Re: New Survey: Celtic Conlangs (and other lunatic pursuits)

Sally Caves wrote:

> PART I.  FOR CELTIC CONLANGERS:
>
> Have you based your conlang(s) wholly or partially on a Celtic language?
> If so, on which?  or combined with which?
Not really based, but rather making Quenya look Welsh. The basic idea
was to apply the Brithenig Grand Master Plan to Quenya and see what
came out. It's kind of like Sindarin, only it's a daughter language to
Quenya and not a sister/cousin (like Sindarin).

> What is your name and what do you call your conlang(s)?
Name: Daniel Andreasson

(Celtic) Conlang: Cein [tSEjn]

> When did you start it/them?
Actually I started working on it on my birthday. :) So, May 26th 2001.

> Are you still working with it/them or have you abandoned it or them?
It's pretty much abandoned for the moment. I do plan to work on it
in the future, though. It's a conlang that I'm very happy with. It
turned out nice.

> What Celtic features have you borrowed?  What is the structure of your
> language?  Be specific.
It's VSO, NG, NA, Prep-N. There are no words for yes/no. Instead you
say _aenth_ 'they are'. The verb phrase is formed "Am I at saying" just
like in Welsh. And of course, all the mutations are there, but slightly
modified. The phonology and orthography is also basically Welsh, but
a bit modified to fit my tastes. The have-construction works as in Welsh,
too.

> What innovations did you introduce?  (new constructions, perhaps a new
> script, etc.)
The stress is like in Welsh only taken one step further. The stress
in Welsh is on the penultimate, but with a high pitch on the last
syllable. The speakers of Cein had the same high pitch on the last
syllable, but they reinterpreted this as being stress. It also helped
(analogy, that is) that many words became mono-syllabic and many words
became stressed on the last syllable due to sound changes. So, stress
in Cein is on the ultimate.

There are two kinds of verbal 'tense', simple and progressive. The
"is he at verbing" structure is used for progressive and "verbs he"
is used for the simple tense.

As for the noun phrase, there is a dual and a partitive number, based
on Quenya, which isn't there in Welsh, afaik.

Possessive phrases are formed by juxtaposition, by using the genitive
particle _o_ or by using a possessive pronoun (pretty much like Welsh,
I think). But there is an alienable/inalienable distinction depending
on whether juxtaposition or the genitive particle is used.

One non-standard variant of Cein is active (as opposed to the standard
accusative one).

> What features of Celtic languages (or a particular Celtic language)
> initially inspired or intrigued you?  For example, Tolkien, as he described
> it in "Welsh and English" was impressed by the beauty of a Welsh inscription
> he saw on a building: Adeiladwyd 1887 ('built 1887').  He loved words like
> wybren, so much more "mellifluous" than our borrowed word "sky."  He was
> likewise enthralled by Finnish and Hebrew.  So he deliberately set out to
> make his Elvish languages beautiful.   Was this a draw for you as well in
> choosing Celtic as a model? (I understand that T's Elvish languages are not
> exclusively "Celtic."  He has described them, however, as being
> "European-like.")
> On the other hand, perhaps the Celtic structures, their VSO, their
> paraphrastics, their initial mutations, their spelling conventions, their
> general strangeness caught your fancy, not necessarily their "beauty" or
> "romance."  Comment?
I really can't tell. I can guess, and my guess would be Sindarin, but
it could also have been the numerous celticonlangs on Conlang-L, like
Brithenig et al. I think what appealed to me was both the phonology and
the very cool features. Especially the paraphrastic verb construction.
And the mutations of course (but I guess that's both a phonological and
a structural thingy).

> How many of you are also scholars of Celtic languages?   Scholars of other
> languages?
Nope and nope. I do however (almost) have a Masters degree in General
Linguistics. :)

> How were you introduced to them?
N/A.

> PART II:  INSPIRATION BY TOLKIEN (tangential to the questions on inspiration
> by Celtic languages):
>
> How many of you were inspired to invent a language because of your exposure
> to Tolkien?
Not initially. My first attempts at conlanging wasn't inspired by Tolkien.
Later on, however, I was very inspired by Tolkien (as can be seen in Cein).

> How many of you based your conlang on one of Tolkien's languages, or your
> conculture in Middle Earth?
Me, obviously! :)

> How many of you have a constructed world, and, if so, does it include some
> of the races we associate with Celtic or Scandinavian mythology? (Elves,
> Dwarves, medieval societies of humans, Faeries or Fays?  Selkies?  Wizards?)
Nope, not me. The speakers of Cein are set in Middle-earth, so I didn't
have to create anything. Just tweak it a bit.

> How many of you were inspired to examine Welsh, Hebrew, or Finnish because
> of your examination of Tolkien?
I didn't really examine Welsh or Finnish *because* of Tolkien per se, but
because I needed to know how Welsh worked in order to do a proper job on
Cein. I do find Finnish beautiful nowadays. In Sweden, most people think
Finnish is a very ugly language. I've learnt to appreciate it thanks to
Quenya.

> How many of you were inspired to invent a conlang or a conculture because of
> some influence OTHER than Tolkien?
That would be me then. I don't know what made me create a conlang, but
it must have been something, and it wasn't Tolkien.

> How many of you were inspired to invent a language because you engage in
> Roll-Playing Games?
I did play RPG's, but I'm pretty sure that wasn't why I started. My first
attempts had nothing to do with RPG's.

> How many of you were inspired to invent a language because you heard of this
> listserv?
Not me. I did it prior to finding it.

> How many of you are members of the Mythopoeic Society, or the Society for
> Creative Anachronism, or other High Fantasy Groups?
Not me.

> PART III:  NON-CELTIC CONLANGERS:
>
> In the discussions I've witnessed on Conlang in almost five years, I've
> observed that many conlangers have deliberately avoided "Tolkienesque"
> languages, and even Indo-European languages as models for conlangs, and
> especially the "Celtic."  Why?  Boring?  Overdone?  Trite?  Too pretty?
> Too Western?  Or none of the above--just more interested in something else?
> <G>  I don't want to give the impression that I think we conlang only
> because of Tolkien, and that anything we invent has to be INSPIRED BY or a
> DEPARTURE from the "Great One"; but in this question I'm eager to see some
> eschewal of or at least indifference towards the Tolkien, the "Celtic,"
> and/or even the Indo-European model.
Well, I ,ll answer these questions as well, because I have several conlangs which
aren ,t inspired by Tolkien at all.

> What is your name and what do you call your conlang?
Name: still Daniel Andreasson.
Conlangs: Nakiltipkaspimak, Seimi, Rinya

> So what is unappealing about the Indo-European model for conlanging?  Or
> Tolkien's Elvish?
It ,s not unappealing. It ,s just that I want to try other things completely different to IE langs.

> How did you start conlanging?  What was your initial inspiration?
See above (part I)

> Did you know about Tolkien's inventions?  Read the books, the appendices?
> etc.  Or not?
See above (part I)

> What language types have you modeled your language(s) after?
Nakiltipkaspimak isn ,t really modeled after anything. I guess it has features of most
polysynthetic langs, though. Seimi is modeled after North Saami (with
some influence of Scots Gaelic, but that ,s just slightly noticable in the
orthography). Rinya isn ,t modeled after anything (or perhaps it ,s modeled
after everything).

> What features of these languages or language types appeal to you?
Their un-IE syntax and morphology. Rinya is active, which practically no IE
langs are. Nakiltipkaspimak is polysynthetic and noun-incorporating which
is a feature I very much like. Some of these langs have very small
phoneme inventories as well, which I like.

> Some of you, and I'm thinking in particular of a conversation I had with And
> Rosta, are not interested in producing a language that is
>  "mellifluous"--that "mellifluousness" is a thing to be avoided in your
> conlang and especially as it is associated with Tolkien's Elvish or copiers
> of Elvish.   Is this so?  Why?
I have my own idea of mellifluousness. Or rather I have two ideas. One is
admittedly alike Tolkien ,s languages. The other is a minimalistic voiceless
phonology: few phonemes, no voiced obstruents. Efficient minimalistic
grammar. (And *not* minimalistic in the Chomsky sense!)

> For how many of you, though, is beauty and/or efficiency a factor in your
> language?  Or elegance?  How would you define these terms?
See the question above. Tepa/Miapimoquitch and Tokana are two -- in my eyes  )-
very beautiful languages. Tolklangs (or rather langs that have the same
general  &feel 8) can be a bit too much. It ,s so mellifluous it makes you
wanna throw up. No one can do better than Sindarin and Quenya anyway.

> For how many of you is the "exotic" a desired feature of your invented
> language?
Very much for me! That ,s what I like most in linguistics. Those odd
grammatical features. I love them!

> How many of you invent a non-human language?  And if so, how alien are its
> sounds and constructions?
Nope.

> Do you prefer inventing an a posteriori language or an a priori language?
> In other words, how many of you invent a language wherein you base it
> closely on a natural language (Arabic, Tagalog) or a combination of
> languages, and how many others of you invent a language from, well, scratch?
> (if that can be done.)
I do both. Both ways have their charm.

> How many of you invent a language based on a particular type (Ergative,
> Accusative, Trigger, etc.)?
Me! Especially active languages. Most of my languages have gone through
a stage when they were active. Rinya is totally based on the  &activeness 8.

> To what degree is difficulty and irregularity of language important to you
> in your conlang?  what natural language eccentricities (or efficiencies) do
> you like and try to reproduce?
It wasn ,t when I began conlanging. Then I wanted the language to be logical
and without irregularities. Nowadays, however, I feel the opposite. Languages
are irregular and I want my languages to feel natural. I want people not
being able to tell if it ,s a conlang or a natlang. (Somewhat of a utopia,
I know...)

> To what degree is accessibility, efficiency, and regularity important to
> your conlang?  What natural language "faults" are you correcting?
See above. I like efficiency in a language, but that doesn ,t mean it can ,t
be irregular.

> How many of you invent logical languages?
Nope.

> How many of you invent IALs?
Not me.

> How many of you have invented non-Tolkienesque or non European concultures
> and what are they like?
No concultures for me. Not very developed in any case. I have some Saamis
on the Shetland Islands (who were taken there as thralls by vikings) and I have
the Nakiltipkas somewhere on a green island in the sun, but that ,s pretty much
it.

> How many of you started out by pulling words out of the air, originally?
> How many of you have chosen a more methodic form of vocabulary building?
> I.e., how have you gone about setting up the framework for your words and
> your grammar?
> (I started out pulling words out of the air.)
Most of the time I have a feeling of how I want the language to sound. So
I think I pull words out of the air. I always make up the phonology first,
though, so I have something to pull from. I ,ve tried word generating
software, but it doesn ,t really do it for me. I ,m not happy with what
it produces.

> PART IV:  THE LUNATIC SURVEY REVISITED (because we are all "fous du
> langage," according to Yaguello and other French critics.
>
> Why do you conlang?  Who will speak it?  Read it?  What's the point?  What's
> the beauty?  what's the intellectual draw?
I conlang because I love languages. Conlangs are something I can control to
the last bit. Well, almost. They seem to take a life of their own after a
while. But compared to painting and writing I can. Conlangs is a way to
create wonderful systems. And I can try out neat grammatical things with
conlanging. I don ,t really care if anyone reads or speaks it. That ,s not
the point anyway. I just like to build things and a language is such an
elegant thing to build! It ,s so simple and yet so amazingly intricate. You
can create the basics in a few minutes, but you can continue developing it
your whole life. And even that isn ,t time enough.

> To what would you compare a conlang?  Is it a miniature?  Is it a model?  Is
> it a tapestry?  Is it an act of obsession and madness? <G>  Or is it a
> communicable language?
Hmm. It ,s not a miniature to me. The whole language is out there, somewhere.
It ,s just that I haven ,t written it all down yet. It exists, but not on
paper. So to me, conlangs are real languages, but not intended to be spoken
by real people. Either it ,s just for my own fun, or created for some imaginary
people. Hmm. Perhaps it is a miniature, only not small. One might
say that the goal is a life-size model.

> If it is a communicable language, to whom do you speak it?
No one.

> To what extent is the opacity or "alterity" of your language something that
> pleases you?  In other words, the sounds and the script have, even for you,
> a quality of being foreign, and this delights.
> Comment?  (I know that when I make maps of cities, and imagine myself in
> them, they delight me because they are both familiar and foreign at the same
> time.)
Never thought of this, actually. But of course it pleases me. The (extremely
small admittedly) concultures which go with the conlangs are foreign, but I
very much like them and wouldn ,t have anything against living in any of them.

> This is a difficult question:  how is it that a word sounds "right" to you?
> We recently discussed this.  To what extent are you finding righter, better
> words for the world in your conlang?  (Perhaps unanswerable).
It is EXTREMELY hard to find the right words. This is probably what I spend
most time with, and I fail utterly almost always. I can come up with three
or four terrific words, but when I try to create more in the same style, I
can ,t. I think most of my langs begin with a word which sounds  &right 8. Then
I go from there. Of course, I can start out with a basic idea as well (see
that question above), like  &polysynthetic 8 or  &VSO 8. But for me, those two
go hand in hand. I combine the  &idea 8 with the  &word/phonology 8. Hmm. This
answer is probably as confusing as the question. :)

> How many of you are fictive map-makers, designers of fictive floor plans,
> fictive yachts, fictive star-ships, world-builders, calligraphers,
> cartoonists, etc.?  (These pursuits have been associated with conlanging.  I
> 've done most of them.)
Not me.

> How many of you have a special script in your conlang?
I do, though I mostly just make it up in a creative flurry and then don ,t
use it anymore. I think all my major langs have scripts though.

> If you use Roman script, how recognizably "phonetic" is your writing system?
> In other words, do you use unconventional letters to represent sounds?
> Why?
At first each phoneme corresponds exactly to each grapheme. This is something
I think about, however. It is IMHO more realistic to have a phonemic writing
system, with a few allophonic variants. Or non-obvious uses of
some graphemes. I mean, non-IPA uses. Like _o_ isn ,t [o] but [V] or _u_
isn ,t [u] but [M], etc. This is something I try to do and have in at least
Cein, Seimi and Nakiltipkaspimak.

I wouldn ,t even go near maggelity, though! :)

> This is a question Heather asked, but I also asked it four years ago:  how
> many of you write in your language?  What do you write?
No, unfortunately I don ,t. I wish I would be fluent enough (and have one
conlang developed enough!) to be able to do that.

> How many of you sing in your language and have invented songs for that
> purpose?
Not yet, but I plan to in the near future. I *did* record a short lullaby
in Seimi about a year ago, but wasn ,t really pleased with it. Don ,t know
what happened to that file.

> How many of you started conlanging when you were a teenager and have stuck
> to the same language over many years?   Why?
Not me. My Rinya is kind of like that, but I don ,t really work on it anymore.
I still have a dream that it will be  &finished 8 one day. That ,s not gonna
happen, though. :(  It ,s my first love, so to speak.

> How many of you change conlangs regularly, developing structures for many
> languages but not sticking with any one for very long?  Why?
That would be me! I can ,t really stick to anything (Don ,t tell my girlfriend! ;),
so why with my conlangs? :/
I want to try new ideas or try something I ,ve read about. Then I get a new
idea and want to try that too. That ,s why most of my conlangs are nothing
more than sketches (at least compared to a lot of other conlangs). I keep
thinking that  &this one I will develop really far 8, but that hasn ,t happened
yet.

> For how many of you does your language function as a spiritual instrument?
> This is a deeply personal question--let me give you an example.  When I
> first started inventing "Tayonian" in my early teens, what I wrote were
> spells and prayers.  They had a talismanic quality.  Does that ring a bell
> for anybody?
Not me. I wish I had though.

> For how many of you was your language at least at one stage of its making
> meant to fool others, or to write secret diaries? (Me, waving my hand).
Nope.

> How many of you can speak your language, at least to yourself and your pet?
> child?  spouse?  <G>  To what extent?
Not me. I wish I could. I learnt a few phrases of Cein and I got pretty good
at making sentences, but I ,ve forgotten most of it now.

> How many of you have put up websites where your language can be showcased?
> If so, what is the website address?
I have. http://home.swipnet.se/escape

> How many of you have made soundbytes of your language so the rest of us can
> hear it?  If so, give the site.
I have a short dialogue in Nakiltipkaspimak. That ,s the only thing I got up
on the net. http://home.swipnet.se/escape/pimakdia.html

> How many of you are comfortable talking to your boss, your professors, your
> family members about this pursuit?   How many of you have received
> condescending or other negative responses to your disclosure?  (I have.)  Or
> even been called "pathological"?
Hmm. I have one friend I can talk to about it, but even with him it feels
a bit weird. My family knows, I guess, but I don ,t talk to them about it.
Most of my close friends know of it to some extent, I think, but I don ,t
think they really care or make a big deal of it. They probably don ,t know
the impact on my life conlanging has had. I think my professor at uni knows,
and he admitted he conlanged himself in his youth, but it ,s not something
I talk to him about.

> If this attitude is changing, to what do you attribute the change?  (On New
> Year's Eve, a delightful, elderly gentleman could not understand why I would
> be interested in this pursuit.  What purpose could it serve?)
I ,m more open about it nowadays. People seem to think it ,s okay, and I guess
my self-confidence is bigger now. If people think conlanging is crazy, so what?
It ,s their problem they ,re so narrow-minded. I don ,t want to be friends with
people like that anyway.

> For how many of you is the damning statement "better to learn real languages
> than invent private ones" a criticism you have encountered?  What would be
> your response to such a remark?
I ,ve encountered it. The response would be that I can do both. I don ,t have
to chose between them. Creating languages of my own also makes me better at
learning other languages, since I get better at general linguistics and can
easily understand the quirks of other languages.

> PART V:  GENERAL DEMOGRAPHICS:
>
> What is your age (optional--and can be general: 30-40, for instance).
25.

> What is your profession or your station in life (i.e., if you are a student,
> what is your MAJOR; if a middle or high-school student, what is your
> intended major)?
Currently I ,m an account manager (in finance, that is. Yes, yes, I ,m
a capitalist pig. :P). I do hope to find work in the linguistics sector at some time, though.

> What is your gender?
Male. (And straight, if we ,re to survey that as well.)

> What is your nationality and your native language?
Swedish, Swedish.

> What natural languages do you speak or have studied?
Swedish, English, French and German. Other than those, I haven't studied
any language professionally in depth. During my linguistic studies I have
come in contact with a wide range of languages, though nothing in depth,
as I said. Worth mentioning: Guaraní, Georgian, Lakhota, Eastern and Central
Pomo, some Chadic langs, Chickasaw, Acehnese. And I've studied Welsh (but only in a
grammatical way), obviously, otherwise the grammar of Cein would have been a
chore.

I've tried studying Latin, Japanese and Sanskrit on my own, but didn't
succeed too well. :/

And I do know how to say "hello!" in Pima. :) (Sape cu'ik!)

Oh! Old Icelandic! I've studied Old Icelandic! How could I forget...

> How many of you have chosen a profession in linguistics because of your
> interest in inventing languages?  Or plan a profession in linguistics?
I did plan to be a grad student in linguistics, but had to give it up.
They don't accept linguistics grad students anymore at my uni due to money
shortage. They might in a few years, but I can't wait that long.

> What have you learned from conlanging?
Lots and lots of linguistics. And that everyone seems to have a unique
taste in language. Everyone seems to have a personal view of what is
a "beautiful" language. (As with everything, I suppose.)

> What texts on language and linguistics have you consulted to help invent
> your language?
Pretty much everything I've read at uni, plus of course "Describing
Morphosyntax", the Language Construction Kit, and Pablo Flores's "kit".

> Do you know of anyone who has not connected with the Internet or the List
> who has invented a language? (I'm firmly convinced that "conlanging" has
> been a private pursuit for many people long before the list started, but
> that the list has increased its visibility as an art).
Yes, two people. They're on the Internet, though, but I don't think
they've come in contact with conlanging through it.

> Can you give me a short sample of your language with interlinear description
> and translation?
Here ,s a poem in the celticonlang Cein:

Coll o fenel
cul oron fag se isidd.
Na'el llim llen.
Allo lum era
ffen alch or iar.
Na'el llim llen.
Na'el llim llen.
Na'i ffein i chess o'i anar,
sen anyn.

Interlinear:

coll  o   fenel  cul     oron     fag   se isidd
cloak GEN heaven dresses mountain every in mist
'Heaven's cloak dresses every mountain in mist.'

na  el  llim llen
are 2SG AUG  beautiful
'You are so beautiful.'

allo lum      era    ffen    alch      or   iar
from cloud:PL remote flashes lightning over sea
'From remote clouds lightning flashes over the sea.'

na  i      ffein  i      chess    o  i   anar sen anyn
are the:PL clouds the:PL feathers of the sun  in evening
'The clouds are the feathers of the sun in the evening. ,

> Would you object to my mentioning your conlang/and or your name in my talk?
> I will be discreet about some of the more personal questions you answered.
No problem in any way.

> Ev send poto, yry poy poy firrimby!
Firrimby to you too. It was most interesting to answer.

Daniel Andreasson

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