

Invented Human Languages (2010) - s-phi-nl
http://schott.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/10/questions-answered-invented-languages/

======
b6
I can't say how deeply sad it makes me that we have this perception about
creating languages -- that it's something you do if you want to have silly
wacky fun in your fantasy book or movie.

It's like it was before the creation of the electronic communication standards
we now take for granted, but much, much worse. It's not that we're unable to
exchange documents, it's that we cannot exchange even basic ideas with our
fellow humans if they happened to be born somewhere else.

I'm a native speaker of English. So far I've spent two years in China studying
Mandarin, and I'm still like a small child. Most people would never be willing
to do what I've done. Or, if willing, they wouldn't have the opportunity. The
situation for Chinese people learning English is just as daunting, if not
moreso.

Our natural languages grew like crazed mushrooms. They don't obey sensical
rules. They're full of exceptions. That's why they're so hard. But it doesn't
have to be that way. We can and should create a language whose rules fit on a
postcard. If I know how to say its words, I should know how to spell them, and
if I see them written, I should know how to say them. The new language's
sounds could be carefully chosen to be comfortable for a very large number of
humans. Learning such a language would actually be doable in a reasonable
amount of time. The benefits of being able to communicate with all our fellow
humans go on and on.

Of course, people should go on speaking their native languages -- they're fun!
Even if a miracle took place and a brilliant standard language were
standardized tomorrow, I'd continue my language studies, because it's
wonderful to be able to tell people that I consider them my family in their
own language. But when necessary or helpful, we should be able to switch to
the standard language.

It's an ongoing travesty. It really makes me sad that humans cannot get their
act together enough to build such a desperately needed bridge.

~~~
WildUtah
_it doesn 't have to be that way. We can and should create a language whose
rules fit on a postcard. If I know how to say its words, I should know how to
spell them, and if I see them written, I should know how to say them. The new
language's sounds could be carefully chosen to be comfortable for a very large
number of humans._

There's already an existing project that fulfills so many of those criteria
that it's going to be very hard to organize a new one from scratch. And the
existing project already has a deep legacy of literature and culture. That
project is the world's second most widespread language: Spanish.

Spanish has been destroying the dreams of Esperantists and others over the
years who hope to build a more regular, orderly, and easy to learn common
language based on common Indo-European roots.

Turns out that it's dang hard to design anything easier or more accessible to
speakers of any European language than Spanish already is. The spelling and
pronunciation are already completely regular and predictable. The grammar is
straightforward and common to almost all European tongues. The vocabulary is
mostly based on Latin with some Arabic variety thrown in, but it's been
standardized over the centuries so that a lot of it has a simpler and more
natural morphology. The sounds are a simple subset of what most languages
already use.

It's a great second language: it's fairly easy, the world's second most
widespread tongue, and spoken in warm countries with very friendly natives.
It's not likely to provide you with many lucrative business opportunities,
though. None of the world's financial capitals use it.

~~~
lcedp
> There's already an existing project that fulfills so many of those criteria
> that it's going to be very hard to organize a new one from scratch.

It's not hard as in "it can't be done" because it was done several times.

> And the existing project already has a deep legacy of literature and
> culture.

For an interlingua candidate I see this more as a drawback.

> That project is the world's second most widespread language: Spanish.

Yes, but the second most widespread language is still only about 6% of the
population.

> Spanish has been destroying the dreams of Esperantists and others over the
> years who hope to build a more regular, orderly, and easy to learn common
> language based on common Indo-European roots.

I don't want to start a flame, but by many standards Esperanto is much more
simpler and logical e.g. if we take conjugation system, irregular verbs, etc.
Esperanto is not unpopular because it's not simple enough. It is; Likewise
Spanish is not widespread because it's easier (in quite a few aspects) than
English. The widespread of Spanish and English is due to historical and
political reasons, that's it.

------
gliese1337
If you're interested in this sort of thing, there's lots of community
resources to help you get into the hobby. As mentioned in the interview, the
Language Creation Society (conlang.org) is a good place to start, but there's
also:

The Conlangery Podcast ([http://conlangery.com/](http://conlangery.com/)),
which covers a mix of serious linguistics and artistic conlanging, with case
studies of both natural and artificial languages.

The Language Construction Kit
([http://www.zompist.com/kit.html](http://www.zompist.com/kit.html)), which
was on HN a few days ago, and the associated Zompist Bulletin Board
([http://www.incatena.org/](http://www.incatena.org/)).

Fiat Lingua ([http://fiatlingua.org/](http://fiatlingua.org/)), a monthly
publication by the LCS on conlanging topics, and Speculative Grammarian
([http://specgram.com/](http://specgram.com/)) a humourous journal of
satirical linguistics.

And finally The Conlang Mailing List (archives as
[https://listserv.brown.edu/conlang.html](https://listserv.brown.edu/conlang.html)).
The members are generally friendly, international, possessed of a wealth of
accumulated wisdom, and usually pretty good about explaining things and
helping out newbies.

