I wouldn't wonder
if the Ebisédian/Tatari Faran's case system already exists
in some way, only using different terms. :-P

 > D. THE LISTSERV
 >
 > 1. How did you first hear of this list?

 From other conlangers; googling for information.

 > 2. How long have you been on this listserv or on other
 > related listservs? Continuously? Infrequently? Off and
 > on? More off than on and vice versa?

Continuously since August 27, 2003.

 > *3. What is the appeal of being on a listserv and
 > contributing to it? Do you think you contribute
 > moderately or excessively, or not enough? Do you tend to
 > lurk ?

There are many knowledgeable people here that like to help.

 > *4. For those of you who remember its inception, how has
 > it changed over the past decade?

N/A

 > *5. How helpful has the list been in developing your
 > language? In learning linguistic information?

Things discussed here are often interesting, and I have a
"treasure chest" where I save things that seem to be
interesting for later use. It has really helped me learning
more about languages.

 > 6. What books have you consulted? On your own, or because
 > you heard of them on the list?

"Describing Morphosyntax" by Tomas E. Payne. I'm on page
30-something ATM. I've also saved various PDF papers and
extracts from websites.

 > *7. Do you peruse the websites of other conlangers?

Rather not.

 > *8. Do you sense that people on this list are interested
 > in your conlang and give you feedback on it?

Yes, people here and on the ZBB tell me frequently that my
work is nice when I come up with stuff.

 > 9. Have you ever set out to learn at least a little bit
 > of someone's conlang, if only a word or two, or a phrase?

Unfortunately not.

 > *10. Do you peruse Jeffrey Henning's Langmaker.com site?

Yes, I'm subscribing the page's RSS feed.

 > *11. What on-line techniques do you use to showcase your
 > conlang, such as Audacity or other sound programs,
 > Dreamweaver, Illustrator, Fontography, and so forth? Did
 > you hear of them on the list?

Goldwave/Audacity for audio, Photoshop 7 for graphics,
GoLive 5 and coding by hand for HTML and PHP, Font Creator
Program/Fontforge for fonts. Aside from Photoshop and
GoLive, I heard about the other tools on the list.

 > 12. Have you ever tried to introduce a friend to the
 > list?

No. Nobody IME is interested so much into *inventing*
languages, though I know some people that would possibly
study a foreign language at uni.

 > 13. Do you know of anyone who does this kind of thing but
 > who has never heard of the list?

No.

 > *14. What other lists do you frequent related to
 > conlanging?

The Zompist Bulletin Board (www.spinnoff.com/zbb
<http://www.spinnoff.com/zbb>). I'm also
frequently visiting DeviantArt (www.deviantart.com
<http://www.deviantart.com>), since
I've got an account there where I upload my photography
stuff.

 > *15. What do you think will be the future of the list? I
 > see it giving birth to alternate lists like Conworld,
 > Lostlanguages, Romlang, etc. What improves the present
 > list and its helpfulness or entertainment value?

It's an old-fashioned method compared to forums, but it
still works. As for alternate lists, I have heard they're
actually dying quite soon or are at least far not as busy
as CONLANG itself.

 > *16. What Internet technology would you most like to see
 > developed that would aid you in showcasing your
 > language(s)?

That listserv finally completely accepts UTF-8? Better
Unicode and IPA support for input. Browsers like Firefox or
Opera can already handle Unicode quite nicely.

 > *17. What lists like conlang exist in other cultures and
 > languages that you know of?

There's a CONLANG in French. There's not much in German
about "con-art" as far as I can tell, since most linguistic
work is done in English and keeps untranslated -- this is
what they told us in the English reading I visited at
Gießen University when our year had an information day
there.

 > *18. There has been some terrific talk about CONLANG as a
 > community. And yet so many of us seem to want the world
 > to know of it and respect it. Is the CONLANG community
 > enough?

It's enough for me. I'm also visiting and posting
occassionally to the ZBB. Both communities are nice
actually.

 > *19. In my 2000 on-line article
 > (http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0003/languages.php)
 > I suggested that the Internet "may provide a site that,
 > with the impetus of competition and showmanship,
 > encourages inutile and obsessive activity"; I was quoting
 > Jeff Salamon's article "Revenge of the Fanboys." Village
 > Voice 13 Sep., 1994. He wrote that over ten years ago. Do
 > outsiders still entertain such notions, do you think,
 > about listservs like this one? Do you? To what extent has
 > the list increased obsessive development in you? Would
 > you be inventing as furiously as you are without the list
 > or knowledge of other inventors?

No. I wouldn't even have got to conlanging without the
Internet and would not have sticked to it if I hadn't
discovered the ZBB and this list. Conlanging is just as
"inutile and obsessive" as other hobbies IMO. It's just far
more uncommon than, say, playing football/soccer.

 > 20. If asked whether it is not better to turn your
 > linguistic talents to the learning and speaking of
 > natural languages (a common response I've met with and
 > aimed at criticizing introversion or solipsism), how
 > would you answer?

I'd answer that I wouldn't mind learning other natlangs, but
making up grammar and finding out stuff yourself can
sometimes be more interesting.

 > *21. In Elizabethan times there were the inkhorn
 > neologisms. There were ciphers and pasigraphies. Today
 > there is conlanging. Do you think the contemporary world
 > is more open to language innovation or more closed?

It's unusual to do conlanging and thus our society is more
closed to unashamedly admitting to invent words/languages.
Still, advertising and technics are constantly making up
new words or labels that enter everyday language sometimes.

 > *22. What would Tolkien have done with such a community?
 > He writes in "A Secret Vice" that language inventors
 > "hardly ever show their works to one another, so none of
 > them know who are the geniuses at the game, or who are
 > the splendid 'primitives'." He suggests that perhaps in a
 > later time language invention will become respectable,
 > and such things can be exhibited. Have we reached that
 > time?

At least, conlanging is due to the internet not as secret
anymore as in Tolkien's time. I guess Tolkien would be all
happy if he knew this.

 > *23. Is there a danger that over-exposure can make
 > conlanging "banal"? To what extent is it exciting because
 > it is a) considered disreputable, "corny" or "mad," or b)
 > largely unknown to the world? Does it have a fizzle-out
 > date?  In other words, is it just a fad, or is it a
 > natural human inclination that will stand the test of
 > time?

People that are not really interested in language would spam
the "scene" with gibberish if conlanging got trendy. It's
like "tolklang" fans complained that due to the films,
there are many people who just surf the wave because LotR
is cool and trendy. I guess the interest of such people
quickly decreases. -- I think serious conlanging will
always be something for the more "bookish" people.

 > Finally, may I have your permission to use any of this
 > material of yours for my academic work on conlanging?
 > First name? last name? pseudonym? anonymous?

You may -- I have sent this directly to the list and my
answers are publically accessible anyway that way.

Carsten Becker

--
Edatamanon le matahanarà benenoea ena 15-A7-58-11-2-A-32 ena
Curan Tertanyan.
» http://www.beckerscarsten.de/?conlang=ayeri