Re: clan of the cave bear conlang

Date sent:              Thu, 6 Jan 2000 21:00:59 -0500
Send reply to:          Constructed Languages List <CONLANG@...>
From:                   Steg Belsky <draqonfayir@...>
Subject:                Re: clan of the cave bear conlang
To:                     CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU

> On Thu, 6 Jan 2000 19:04:57 -0500 Paul&Kathy <paulnkathy@...>
> writes:
> > Do you intend to develop a lang along these lines (perhaps ur-
> > proto-rokbeigalm?)  I'd be very interested in seeing what you come
> > up with.
> I was thinking a little bit about trying to make a similar language (or
> even their language!), but since i have no experience with signed
> languages, i wasn't that confident about my ability to remember and
> reproduce signs correctly without having a good way of writing them down.
Can I suggest watching the film.  It'll doubtless have you shouting
at the screen, having read the book, but it has some good insights
into the physical forms of signs that might be plausible.  There
seems to be a complex gestural system in use, more like modern
signing than simple gestures, where both hand/arm
configurations and hand/arm movements each convey separate
information, generally the configurations are lexical and the large
movements are grammatical, illustrative or explanatory.

There's a section in Daniels & Bright on systems for notating sign
language, IIRC.  I'll try and dig it out and see how much of it I can
put into ASCII if you like.

You don't need to write gesture forms down at first.  If you can
write the name of a gesture down, you can apply physical form to it
at a later date.  I suggest you work purely with the romanised form
of the language to get the vocab and grammar right, and then work
on the physical forms of the gestures.

>  Although it would be a great challenge, especially figuring out what
> concepts are "basic" enough to be encoded as words.  Maybe i'll try it
> later on, when i'm more experienced, if someone else doesn't take a shot
> at it first.
I spose you could dig around egroups for previous "minimal
grammar" and "20-word conlang" postings and the like.

Or, start by using the words and gesture-names from the book(s)
and build from there, which might be an easier starting point.

> An ur-proto-Rokbeigalmki....hmmm...now *that* would be interesting.  But
> how the heww would a barely-vocalized predominantly-signed language turn
> into a purely spoken one?
Here's my .02, it turns into a bit of a rambling diatribe, but I'm not
ashamed of it.

There is a clear advantage to speech over signing -- you do not have
to be facing (and in range and LOS of) the person you're
communicating with, vital when the majority of important
discourse is likely to be practical (warnings, instructions) rather
than artistic.

Another -- you can carry things and talk at the same time.
Shouting can be distinguished more clearly over medium to long
range than sophisticated signing.  Shouting provides a higher data-
rate over medium to long range than unsophisticated signing, and
obviates the need to invent a second type of signing.  Speaking in
and of itself has a lower energy cost than signing.

The following events (among others) occured fairly simultaneously:
(and I refuse to be drawn on cause and effect chains here -- I've
seen one too many quite nasty jihads on the subject on usenet to
make that mistake :-)

Brain size enlarges
Speech tract improves
Teaching increases
Social groups enlarge

During these processes, speech (as opposed to signing) became
both more desirable and more accessible, and thus speech took
over as the dominant medium.  At least that's my take on the
subject.

Yikes!  Erm, rant over, I guess.  I'll get back in my box...

---
Pb