Re: Heyas all!

On Thu, 25 Mar 1999, Trace Erin Kern wrote:

> This project is intended to be a 'quick patch' piece of work. Used
> primarily for writers who want to create a species and new language for
> either one-shot stories, or a short series.
> As for what I mean by 'creating'...One author gave me the advice to use
> the species culture as a language base. A militaristic species will
> likely have alot of harsh gutteral <sp?> phonetics, where a more relaxed
> or perhaps reptillian species will have alot of soft and sibilant sounds.
> I want to incorperate that advice into the program. It asks you for some
> base consonants, sounds, etc to use as a seed. Then it would take an
> English/Terran/etc dictonary and generate a translation dictionary.
> So yes this would be more of a relexification program.
I think such a project would be ideal for the purpose.  One small quibble,
though: don't assume that militarism = harsh gutterals or that reptillian
= sibilants.  I think Latin, for example, is quite the opposite from harsh
gutterals in sound, yet their legions conquered everything from
Northumbria to Morocco and on over to Dace and Arabia.  You may rather
consider things like shape of species' vocal tract, sinuses, length of
jaw, existence (or lack) of soft tissues in order to figure out the sounds
that they can produce.  Then consider the types of sound their culture and
language prefer.  These two levels ought to be easy enough to insert into
the program.

>
> >        How would you handle the syntax of languages here? I think
> >that's a thing which can't be handled with an automatic program.
>
> Good point. See above.
Unless the writers of these stories or short series really _need_ to deal
with syntax and other complex issues, why bother?  If they can get along
with a few words sprinkled here and there, and maybe a few short sections
of connected speach, I don't think they would need any more than a word
generator such as you describe above.  You could also have it generate
"short" words and affixes that could be liberally scattered amongst the
main words to give the look and feel of Genuine Authentic Grammar. :)

Padraic.

>
> >>Any ideas folks?
> >>
> >>Trace Erin Kern -  TraceFox@juno.com
> >>~Hah'Rooqh Tah'Khrine, Eayl Noh'Tahl~
> >>~May you go in peace, all your journey~
> >>
> >
> >        Is this sig in one of your languages?
>
> Sort of. I've had the 'alien' words floating around in my head for a
> while, then decided to give temporary meaning to them. This translation
> isn't part of a full language unfortunately.
>
> Trace Erin Kern  -  TraceFox@juno.com
> ~Hah'Rooqh Tah'Khrine, Eayl Noh'Tahl~
> ~May you go in peace, all your journey~
>
> ___________________________________________________________________
> You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail.
> Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html
> or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]
>