Re: CHAT: Hello

--- The Gray Wizard <dbell@...> wrote:
> > From: Tom Tadfor Little
> > Sent: Thursday, April 26, 2001 1:48 AM
> > To: CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU
> > Subject: hello
> >
> >
> > Hello all.
> >
> > I'm a newcomer here. I was delighted to come
> across this list, as
> > I've been
> > playing at language creation since I first read
> Tolkien 25+ years ago. I
> > start lots of them, but seem to always get
> diverted before I really flesh
> > anything out.
>
> Welcome to the list, Tom.
>
> I think you'll find many of us on this list have
> been influenced by JRRT.
> Although I started creating languages in my
> mid-teens (1950's), I didn't
> discover Tolkien until the mid 60's.  Of course when
> I did, I was excited to
> discover that in my pursuit of this strange
> enterprise I was in such good
> company.  His elvish languages have been a
> consistent influence on my
> conlanging work ever since.  My major conlang, amman
> iar, shows significant
> lexical influences from JRRT's elvish tongues as
> explained by an early
> concultural contact between its speakers and some
> Dunedain sailors escaping
> the destruction of Numenor.  I also seem to share a
> similar sense of
> phonetic aesthetics with Tolkien (I often call this
> my "cellar door"
> syndrome).
>
> > I'm currently working on an imaginary world with a
> small number
> > of distinct
> > racial/linguistic/cultural traditions that
> eventually merge and
> > synthesize.
> > I'm hoping it can be some sort of meaningful
> mythologization of our own
> > eclectic times.
> >
> > For this project, I need linguistic traditions
> that are distinctive, but
> > not so wildly different from each other to hamper
> sharing of concepts and
> > vocabulary.
>
> Sounds interesting.  I had an early interest in
> diachronic analysis and once
> envisioned a whole family of languages descended
> from a single
> protolanguage. The plan was to distribute to each
> language a set of
> interesting linguistic parameters that would drive
> the development of that
> language from the protolanguage along diverging
> pathways. I was young and
> had no idea what a massive undertaking I had set for
> myself. Many years
> later, only amman iar has any real depth to it.
>
> > I'm just now starting out on characterizing
> Iltârer (apologies to Mac
> > users), the eldest of the language families
> involved. I envision it as
> > phonologically elegant and syntactically
> sophisticated in its capacity to
> > support subtle philosophical and esthetic
> expression. Today I wrote a
> > modest program to generated Iltârer root words,
> and I have some of the
> > grammar established.
>
> I look forward to hearing more of Iltârer. Please
> share as much as you can
> with us.
>
> David
>
> David E. Bell
> The Gray Wizard
> www.graywizard.net
>
> Wisdom begins in wonder.
Hi Tom, David,

I'm new to the list too, but have already got ample
greeting from many!  In fact, today is the 4th day
since I last checked my email, I have over 300 here
awaiting me.  It puts a damper to my replying, and
especially if one of my personal contacts are trying
to contact me, but I guess I'll enjoy reading 1-by-1
the discussions here.

Tom, you may be surprised by other things I have
already learned.  What I mean is that, the other day
when I made my debut, I mentioned my conlang Vya:a:h
(which will be partially based off Finnish with Polish
c.clusters & Hangul/Khmer/Kana-esque writing system),
I soon got a reply from the creator of Uusisuom -
which is also a conlang partially based from Finnish.
To my surprise indeed!

Matt




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