Re: [TIED] Reanimating Indoeuropean?

From: Dan Jones
Message: 2716
Date: 2000-06-21

Manuel Rosario

> Welcome to the Li(nguistic)St(udy)
> What are the purpose of constructing your own language?

Ask the 200+ people who subscribe to the CONLANG (CONstructed LANGuage)
list, where we discuss International Auxiliary Languages (but only rarely)
but mainly "artlangs", which has the idea of language as art. Most of us
create our own languages for our own amusement, but a good number feature in
books (Quenya, Sindarin, Laadan) and many are "experimants". Laadan was an
experiment to test the Sapir-Worff hypothesis. For an example of a
constructed language, look at my sig, it's a phrase from one of my own
languages, Carashán, which derives indirectly from PIE.

> I celebrate your
> Gedankexperiment but you must have into account language is a social
> phaenomenon rather than an individual creation.

All you have to do is emulate the society which speaks your language,
thinking out semantic changes and language development.

> However, Daniel: why did you choose celtic or germanic models? it
> is not a
> million times worthier to re-animate IE itself (despite of all of us
> disagree in describing the parent language).

Or, alternatively, derive a daughter language from it, as a way of
understanding it better. I created a Pseudo-Classical language, Aredos,
which was based upon PIE. In fact, my first post to the list was about
something I want to incorporate into ARedos, the dual verbal inflections.
You see, emulation is a great way of learning.

I try not to be an apologist for Conlangers, but a few good resources on the
net are:

Helge Fauskanger's article, "Tolkien's Not-So Secret Vice,
http://www.uib.no/People/hnohf/vice.htm"
Dean Easton's "A Conlang FAQ,
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/9219/conlangfaq.html"

And others, just follow the links.

Dan

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Lo deu nu preca êl'aisún necoui. God prays at noone's altar.

Dan Jones: www.geocities.com/yl_ruil/
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