Re: Futurese

>        Thus: what's wrong with all the other auxlangs that your auxlang
will solve?

Well, Esperanto's design flaws for example have already been
pointed out several times by others.


>(BTW, this is not meant to start a flame war to all of you who are making a
>reflexive grab for your asbestos underwear. :)
>        And, even though I am one of those dreaded native English speakers
(boo,
>hiss), I must object to your calling English a "national" language. It is
>properly an international language, spoken natively all over the world.
Then , Spanish is also an "international" language, since
it also is spoken natively "all over the world".


>Perhaps you don't like it, but at this present time, English is the de
facto
>lingua france.
O.K. I know that and, as you said, I DON'T LIKE IT AT ALL.


> In another century, it could easily be Spanish, Mandarin, or
>Hixkaryana. :) Such has always been the case; lingua francas change,
>depending on time and geography. At one point or another, French, Latin,
>Greek, and Aramaic have all been the languages of international politics
and
>trade but no longer occupy that prestigious position.
Well, you seem to forget that Spanish has ALREADY been
the world's lingua franca some centuries ago (the Spanish
Empire at that time was so big--half Europe and overseas
to Africa, East Asia and America--that one could say the
sun never set in it).


>> Just think of futurese (this is just a working nickname,
>> not meant as the definitive name for the language) it as a
>> conlang devised so as to meet certain requirements.
>
>        I'm glad you mentioned that, because "Futurese" is definitely an
English
>coin word.
Well, sorry, "futurese" is not an English coin word, but
the anglicization of "futurés", the nickname we gave it in
a Spanish-language conlang mailing list. Of course,
"futurés" is derived from "futuro" (future), which derives
from Latin "futurus", a future participle of the verb "essere"
(to be). So, in short, "futurese" is definitely not an English
coin word, but a Latin one.


>> The main goal of futurese is to be as culturally neutral,
>> logical and easy to use and learn as possible.
>
>        Ok, I'll try to frame this as a "features" question: how do these
features
>compare with other auxlangs? I've heard the exact same thing a dozen times
>before, but few get past the "easy phonology" part. Be specific: what about
>the features are culturally neutral? After all, what some people consider
>"culturally neutral" would be immediately labeled as very Western in many
>parts of the world. What do you mean by "logical"? Are we taking Lojban
>logical here, or just "no irregulars"? How is it easy to use and learn?
>Hawaiian is easy to pronounce for me, and Quechua is almost completely
>regular, but neither recommend themselves as IALs.
Well, to all these you'll find answers as I post further
comments on the project.


>> Here's a short summary of some of its main features:
>>
>> 1) Structure: ISOLATING
>        Ok, this is probably the best choice, but having tutored native
Russian
>speakers, some people may find this more difficult than at first glance.
Things become easier when words don't change.


>> 2) Script: standard 26-letter ROMAN ALPHABET
>        While this is the best choice for our technological society, there
are many
>who would feel that this is not necessarily culturally neutral. Just an
>observation. :)
Yes, but of all the alphabets currently in use, the roman
is the only one used by languages from almost every
linguistic family (so nowadays it is no longer a "European"
alphabet).

OTOH, introducing a new alphabet would cause so many
inconveniencies that I think nobody would prefer it
to the roman alphabet.


>> 3) Phoneme chart:
>> --------------------------------------------------------
>> .............|. labial .| dent-alve | palat-velar | gl |
>> -------------------------------------------------------|
>> plosives: ...| p .......|. t .......|......... k .|. ' |
>> .............| b .......|. d .......|......... g .|....|
>> fricatives: .|...... f .|....... s .|. c .........|. h |
>> .............|...... v .|....... z .|. x .........|....|
>> nasals: .....| m .......|. n .......|......... q .|....|
>> liquids: ....|..........|. l .......|.............|....|
>> .............|..........|. r .......|.............|....|
>> semivowels: .|..........|...........|. j ..... w .|....|
>> -------------|-----------------------------------------|
>        Hmm...both [h] and [x]. Interesting. Or does |x| represent [S]
(sh)? But it
>seems as though it is voiced.
Yes, it represents not /x/ nor /S/ but /Z/.


> What do |c| and |q| represent?
<c> /S/ "sh"
<q> /N/ "ng"

> Is |r| retroflex
>(American English and Mandarin), trilled, or tapped?
Well, any rhotic will do, but I think a trill as that of
Italian is preferrable because that way it becomes
impossible to mistake for any other phoneme.


> Oh, and I just noticed
>the ', which I assume to be a glottal stop. That's very unusual for an
>auxlang.
Well, maybe it is unusual for an auxlang, but certainly
not for the languages of the world, since the glottal
stop appears in the UPSID survey of most frequently
used phonemes at a global scale.


>> vowels: .....|........................ i . y . u ..... |
>> .............|.......................... e . o ....... |
>> .............|............................ a ......... |
>> --------------------------------------------------------
>> (p, t and k, aspirated; y, schwa)
>        Why insist on aspiration?
To emphasize the opposition between the pairs p/b, t/d,
k/g.


>> 4) Syllable structure: (C)V(C)
>> (glottal stop inherent in syllable-initial vowels)
>        Is this the only time the glottal stop occurs? If so, why mention
it?
>Speakers who are used to inserting a glottal stop will naturally do so,
those
>who are not will still be understood perfectly.
Because inserting a glottal stop in that position will not
be optional but customary, as in German. And that's so to
keep syllable structures unaltered.


>> 5) Basic vocabulary: MONOSYLLABIC
>>
>> 6) Vocabulary sources:
>> (a) onomatopoeic / expressive
>> (b) "inspired" by existing languages (Lojban's method)
>        What languages are on your list of inspiration?
I have made an extensive list of languages to be taken
into account, chosen so as to include representatives of at
least the main language families and those languages most
widely spoken.


>> 7) Right-branching
>>
>> 8) Basic sentence structure: theme - predicator - rheme
>        Sorry, I'm not exactly familiar with that terminology. Do you mean
it's SVO
>(Subject-Verb-Object)?
Not exactly. "Theme" is that about which you're going to
say something, "rheme" is what you're saying about the
preceding, "predicator" is the word that separates both.
A predicator--I mean, a word that's used just for that--
frequently appears in creoles, such as Tok Pisin's "i"
(which is a grammaticalized word derived from English
"is"; e.g. "Em i go": They go).

Cheers,
Javier

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