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A method of generating "flavored" words

From:Gary Shannon <fiziwig@...>
Date:Saturday, August 5, 2006, 2:15
Here's an interesting procedure I stumbled upon while playing with word
generation. Take words from a lnaguage whose flavor you wish to capture. This
can be your own conlang to generate "matching" words, or any natlang you would
like to copy the flavor of. Or it could even be a combination of two or more
different natlangs to get a blended flavor.

Collect a few dozen or more words. Divide those words into VCV groups where the
V's represent ALL the adjacent vowels in a word and the C represents ALL the
adjacent consonants. For example, the English word "miniature" would become
"-mi", "inia", "iatu", and "ure". "school" would become "-schoo" and "ool".
These groups will be assembled together with other groups from other words with
the rule being that the complete set of adjacent ending vowels must match the
complete set of starting vowels for the attached group.

Thus "inia" (from "miniature") could be followed by "iate" (from "alleviate"),
but it could NOT be followed by "ave" (from "have") because "a" does not
completely match "ia".

Here are a few random samples to show how the generated words usually retain
the general flavor of the language from which the groups were drawn:

== English ==

-mi  miniature
ino  dinosaurs
octo doctoral
ore  more
	-> minoctore

-vo  volunteers
ofe  professional
eti  meticulously
ishe established
ent- student
	-> vofetishent

-si  sites
inia miniature
ude  student
	-> siniatude

-pro professional
olo  paleontologists
on-  season
	-> prolon

-sta  started
aleo  paleontologists
eove  moreover
entra concentration
aci   racing
ity   rigidity
	-> staleoventracity

== Italian ==

-inco incontro
orto  ritorto
ore   dictore
	-> incortore

-cru  cruciale
utto  farabutto
ola   regolare
	-> cruttola

-so   sotto
oro   caloroso
oso   difettoso
	-> soroso

-nu   nullo
umi   incolumita
ile   amabile
ento  momento
	-> numilento

== Swahili ==

-da   dadisi
amba  mamba
asi   masizi
	-> dambasi

-hu   hutubu
uli   tambulika
inga  ingawa
anda  jamanda
	-> hulinganda

-mga  mganda
abi   thabiti
izu   kizuka
ungu  mungu
	-> mgabizungu

== Dutch ==

-kni   knippen
ichte  berichten
ergaa  ondegaan
aap    slaap
	-> knichtergaap

Try it. You'll like it.

--gary

Replies

Philip Newton <philip.newton@...>
Adam Walker <carrajena@...>Seriously OT request