Re: Introducing myself, and several questions

Hallo!

On Tue, 15 Feb 2005 17:58:35 -0500,
Sally Caves <scaves@...> wrote:

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jörg Rhiemeier" <joerg_rhiemeier@...>
>
> > Hallo!
> >
> > On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 00:01:43 -0500,
> > Damian Yerrick <tepples@...> wrote:
> >
> >> My name is Damian, and I'm a conlanger.
>
> This does sound like a twelve step program, doesn't it! :)
What is a twelve step program?

> [...]
> >>
> >> LEXICAL ICONICITY
> >>
> >> When creating the a priori lexicon for Qenya (early drafts of
> >> Quenya), Tolkien chose sound patterns that he felt "fit" a given
> >> meaning.
> >> http://www.uib.no/People/hnohf/vice.htm
> >>
> >> However, I seem to have a dulled sense of aesthetics, possibly
> >> caused by my Asperger syndrome that causes me to distrust vague
> >> hunches.  Much of the time, I can't seem to do better than creating
> >> phonotactic rules and then randomly assigning Swadesh-list glosses
> >> to sound patterns, possibly with the aid of a computer program.
> >> Are there some general procedures that govern lexical innovation
> >> in natlangs and naturalistic conlangs?  Has anybody successfully
> >> implemented ding-dong or ta-ta in their conlangs?
>
> Words that are onomatopoeic?  Tsyttsytsa is "cricket" in Teonaht, and it
> intends to imitate the sound a cricket makes.  In the early stages of
> Teonaht, Damian, I just pulled words out of the air arbitrarily.  I had a
> strong sense at the time (which you claim you don't but you may surprise
> yourself!) that a word would "fit" its meaning, and as the language
> developed I resorted to more and more compounding.  But I state as strongly
> as Jörg does that this is completely subjective.
What I am doing in my conlanging is to find wprds that sound "right"
to me.  Of course, this is entirely subjective, and the sound-meaning
relationship remains arbitrary.

> > The relationship between sound and meaning in languages is generally
> > arbitrary, with only few words approaching iconicity.  And aesthetics
> > is a very subjective issue.  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
>
> Exactly.  In looking over Teonaht, I have found that I find "nrina" rather
> beautiful, although it starts with a rather unconventional consonant
> cluster.  I have tended to favor quite a lot of clucky sounds: kemkrilyt for
> "labyrinthine" is full of clusters that other people might find harsh, and
> yet I adore that word.  I have a book of words I pulled out of the air
> (where the F*#)(@)k is it?) and to which I had planned to assign meanings,
> and many tend towards three syllables with stress on the first syllable.
> Avgyab, begrimod, krestimait, zydzyend, etc.  I find these collection of
> syllables pleasing, though there is nothing inherently beautiful about them.
>
> > I find naturalistic conlangs (i.e., conlangs that look like natlangs,
> > with a sense of historicity) beautiful and conlangs that give away
> > their artificiality at first sight ugly, but there are people around
> > here who have a different taste.
>
> So Jörg, what conlangs give their artificiality away?  There are so many
> features of a language that could considered "artificial."  Many of the
> linguistic scholars of glossolalia were so sure they could identify the
> artificial aspects of that linguistic practice by noting the 1) open
> syllables, 2) reduced phonology, 3) echoism, etc. that we find in Hawaiian,
> for instance.  An over regularity of grammar?
It is not easy to say, but an extreme regularity of phonology, grammar
and word formation looks artificial, so does, for example, a language
which superimposes some sort of grammatical categories onto the IPA
chart.  The worst offenders are philosophical languages and closed-
vocabulary schemes.

> > [...]
> >
> > The variation among human languages is enormous, and it is hard
> > to say whether left-branching (object-verb, adj-noun, postpositions)
> > or right-branching (verb-object, noun-adj, prepositions) structures
> > are easier to parse.
>
> Teonaht is a direct violation of the Greenbergian rules for syntax.  It is
> OSV, or more colloquially SOV with adjectives that are postpositional and
> prepositions that are... for the lack of a better word. . .prepositional,
> although you do find the -jo and -ro among the conjuntions that are
> postpositional.
>
> If I were ever to invent a new language, don't hold your breath! I would
> probably make its words far more monosyllabic; it would be inflected with a
> syntax that expresses topic and focus.  Or I would invent a Teonivar who
> invents a philosophical language.  And have it fail, or taken up by
> Rrordaly's mimes.
Who are Rrordaly's mimes?

> >> CULTURAL-PHONETIC CORRELATION
> >>
> >> Does tendency for open or closed syllables, for softer or harder
> >> sounds, or for tones or no tones, depend on culture?  I've heard
> >> of the Inuit and the Arabs, whose languages have fewer distinct
> >> vowel heights and more back consonants because their harsh
> >> environments make it painful to open the mouth to the elements
> >> in order to produce low vowels.
> >
> > Few linguists would subscribe to that.  There seems not to be
> > any correlation between culture and phonology.
>
> Again, exactly.  It's like the amateur linguists who wanted to psychologize
> the Welsh for their initial mutations ("they're lazy") or better, for the
> particles that precede initial verbs and predicates.  "Nothing touches. They
> are secretive, careful, mystical."  Bosh!
I whole-heartedly agree.  It is just a big bucket of bilge.

> >>        In addition, Tolkien's chaotic
> >> orcs speak a phonaesthetically "harsher" language than his
> >> lawful elves.  Is such correlation the rule or the exception?
> >
> > Again, it's subjective.  Tolkien decided that the good guys in
> > his story would speak languages he'd consider beautiful, and the
> > bad guys languages he'd consider ugly.  The next author will have
> > different ideas about what is beautiful, and build his languages
> > accordingly.
>
> However, I might add that there is some research being done into the
> aesthetics of western language by no other than the Cornish Language
> revivalists; I talked to one at the Berkeley conference I attended two years
> ago.  I don't know if this was his particular bailiwick, or one that has a
> larger calling.  But language aesthetic, especially in the reconstruction of
> language, or the creation of a dead language, is of interest to some people.
> We talked about the relatively common assumption that front consonants and
> liquids with few clusters are considered "prettier" than back consonants and
> back consonant clusters.  I like Mike Ellis's examples!  HAH!  But again,
> this is cultural.  Like what chords and note sequences express
> "sorrowfulness" vs. "an upbeat attitude" in music.
Yes.

> >> CULTURAL-GRAMMATIC CORRELATION
> >>
> >> Likewise, are any grammatical qualities correlated to aspects
> >> of the culture?  Does an environmental or cultural constraint
> >> correlate with an OV or VO preference, with obligate marking
> >> of various properties of a noun or verb, or anything similar?
> >> I can see how a more paranoid culture might lead to evidentiary
> >> markers becoming grammaticalized; are there other examples?
> >
> > There is perhaps more of a correlation between culture and grammar
> > than between culture and phonology.  A rigidly stratified culture
> > is perhaps more likely top develop an elaborate system of honorifics
> > than an egalitarian one, for example.
>
> I agree.  But I don't think that syntax can be tied down to cultural
> constraints.  I also don't think that a culture need be "paranoid" to
> produce evidentiary markers, any more than a culture is overly precise and
> fussy because it shows redundant marking with gender/number and
> noun/adjective.  The French however... :) :) :D
This is also what I think about it.

> > [...]
> >
> >> Specifically, is the narrator's description of the language of
> >> the Eloi in chapter 5 of HG Wells's _The_Time_Machine_ unnatural?
> >>
> >> "Either I missed some subtle point or their language was
> >> excessively simple - almost exclusively composed of concrete
> >> substantives and verbs. There seemed to be few, if any, abstract
> >> terms, or little use of figurative language. Their sentences
> >> were usually simple and of two words, and I failed to convey
> >> or understand any but the simplest propositions."
> >
> > Sounds like a pidgin.
>
> Sounds, rather,  like that South American tribe whose name I can't remember;
> I have it on the tip of my tongue.  Their language was also almost devoid of
> abstractions, and they showed an inability to calculate, as well, i.e., to
> think in abstractions.  We even discussed it about a year ago.
Pirahã is the name.  I could believe the story if it was set in a
Eurasian relic area and involved the speakers of that language
having bony ridges above their eyes and mixed offspring between
them and normal humans being sterile etc., because then it would be
a candidate for a Neanderthal or Homo erectus survival.  However,
it is in the wrong location for that, and I am pretty sure that
it is a hoax.

Greetings,

Jörg.

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