Re: fictional worlds

Santiago <sanctifeld@...> writes:

> I have a question for you all... I'd like to
> know to what extent are the cultures behind
> your conlangs absolutely fictional...
My latest conlang, Senu Yivokuchi, literally
means "language of the Bokuchi", the Bokuchi being
humans who live in a territory around the north of
the Persian Gulf, in the 21st Millennium (the year
might be 20000 to 20250 A.D.). So the culture is
fictional, but it has strong ties to the past, at
least geologically/geographically/ecologically.
Humanity has gone through ecological disaster,
mass starvation, war, an asteroid impact and an
Ice Age, but people still get married (and get
dressed for the occasion), still have traffic
laws, still talk about the weather, etc.

The Bokuchi culture is reflected in some parts of
the language that I still have to develop, but have
already thought about. For example, there are a lot
of terms referring to ecology, ecological services,
and dynamic processes, gradients and environmental
variables; and these are not specialized words but
just everyday terms with a high detail.

> My lang, Moesteskin (Moestesian would be in English)
> has a lot of vocabulary relating to the latest (an
> not so late) technology developments... Yes, words
> like "television", "computer"... what do you think
> of that? It doesn't look original, does it?
It's quite all right if your culture has those things.
One of the first things I tried in SYV was relating this
culture, so far away in time and so changed, with those
things we know that wouldn't have changed much. For
example, I made up |git ejop fokor| 'air conditioning'
and |ayijhep| 'reserved radio frequency'. These are
common words made up of native elements. Really alien
cultures are a challenge, but if you don't want to
deal with anything non-human, then you really don't
have to invent anything -- truth is stranger than
fiction, as they say.

If you don't feel OK having Moesteskin... hmmm...
_en el aire_, then why don't you take it back to your
fictional culture?


--Pablo Flores
  http://www.angelfire.com/ego/pdf/ng/index.html