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Re: CHAT: Sally's questionnaire

From:Aidan Grey <frterminus@...>
Date:Sunday, April 29, 2001, 20:17
> > I hope you haven't forgotten Teonaht!
Who could forget your song?
> > > 1) How many of you old- and new-comers started > inventing a language > > in isolation from the list? >
I did.
> > > 1a) If so, how old were you? >
When I was 11. I started out with codes when I was younger, so I could call my sister names and she wouldn't know what I was saying (Mom, Aidan called me a gakjshgjksha!). I started adding language features (plurals, conjugations, and so on) and worked my way up to langs using complicated coding systems to derive words or roots. True conlangs didn'really start until I was eleven.
> > 1b) Was it a project with friends or a solitary > project? >
Solitary also.
> > > 1b) Did your invented language have some kind of > private purpose? > esoteric? erotic? religious or mystical? >
Yes. All three. Esoterically, it was a way for me to make notes on divination systems without fear of ... Satan! I was raised by a Pentecostal woman, so pretty much everything was evil. Didn't see Bambi until I was thirteen because it was satanic. Of course, she's less than happy with where my life is now (gay, pagan, and so on). Erotically, I used various langs to write out elaborate fantasies during puberty, and I'll leave it at that. Again, secrecy was important. Religiously, I knew that my mother's religion wasn't for me. I spent a year living in Missouri with my mom after my parent's divorced. During that year, she worked so much that we never saw her. Maybe once a week. It was then that I started investigating other religions and developing my divination systems, and on at least three different occasions, developed conlangs to go with the elaborate pantheons I developed. I focused on words relating to religion, of course. Altar, god, goddess, prayer, soul, and so on. And many words that were used in my prayers and chants. I also designed a couple of langlets to be magical languages, and played aound with this use all the time, for every language.
> > > Since the topic of my panel is "the language > of mysticism," I'm > especially interested in this last. > > > 3) How many of you, when you were starting out on > this on your own, did this kind of thing: you have > a list of words you want to invent new ones for, so > you drew di-and polysyllabic words out of the air.
I had elaborate systems to develop words out of english words. I started out developing the whole (using my coding tables applied to the whole word, incliding -ings and re-s). After a time, I began to differentiate these endings and affixes (I was learning spanish, my first natlang learnt). Then I found Tolkien's language stuff (I had only read the Hobbit until after my stay in MO, so I hadn't really been exposed to the languages of Arda). I immediately started using my tables to find roots, and then derived from there, like Tokien did in the Siilmarillion and so on. The one root from that lang that I remember was IL-, which became ilo, eye, ilen, optic, and hail, to see. I remember it because I tried to teach it to a toddler I was babysitting at the time. My most complete lang isn't a lang at all, but It's the one I can still write in fluently, simply because it's a modified form of english, written backwards. Here's an example of this paragraph (from "my most...) in it: Egawen tso-etemploch to shi egau lha ta, tuw shi enoth nachi etiruni litse il-tanewolu, il-emplis esauk shi moru de-ifidom shingleo, il-drokau d-etiru. Erech shi emplashe phagrau-sitho (moru "egawen...) tin:
> > > 4) If so, how important was it that the new word > sound "exotic," "beautiful," or "suggestive" in some
personal way of the word you wanted it to stand for?
>
Very important. I agonized for days sometimes over certain words. They had to sound right in all the compounds I could think of. I also borrowed a lot... especially from Quenya and Finnish. They were the prettiest languages I could find. My tastes have changed, I like Sindarin more now...
> > 5) How many of you invented words to express > concepts that could not be expressed in your native
language?
>
I did. I mean, they could be expressed in English, but it took a long explanation. Some examples of definitions included "the life energy, equivalent in some respects to Qi, Ki, or Prana", "an event which is significant and bears the distinct mark of a deity" (significant events didn't count unless there was a deity's mark upon it, and the same goes for omens. Names for various rituals I devised were also unique words unto themselves, and their definitions consisted of explanations of the ritual. Various classes of sacrifice / offerings had their names as well.
> > > 6) How many of you used it for prayer? For > secrecy? >
yep. See above...
> > > 7) For how many of you was it an intellectual > exercise? >
It was probably that, but I didn't recognize them as exercises until much later. I didn't create them just to see, I did them for specific reasons.
> > 8) A language for a conculture? > > I did a little bit of conculturing for one of my > languages at one point, > but not usually. > > > 10) What is your definition of a mystical > language? Would any of you characterize your
conlang
> as such?
A mystical language is any language that attempts to provide some means for explaining or dicussing the Mystery. The mystery being the world, the gods, the spirits, or any other truth hidden in the mundane. Mystical languages also depend on the power of the word to be a magical force, shaping the world as they describe it. I very much agree with Navajo ideas about this, to this day. A "sing" or ritual is beasically a singing/chanting of the creation myth, renewing the world by reenacting it, with proper changes to restore beauty / balance. Aidan __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices http://auctions.yahoo.com/

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Irina Rempt <ira@...>