Re: SemiOT: Revealing your conlanger status, personal experiences of reaction...
| From: | Roger Mills <rfmilly@...> |
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| Date: | Friday, June 18, 2004, 16:06 |
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BTW "SemiOT" makes a remarkably apopos heading.
Sally Caves (replying to John Leland) wrote:
> Wittgenstein calls a "private language" that which has no circulation in
> the
> real world, or which cannot be used as a means of communication with
> another
> person, because it is made up of words that refer only to the speaker's
> PRIVATE and idiosyncratic experiences and sensations. Since language is a
> public consensus, using words that are agreed upon publically to express
> even private feeling, then a private language is an impossibility.
Surely any conlang that is exposed to public scrutiny (e.g. here) ceases to
be "private" in Wittgenstein's sense-- his I think might better be thought
of as "(secret) codes". The underlying assumption of every conlang I've
seen is that it could indeed be a real language, spoken _somewhere_ by some
society, however strange it may be (vide Teoh's Ebisedi!!). Thus all our
con-words are "agreed upon publicly", and our languages are learnable,
should anyone want to take the trouble.
(big snip)
> How lucky you are to have such a handle on your language! I am still
> working on fluency in Teonaht. I, too, however, have come across old
> texts
> I've written in T. and deciphered them, with difficulty; I'm always
> inventing and discarding words.
I've come across some Kash compounds, created only months or at most 2-3
years ago, where I no longer remember which word-bases I used to form the
compound. (E.g. cucifici mentioned a few days ago, where I remembered the
source of -fici but not cuci-. Incidentally I think I was wrong on Span.
chuchifrito(s), it's not in my little pocket dictionary tho I'm sure I've
seen it somewhre. It may or may not be a slang synonym for the fried
cruller-like thing I had in mind, which is _churro_. I just hope it's not
some vile obscenity :-)))
Speaking OT of Spanish slang, Argentine 'macanudo' is a term of opprobrium
(sort of 'stupid idiot'); but also a brand of very fine Jamaican cigar.
And a very good essay it is.
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