Re: Aesthetics

 Ray and others will remember that I wrote on esthetics of languagesome time
back. There is even a rather sorry looking web page of mine on the subject
still posted. (I should update and clear it up,but other priorities have
intervened) So glance athttp://www.acadon.com/esthetics_of_language_design.htm
Comments much appreciated.Regards, Leo J. MoserSent
via:via_acadon@excite.com--- On Sat 10/20, R A Brown <
ray@CAROLANDRAY.PLUS.COM > wrote:From: R A Brown [mailto:
ray@CAROLANDRAY.PLUS.COM]To: CONLANG@listserv.brown.eduDate: Sat, 20 Oct 2007
12:04:21 +0100Subject: Re: AestheticsJörg Rhiemeier wrote:> Hallo!> >
On Thu, 18 Oct 2007 20:54:46 +0100, R A Brown wrote:[snip]> >>I know
well that there are some conlangs in which aesthetics do play a>>part.
They are, I guess, mainly artlangs. Indeed, there is IMO no reason>>why
aesthetics shouldn't play a part. I'm sure they played a large part>>in
Tolkien's Quenya.> > > Sure. Quenya
was made entirely to fit the personal taste of its> creator. Many, if not most
artlangs are that way. However,> aesthetics sometimes play a role in other
kinds of conlangs as well.> Many auxlangers try to make their languages
beautiful because they> feel that a beautiful language will find it easier
to be adopted> by millions of people than an ugly one. Of course, beauty
lies in> the eye of the beholder ...Quite so, as well as the ear of the
beholder. IME people _tend_ to find what is similar to their own L1 is pleasing
and what is very different is unpleasing. I stress I have found this as a
tendency, not by any means an absolute.That may in part explain why auxlangs so
often reflect to a lesser or greater extend the phonology of an author's L1.
But I'll not go too far that road as anything said about auxlangs IME, alas, is
liable to provoke flames. I've had more than enough of that.>>But what I
was saying was that one should not assume that all
conlangs>>are guided by aesthetic principles.> > Yes. For example, I find my own X-1
outright *ugly*. Oh - I think you're doing yourself an injustice. All unblocked
syllables, the only consonants being /p t k s l m n/, no consonant clusters.
That is not what I call ugly. I know some people like he /a/ sound, and that is
lacking. I also know some people don't like the languages with just CV
syllables like the Polynesian languages; but I find them attractive. But, as
this thread has made quite clear, such things are very much subjective.But FWIW
I don't find X-1's phonology ugly.> Perhaps I will> ditch the present
orthography and pronunciation scheme entirely one day> - it is entirely
secondary to the structure of the language anyway.That is true. But I will be
very interested to see what you come up with. As you know, I've had several
attempts at devising a phonology & orthography to which a stream of
'nibbles' may map.> Engelangs are guided by
objectively testable criteria - and aesthetics> is of course not objectively
testable!Indeed not. I suppose and author could state those features s/he
thinks contributes to a language being aesthetically pleasing and one could
measure how well those features are implemented. An interesting
concept.>>Maybe, when I've got EAK & Piashi out of the way (not sure
about the>>"reformed Plan B" one), I will treat myself and design an
artlang purely >>for my own pleasure ;)> > Do so when you find the
leisure to do it.I must at least get EAK & Piashi out of the way. EAK
should not be too much of a problem as it is based on a natlang & the
vocabulary is, so to speak, 'ready made'. I'm hoping that by solving some of
the problems involved with a _flexionless_ language, it may help with Piashi
which, after some 50 years maturing, really needs to be finished!--
Ray==================================http://www.carolandray.plus.com==================================Entia non sunt multiplicandapraeter necessitudinem.

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