What we need >Working phonological inventory of sounds and corresponding orthography of letters and/or symbols >Working system of grammar and structure. Cases, declensions, conjugations, etc. >Translation of the top 1500 most utilized vocabulary words in English and their direct cognates in our new language
I think the most important first step with our language is deciding whether it will be a priori or a posteriori.
An a posteriori conlang is a constructed language whose vocabulary or grammar is based on one or more already existing languages. A posteriori conlangs are the opposite of a priori conlangs, which are languages made entirely from scratch.
Both have their pros and cons. With an a posteriori conlang, forming words will be effortless since we can draw from a family of existing languages. There's also the added plus of a good portion of the language being intelligible with one or more existing languages. At the same time, this can alienate some learners. For instance, if our language is completely based on Latin, speakers of Finnish and Hungarian will have a higher learning curve and will be less likely to intuitively discern meaning from new words.
On the other hand, an a priori language will require lots of work when building vocabulary, but has the advantage of being entirely unique and "leveling the playing field" so to speak. When using said autism speak on the internet, it is unlikely that any non-speaker of the language will be able to obtain any bit of information from the language being written or spoken without some heavily computational linguistic research.
What will it be, Sup Forums?
Jacob Robinson
Definitely make it an isolated language like Basque or Ainu
Blake Hernandez
The second one.
James Hill
I agree with you guys. Basing something off existing languages will just make it look dumb and autistic like Esperanto.
It needs to be hipster and unique.
Robert Gomez
Make it use agglutination
Add suffixes onto nouns that give them extra meaning instead of having a bunch of useless prepositions
Just get a Finn to help you do this they're experts in it
Hunter Rodriguez
make a new slavspeak
Jaxon Lee
So we're using an a priori system. That works out great.
The next thing we need to discuss is our phonology. What vowels and consonants should we have?
There are two possibilities from here; We can use a wide variety of sounds or we can keep it simple.
What kind of logo? We don't have a name or a structure or anything yet.
Owen Williams
Is everyone okay with these sounds? There will be 3 pics and I'll be happy to answer any questions about them.
Nolan Martinez
...
Jack Cruz
let's do something like chinese characters only the characters can correspond to a much wider range of phonemes, like english words :)
Jackson Walker
I felt as though the five vowel system would be the most efficient one for what we're trying to do, and I used rather basic consonants. No "sh" or "zh" or "ch" as that would make typing it a little more difficult and I didn't want people arguing over what diacritical marks to use.
Luis Fisher
Also I've made the syllable structure (C)V(C) meaning we don't have to worry about diphthongs. All that means is that every one consonant is followed by a single vowel.
Ian Ross
Since we'll only be using it on Sup Forums it makes more sense not to use a writing system which cannot be typed with a keyboard.
Cameron Turner
why not go as simple as possible?
just make words and put em together and have em work like indonesian or chinese
Charles Wilson
Let's go with a variety of sounds. The simple thing is overdone.
Austin Morris
We need to make >implying into a feature of the language somehow
Aiden Diaz
This, just make sure each sound is represented by one single letter. We don't need silent letters.
I'm not suggesting we make it incredibly difficult to learn, but going simple is what faggot commie Esperantists do. If we go simple we'll end up with a bunch of low IQ amerilards and redditors using our language.
Also I second the guy saying agglutination.
Instead of saying "in the house" and "by the river" we just say "houseinside" and "riverby"
Noun cases make everything more fluid.
Lincoln Perry
Also seconding internet related translations. Since we're using the language primarily on Sup Forums we need words for our own terms like OP, post, thread, and shit like that.
Gavin Turner
I think that's a thing in Chinese actually, where the subject is implied
Christopher Peterson
can't we just make a germanic language?
since folkspraak failed we can do it in their stead
Evan Barnes
Only if we can use þ and ð
Levi Robinson
We already tried this at least thrice, if not more.
Suggestions: It's looking a bit too European to be honest. Add a velar nasal, at least as allophone before /k g/. /v z/ are easy to confuse with /w s/ respectively; might as well remove them. The tap and the lat approx are really similar, some Asians struggle with the difference. Have this in mind.
If there's a free stress pattern, make accents obligatory for anything but paroxitones. You might want to restrict a bit the word final consonants; pairs like "bed" and "bet" are really hard to distinguish for most people. I personally would go with /k l n p s t r w j/. Also, restrict certain stuff like /wu/ and /ij/, it's hard as fuck for most people (Ukrainians with their /ji/ and Poles with their /wu/ need not to apply)
Lower /e o/ a bit, make them truly mid. If you're going with a front Sup Forums, either add a back low vowel or centralize this. Note this vowel inventory is safe but boring as fuck.
I know I'm biased, but those two phonemes scream for me "THIS LANG WAS MADE BY AN ANGLO WITH POOR IMAGINATION".
Lucas Collins
Most Germs can't make those sounds9510
Robert Wood
>wanting to facilitate azns
Fuck em. If it ain't white, it ain't right. It needs to be a P.I.E. derived language.
Gabriel Wright
A posteriori is fun, and you already have most vocab done from German and English. If going this route:
* three cases - nominative (no ending), accusative (-n), dative (-p). No genitive/possessive, do it like German (from+dative). -p for Dativ because it's fucking annoying to distinguish /n/ and /m/. * articles "ajn" and "de". No grammatical genders. * articles and adjectives agree with the noun in a simple way: ajn rot Haus, but ajnen roten Hausen. * plurals marked with -[e]s after the case mark. * verb word order like English. Really, most people can't wrap around the concept of V2+SOV. * If you want to spice up a bit the phonology add front rounded vowels, but otherwise forget about strong/long vs. weak/short.
Check Euroquan on /r/conlangs. Seriously, the guy did an amazing job at that - a speakable PIE dialect.
Kayden Nguyen
It's really funny to see a feature where English, of all Germanic languages, decided to be conservative...
But really. Þ and ð are by no means hard to pronounce.
It looks like someone took a mixture of Latin and Sanskrit and sprinkled sesame seeds and dirt on my monitor. How can you type this shit?
Cooper Howard
His orthography is atrocious because it's the one from PIE studies. He has a Sanskrit-derived alphabet though.
I'd respell that to >sòas árx̣ gw'éd'iete iụxs: Px̣tér Nosi, kwis hén huorsanósụ, ueikxisò hnómṇ toi.
Jace Mitchell
Still looks like complete garbage.
I think the problem with reddit conlangers is that they overanalyze things and try too hard to be different. Some things just work and look good, despite being "unimaginative"
If you posted Ainu on there as a conlang the community would tear it apart and call it stupid.
Nolan Campbell
The problem in this case is that PIE is one of those languages that want you to say "FUCK YOU, LATIN ALPHABET" as loud as you can. Latin alphabet has no proper way to deal with stuff like /gʷʰ/.
Still, there are ways to simplify it if you don't try to convey every fucking single piece of info on the word: >soas arx gw'ed'iete iuxs: Pxter Nosi, kwis hen huorsanosu, ueikxiso hnomn toi. for /h2/ is ugly, but well, it's unused anyway.
Although I do agree with you on the "snowflake syndrome".
Liam Powell
i think basing it off living languages would be a mistake
Grammar so far doesn't have a completely concrete system, but what I have is a fairly simple and straightforward system of particle modifiers.
What I mean by this is, different suffixes are tagged onto the ends of words to modify the meaning and make the words more descriptive.
For instance, our second person singular impersonal pronoun, "tu" can be modified into a genitive form by adding "-me."
>Ki ast tu-me nom? What is you-possessive (your) name?
It does not vary by any personal pronoun and is used in the same way with all.
>Man, man-me = I, my >Tu, tu-me = Thou, thy/thine >Le, le-me = He/she, his/her
Oliver Flores
A small dialogue showing how you can play with the simplistic grammar.
Person A: Dwen dien! Person B: Dien dwen. Ki ast tu-me nom? Person A: Man-me nom ast Tomas. I tu? Person B: Nom man-me Adolfo ast. Person A: Dwen ajko tu, Tomas. Person B: Toke dwen ajko tu, Adolfo. Person A: Kal ast tu is-dien, Tomas? Person B: Abro dwen, grasha. I tu? Person A: Toke dwen. Person B: Retis, Tomas. Person A: Retis, Adolfo.
>Person A: Dwen dien! Good day!
>Person B: Dien dwen. Ki ast tu-me nom? Day good! What is you-possessive name?
>Person A: Man-me nom ast Tomas. I tu? Me-possessive name is Thomas. And you?
>Person B: Nom man-me Adolfo ast. Name me-possessive Adolf is.
>Person A: Dwen ajko tu, Tomas. Good meet you, Thomas.
>Person A: Kal ast tu is-dien, Tomas? How is you this-day, Thomas?
>Person B: Abro dwen, grasha. I tu? Much good, thanks. And you?
>Person A: Toke dwen. Also good.
>Person B: Retis, Tomas. Goodbye, Thomas.
>Person A: Retis, Adolfo. Goodbye, Adolf.
Matthew Hall
Nosh-me Pater, ki ast an Kemel >Us-poss Father, what is in Heaven
Sanktis ast Tu-me Nom >Sanctify is you-poss Name
Tu-me Reg ejket >You-poss Kingdom come
Tu-me Welti didemet >You-poss Will to do
An Ters Kal ast an Kemel >On Earth how is in Heaven
Dintet-nosh is dien nosh-me dienpan >Give-we this day we-poss daybread
I ludet-nosh delegs nosh-me >and free-we debt we-poss
Kal nosh ludet nosh-me delegswiroms >How we free we-poss debt man
I na wedet-nosh an temptashons >And not lead-we in temptation
Mo smejet-nosh po skelis. >But send-we from evil.
Camden Reed
And a sample with Cyrillic
Ekak manush ast lude i somos an gurav i swadarma genat. Tej ast kom-genat arguj i chana, i arhej didemet sarwa kom bratra-chit.
Eкaк мaнyш acт лyдe и coмoc гypaв и cўaдapмa гeнaт. Teј acт кoм-гeнaт apгyј и aнa, и apхeј дидeмeт capўa кoм бpaтpa-чит.
Every human is free and equal in dignity and rights born. They are with-born reason and conscience, and ought to do each with brotherhood-spirit.
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Isaac Gutierrez
чaнa*
Jaxson Rogers
hindi + latin?
Zachary Brown
Yes but no.
Proto-Indo-European + Sanskrit
There were originally 3 other anons helping me design it but they've all quit ;__;
Mason Wilson
What about th? Do we just use F/ф or Z/з, or do we use þ?
Colton Morris
The th sound doesn't fit, I don't think.
Carter Sullivan
Do you mean for loanwords? I would just use /t/.
Like if someone's surname is Thacker, we would just say "tacker"
