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Conlangs: a window on the mind?

From:R. Skrintha <srik@...>
Date:Sunday, October 4, 1998, 15:24
Hi,

>Matt Pearson <mpearson@...> wrote in re: Survey (a new one):
> >In "A Secret Vice", Tolkien remarked that the > >correspondence "vru" = "ever" had crept its way > >into every one of his languages, and I find the same > >thing happening with mine. For example, in each of > >my major conlang projects, the word for "in" or > >"inside" has consisted of a fricative followed by > >/i/ or a diphthong containing /i/: > > > > Messyen: thui > > Tadheka: zui > > Kosan: hi > > Tokana: hi, fi (earlier versions) > > Tokana: him (most recent version) > > > >Do other people find the same sort of thing happening > >in their conlangs? >
In an early (unwittingly) relex project of mine, the con-word "ensser" kept popping up in my mind as a suitable word to mean 'between' for no reason apparent to me then. Only much later did it strike me that I had subconsciously taken French "entre", given it the US-like -re->-er end-flip and included the Modern High German feature of having an -ss- instead of English/Scandinavian intervocalic -t-. It did give me the feeling of taking a peek into my own subconscious mind! Have others detected such Freudian/Jungian patterns in their conlanging? Regards, skrintha