Lance's Languages

21E™

2015-04-13T12:16:00.000-05:00

Its been too long since my last post but I came across a phonetic writing system which I actually use during the day to write things down which I need or want to remember but others will think it is a code and cannot read it!

The writing system is called 21E™.

21E ™ is a phonetic code for writing secret messages in English devised by Kali Woodward who initially invented it to help his son learn to read. It uses 19 letters from the Latin alphabet plus 27 special symbols for vowels and some consonants. There are three styles of 21E™: print, script and condensed, in which vowels are written above the other symbols/consonants and can be stacked when they occur together.

The condensed script is what I use daily to keep track of important things at work but no one else can understand it. I really like this script because everything is written out phonetically and is easy to write in. It is the first script I have actually been able to use on a regular basis.

This is short and sweet but I hope you enjoy it and maybe you can learn it and write things down, like a journal or diary, and keep it secret!

Norwegian - easy or difficult?

2014-06-11T22:22:00.000-05:00

Norwegian is a North Germanic language which is spoken in Norway. Jeg kan snakke litt norsk. (I can speak some Norwegian.)

Norwegian letter(s)	English sound
d	silent at end of word; and in -ld, -nd, -rd
ig	ee
eg	ay
h	silent before consonants, such as in hv-
j, gj, hj	yuh, as in yes
kj, tj	sh, but softer and more palatalized (as in German)
sj, skj	sh
sl	shl
ki, ky, kei, køy	sh, but softer and more palatalized (as in German)
ski, sky, skei, skøy	sh
gi, gy, gei, gøy	yuh
g + other vowels	guh
sk + other vowels	sk
-egn, -egl, -øgn	g is silent
ng	nasalized, as in singer and not finger
æ	ah as in cat
ø	ay, but with lips rounded
å	aw as in saw

Nouns in Norwegian (Bokmål) have two genders, masculine and neuter, which adjectives must agree with when modifying nouns. Technically there is a third gender, feminine (which Nynorsk retains), but since feminine nouns can be written as masculine nouns, I'm including feminine nouns in the masculine category. There are two indefinite articles that correspond with these genders: en for masculine nouns and et for neuter nouns. In the vocabulary lists, a noun followed by (n) means that it is a neuter noun and it takes the indefinite article et. The majority of nouns in Norwegian are masculine, so they take the indefinite article en.

The only case of nouns that is used in Norwegian is the genitive (showing possession), and it is easily formed by adding an -s to the noun. This is comparable to adding -'s in English
to show possession. However, if the noun already ends in -s, then you add nothing (unlike English where we add -' or -'s). Olavs hus = Olav's house

There are two indefinite articles (corresponding to a and an): en and et. En is used with most of the nouns (words denoting people almost always use en), but you will just have to learn which article goes with which noun. The definitearticle (the) is not a separate word like in most other languages. It is simply a form of the indefinite article attached to the end of the noun. Note that en words ending in a vowel retain that vowel and add an -n instead of adding -en. And et words ending in -e just add -t. Furthermore, the t of et as an indefinite article is pronounced; however, the t is silent in the definite article -et attached to the noun. (For feminine nouns, the indefinite article is ei and the definite article that is attached to the noun is -a. In theory, this gender does still exist in Bokmål, but in practice, it is rarely used and the feminine nouns are inflected like masculine nouns, i.e. add -en instead of -a for the definite form.)

Articles

En words (masculine)				Et words (neuter)
Indefinite		Definite		Indefinite		Definite
en fisk	a fish	fisken	the fish	et vindu	a window	vinduet	the window
en baker	a baker	bakeren	the baker	et barn	a child	barnet	the child
en hage	a garden	hagen	the garden	et hus	a house	huset	the house

Demonstrative Adjectives

masculine	denne dressen	this suit	den dressen	that suit
neuter	dette skjerfet	this scarf	det skjerfet	that scarf
plural	disse skoene	these shoes	de skoene	those shoes

Notice that the noun that follows a demonstrative adjective must have the definite article attached to it.
(The feminine form of demonstratives is identical to the masculine; denne and den.)

Subject & Object Pronouns
jeg I
meg me
du you (singular)
deg you
han he
ham him
hun she
henne her
den it (masc.)
den it
det it (neut.)
det it
man one
man one
vi we
oss us
dere you (plural)
dere you
de they
dem them

Some common phrases.

God morgen Good Morning	Hallo / God dag Hello / Good Day	God kveld Good Evening
God nattGood Night	Ha det bra Goodbye	Hei / Ha det Hi / Bye
Vær så snill Please	(Tusen) Takk Thank you (very much)	Ingen årsak / Vær så god Don't mention it / You're welcome
Ja / Nei Yes / No	Herr / Fru / Frøken Mister / Misses	Velkommen! Welcome!
Hvordan har du det? How are you?	Hvordan går det? How it's going?	Bra / Dårlig Good / Bad
Hva heter du? What's your name?	Jeg heter... My name is... (I am called...)	Hyggelig å treffe deg! Pleased to meet you!
Hvor kommer du fra? Where are you from?	Jeg er fra... I'm from...	Unnskyld Excuse me / Sorry
Hvor bor du? Where do you live?	Jeg bor i... I live in...	Jeg vil gjerne ha... / Jeg skulle gjerne hatt... I would like...
Hvor gammel er du? How old are you?	Jeg er ____ år (gammel). I am ____ years (old).	Jeg vet [ikke.] I [don't] know.
Snakker du norsk? Do you speak Norwegian?	Jeg snakker engelsk. I speak English.	Snakk langsomt Speak slowly
svensk, dansk, fransk, italiensk, spansk, tysk, holländsk, rysk, japansk Swedish, Danish, French, Italian, Spanish, German, Dutch, Russian, Japanese		Hva heter ... på norsk? How do you say ... in Norwegian?
Forstår du? Do you understand?	Jeg forstår [ikke.] I [don't] understand.	Vær så snill å gjenta / Vennligst gjenta Please repeat
Hva er dette? What is this?	Hvor er ... ? Where is ... ?	Hvor mye koster dette? How much does this cost?
Jeg er sulten I'm hungry	Jeg er tørst I'm thirsty	Jeg er trett I'm tired
Jeg er syk I'm sick	Jeg tror [ikke] det I [don't] think so	Kom inn / hit Come in / here
Ta plass Have a seat.	Stans! / Stopp! Stop!	Straks! Immediately! / Soon!
Jeg har gått meg bort I'm lost	Hjelp! Help!	Fare! Danger!
Pass på! Watch out!	Vent litt! Wait a minute!	Hvor langt er det? How far is it?
Det var synd. That's too bad!	Velbekomme! Have a good meal!	Skål! Cheers! (toast)
Lykke til!Good luck!	Jeg elsker deg. I love you.	Jeg savner deg. I miss you.

The one thing most people, myself included, see right away is how similar Norwegian is to English. While Norwegian looks scary with its extra letters ø and å, they are not as difficult as one might think. Yes, it takes some listening to and practice but soon it can become as normal and regular as speaking English.

One thing I really like about Norwegian is the simple way to conjugate words, for example:

Present tense is made by adding an -r to the verb, regardless of who's doing it. That gives us:

ha - to have

jeg har - I have

du har - you have

han har - he has

vi har - we have

etc.

See how easy it is? There are no endings to change depending on who I am talking to, about or for gender. This makes Norwegian one of the easiest languages to learn. So what are you waiting for? Lær norsk! (Learn Norwegian!)

Lingua Franca Nova

2013-11-19T12:56:00.000-06:00

Lingua Franca Nova is somewhat similar to a previous blog post about Occidental Interlingue, both languages are simplistic and have a regular style grammar. I must admit... I do have a preference for Occidental Interlingue however, Lingua Franca Nova (LFN) has more activity on various websites including a Wiki with over 2,000 entries.

According to Lingua-Franca-Nova.net

Lingua Franca Nova es desiniada per es un lingua vera simple, coerente, e fasil aprendeda, per comunica internasional. El ave varios cualia bon:

Lingua Franca Nova was designed to be a particularly simple, consistent, and easy to learn language for international communications. It has a number of positive qualities:

Here is an example of the Lord's prayer in LFN:

La Prea de nos Senior

Nos Padre, ci es en sielo:
Tu nome ta es santa.
Tu renia ta veni.
Tu vole ta es fada,
en tera como en sielo.
Dona oji nos pane dial a nos.
Pardona nos ofendes
como nos pardona los ci ofende nos.
No condui nos a tentia,
ma proteje nos de malia.
Amen.

Sranan Tongo

2013-01-23T13:31:00.001-06:00

Sranan Tongo is a creole language spoken by most people in Suriname. It is the mother tongue of about 100,000 people in Suriname who are descendants of slaves brought from Africa during the colonial period. It is also the lingua franca between different ethnic groups in Suriname. Today many Sranan Tongo speakers also live in the Netherlands.

Features of Sranan Tongo. Sranan is similar to Aukan and Saramaccan. As a creole language it is characterized by simple morphology and a relatively small vocabulary. There is no inflection or declension in the words. Although it is impossible to know for sure how many words there are in Sranan, they number in the several thousand, rather than hundreds of thousands for major world languages. These features make it a relatively easy language to learn.

Odi en grantangi gi luku disi e piki. Hello and thank you very much for looking at this information.

Being a Creole, Sranan Tongo uses words like: e aux.v. indicates that the action of the verb is still in progress or that it repetitive is. Yu no e si taki mi e tnapu dya e wakti yu! Can’t you see that I’m standing here waiting for you? Although I could not find a reason for the use of "e" before the word "si", I am guessing it is like saying: "You not seeing..."

What I like about this language is that it has a much smaller vocabulary when compared to other world languages which allows some ambiguity but also allows the speaker to simply get to the main point and say it.
Another thing I like is how words are formed or put together like the word for Dictionary - Wortubuku literally "Word-Book". The word for Language - Tongo (tongue), Leriman - Teacher; a learned person.

Didibri tesi Yesus fotenti dei langa. The devil tempted Jesus for forty days.

There is an online New Testament version of Sranan Tongo here, you can read and listen to the text.

Fa waka? - What's up? Literally: how's (your) walk ( FA-WA-KA)
Fa i go? - How are you? Literally: how's (it) going? ( FAI-GO )
e go! - it's going! (answer) ( I-GO )
Fa yu tan? - How are you? ( FA-YOU-TAN )
Ala suni bun? - (is) everything well? ( ALLA-SANNY-BOENG )
Mi lobi dati! - I love that! ( ME-LUBY-DATY )
Mi sorri! - I'm sorry! ( ME SORRY )
Omeni wan? - How much is one? (What's the price?)
Mi gwe! - I'm leaving
Mi de go na oso - I'm going home
Mi go na winkri - I'm going to the store
Su-ma na yu? - Who are you? ( SUE-MA-NA-YOU )
Pe yu e go? - Where are you going? ( PAY-YOU-AH-GO )
Pe yu e de? - Where are you? ( PAY-YOU-AH-DAY )
Omany? - How much? ( O-MANY )
Yepi! - Help ( YEPY )
Pe disi presi? - Where's this place? ( PAY DEE-SEE PRACY)
Soot bus mi mus teki? - What bus must I take? ( SOOT BUS ME MUZ TAKY )
Skowtu! - Police! ( SCOW-TWO )
Pe de skoru de? - Where's the school? ( PAY-DAY-SCEW-RUW DAY )
Pe yu de wroko? - Where do you work? ( PAY-YOU-ROCK-O-GI )
Pe mi kan fini wroko? - Where can I find work? ( PAY-ME-KAN-FINY-ROCK-O )
Kantoro - Office

Sousic - a brief introduction

2013-01-12T22:24:00.000-06:00

Dhi es Introduction a Sousic. Sousic es practical literar Lugha. It es practical Lugha pro Literatur.

This is an introduction to Sousic. Sousic is a practical literary language. It is a practical language for literature.

Unlike most "conlangs" which are made to be spoken as an international second language, Sousic is a language for readers. It is designed for optimal ease of reading.

The orthography of Sousic has the following characteristics:

very strict
naturalistic
no diacritics
Latin alphabet
computer friendly
simplified but not simplistic
designed for optimal ease of reading
heavily influenced by English but entirely regular
often recognizable to English and French speakers
several ways often exist for writing the same sound
all words are pronounced exactly as they are written
there is only one correct spelling for any given word
to determine the correct spelling of a word a dictionary must be used

I am excited to see when Sousic is finished and also see what kind of literature is available in this language.
Here is the original blog post. Here is the official site for Sousic for pronunciation and grammar.

'''Gough Whitlam''' [Gof Whitlam] wos Australian Premier Minister khilaal 1972-1975.

Gough Whitlam was the Australian prime minister from 1972 to 1975.

Since there is so much more information available on the website, I will not reiterate everything here, rather I want to direct you to the blog and website where you can learn more about this fascinating language!

Python

2013-01-09T21:17:00.000-06:00

What is Python? It is a computer programming language. While programming languages are strictly for computers (and programmers) and used for actual communication between people but it is nonetheless very interesting to see how a computer language works.

Python is a very simple language and is perfect for beginners yet powerful enough that gaming companies like: Activision Blizzard, Firaxis Games use Python for their games.

So what does Python look like?

1| name = input(" Please tell me your name: ")

2|print("Hello", name)

So what does all this mean? Line 1 is asking for you to type your name that is the "input". After you type your name and press enter the computer will display the following: "Hello (your name)". Now this is a very simple example and as you can see, anyone could write some simple code and start programming.

Here is another example of a simple game:

from pygame import * # Use Pygame's functionality!

ballpic = image.load('ball.png')

done = False

ballx = 0 # Ball position variables

bally = 0

ballxmove = 1

ballymove = 1

init() # Start Pygame

screen = display.set_mode((640, 480)) # Give us a nice window

display.set_caption('Ball game') # And set its title

while done == False:

screen.fill(0) # Fill the screen with black (colour 0)

screen.blit(ballpic, (ballx, bally)) # Draw ball

display.update()

time.delay(1) # Slow it down!

ballx = ballx + ballxmove # Update ball position

bally = bally + ballymove

if ballx > 600: # Ball reached screen edges?

ballxmove = -1

if ballx < 0:

ballxmove = 1

if bally > 440:

ballymove = -1

if bally < 0:

ballymove = 1

for e in event.get(): # Check for ESC pressed

if e.type == KEYUP:

if e.key == K_ESCAPE:

done = True

Here is a (long) short game which can be programmed to play on your computer.

The Dodger game has the player control a small man (which we call the player's character) who must dodge a whole bunch of baddies that fall from the top of the screen. The longer the player can keep dodging the baddies, the higher the score they will get.

import pygame, random, sys

from pygame.locals import *

WINDOWWIDTH = 600

WINDOWHEIGHT = 600

TEXTCOLOR = (255, 255, 255)

BACKGROUNDCOLOR = (0, 0, 0)

FPS = 40

BADDIEMINSIZE = 10

BADDIEMAXSIZE = 40

BADDIEMINSPEED = 1

BADDIEMAXSPEED = 8

ADDNEWBADDIERATE = 6

PLAYERMOVERATE = 5

def terminate():

pygame.quit()

sys.exit()

def waitForPlayerToPressKey():

while True:

for event in pygame.event.get():

if event.type == QUIT:

terminate()

if event.type == KEYDOWN:

if event.key == K_ESCAPE: # pressing escape quits

terminate()

return

def playerHasHitBaddie(playerRect, baddies):

for b in baddies:

if playerRect.colliderect(b['rect']):

return True

return False

def drawText(text, font, surface, x, y):

textobj = font.render(text, 1, TEXTCOLOR)

textrect = textobj.get_rect()

textrect.topleft = (x, y)

surface.blit(textobj, textrect)

# set up pygame, the window, and the mouse cursor

pygame.init()

mainClock = pygame.time.Clock()

windowSurface = pygame.display.set_mode((WINDOWWIDTH, WINDOWHEIGHT))

pygame.display.set_caption('Dodger')

pygame.mouse.set_visible(False)

# set up fonts

font = pygame.font.SysFont(None, 48)

# set up sounds

gameOverSound = pygame.mixer.Sound('gameover.wav')

pygame.mixer.music.load('background.mid')

# set up images

playerImage = pygame.image.load('player.png')

playerRect = playerImage.get_rect()

baddieImage = pygame.image.load('baddie.png')

# show the "Start" screen

drawText('Dodger', font, windowSurface, (WINDOWWIDTH / 3), (WINDOWHEIGHT / 3))

drawText('Press a key to start.', font, windowSurface, (WINDOWWIDTH / 3) - 30, (WINDOWHEIGHT / 3) + 50)

pygame.display.update()

waitForPlayerToPressKey()

topScore = 0

while True:

# set up the start of the game

baddies = []

score = 0

playerRect.topleft = (WINDOWWIDTH / 2, WINDOWHEIGHT - 50)

moveLeft = moveRight = moveUp = moveDown = False

reverseCheat = slowCheat = False

baddieAddCounter = 0

pygame.mixer.music.play(-1, 0.0)

while True: # the game loop runs while the game part is playing

score += 1 # increase score

for event in pygame.event.get():

if event.type == QUIT:

terminate()

if event.type == KEYDOWN:

if event.key == ord('z'):

reverseCheat = True

if event.key == ord('x'):

slowCheat = True

if event.key == K_LEFT or event.key == ord('a'):

moveRight = False

moveLeft = True

if event.key == K_RIGHT or event.key == ord('d'):

moveLeft = False

moveRight = True

if event.key == K_UP or event.key == ord('w'):

moveDown = False

moveUp = True

if event.key == K_DOWN or event.key == ord('s'):

moveUp = False

moveDown = True

if event.type == KEYUP:

if event.key == ord('z'):

reverseCheat = False

score = 0

if event.key == ord('x'):

slowCheat = False

score = 0

if event.key == K_ESCAPE:

terminate()

if event.key == K_LEFT or event.key == ord('a'):

moveLeft = False

if event.key == K_RIGHT or event.key == ord('d'):

moveRight = False

if event.key == K_UP or event.key == ord('w'):

moveUp = False

if event.key == K_DOWN or event.key == ord('s'):

moveDown = False

if event.type == MOUSEMOTION:

# If the mouse moves, move the player where the cursor is.

playerRect.move_ip(event.pos[0] - playerRect.centerx, event.pos[1] - playerRect.centery)

# Add new baddies at the top of the screen, if needed.

if not reverseCheat and not slowCheat:

baddieAddCounter += 1

if baddieAddCounter == ADDNEWBADDIERATE:

baddieAddCounter = 0

baddieSize = random.randint(BADDIEMINSIZE, BADDIEMAXSIZE)

newBaddie = {'rect': pygame.Rect(random.randint(0, WINDOWWIDTH-baddieSize), 0 - baddieSize, baddieSize, baddieSize),

'speed': random.randint(BADDIEMINSPEED, BADDIEMAXSPEED),

'surface':pygame.transform.scale(baddieImage, (baddieSize, baddieSize)),

}

baddies.append(newBaddie)

# Move the player around.

if moveLeft and playerRect.left > 0:

playerRect.move_ip(-1 * PLAYERMOVERATE, 0)

if moveRight and playerRect.right < WINDOWWIDTH:

playerRect.move_ip(PLAYERMOVERATE, 0)

if moveUp and playerRect.top > 0:

playerRect.move_ip(0, -1 * PLAYERMOVERATE)

if moveDown and playerRect.bottom < WINDOWHEIGHT:

playerRect.move_ip(0, PLAYERMOVERATE)

# Move the mouse cursor to match the player.

pygame.mouse.set_pos(playerRect.centerx, playerRect.centery)

# Move the baddies down.

for b in baddies:

if not reverseCheat and not slowCheat:

b['rect'].move_ip(0, b['speed'])

elif reverseCheat:

b['rect'].move_ip(0, -5)

elif slowCheat:

b['rect'].move_ip(0, 1)

# Delete baddies that have fallen past the bottom.

for b in baddies[:]:

if b['rect'].top > WINDOWHEIGHT:

baddies.remove(b)

# Draw the game world on the window.

windowSurface.fill(BACKGROUNDCOLOR)

# Draw the score and top score.

drawText('Score: %s' % (score), font, windowSurface, 10, 0)

drawText('Top Score: %s' % (topScore), font, windowSurface, 10, 40)

# Draw the player's rectangle

windowSurface.blit(playerImage, playerRect)

# Draw each baddie

for b in baddies:

windowSurface.blit(b['surface'], b['rect'])

pygame.display.update()

# Check if any of the baddies have hit the player.

if playerHasHitBaddie(playerRect, baddies):

if score > topScore:

topScore = score # set new top score

break

mainClock.tick(FPS)

# Stop the game and show the "Game Over" screen.

pygame.mixer.music.stop()

gameOverSound.play()

drawText('GAME OVER', font, windowSurface, (WINDOWWIDTH / 3), (WINDOWHEIGHT / 3))

drawText('Press a key to play again.', font, windowSurface, (WINDOWWIDTH / 3) - 80, (WINDOWHEIGHT / 3) + 50)

pygame.display.update()

waitForPlayerToPressKey()

gameOverSound.stop()

_________________________________________________________

While all the code above may seem overwhelming at first, remember there is much to learn before you start coding like this. Programming can be fun and rewarding, so go ahead and give it a try!

Python.org | sthurlow.com | Python the hard way

Sasxsek

2012-12-22T22:34:00.003-06:00

Salam,
This interesting language created by Dana Nutter is simple in design and has its own naturalistic sound to it. Dana thought of everything for this language including: Numbers, dates, time, colors and more. Sasxsek has an SVO word order.

Sasxsek is an artificial (or constructed) language designed to be used as an auxiliary
language which is simple to learn but powerful enough to cover the full range of human
expression.

Alphabet
Sasxsek writing is based on the Roman alphabet, however there is no distinction between
upper or lower case. Text can be written in either all lower case, or all upper case (for
headlines, titles, etc.), but not to be mixed within words and phrases. Generally, headings
and titles should be in upper case while the text of a document is in lower case. There are 6
vowels and 18 consonants for a total of 24 letters. The letters W and Y are not used.

Particles
o = Vocative particle.
ai = Exclamatory particle (!).
e = Subject particle.
a = Object particle

Grammatical and derivational suffixes
-a passive. (ies = eat; iesa = be eaten)
-e performer (fab = build; fabe = builder)
-o manifestation (vid = see; vido = sighting)
-i qualifier (boni = good; well)
-ai female (bovai = cow)
-au male (bovau = bull)

Inflection
Neither nouns nor pronouns inflect for case, number or gender and therefore have only one
form each. Articles do not exist, neither definite (the) nor indefinite (a, an, some).

kitab = book; a book; the book; books; some books; the books.

Case
Noun functions (case) are indicated by word order and the use of prepositions.
mo don kitab fu lo.
I (subject) give book (object) to he (indirect object).
I gave him a book. / I gave a book to him.

mo don kitab fu so mu kitabuk.
I (subject) give book (object) to this (indirect object) from libarary.
I gave him a book from the library.

The above information is just a tiny amount of the 46 page document which explains grammar in much greater detail. Also check out the 114 page dictionary he has available. Dana also has several other conlangs on his site but most are under construction and being updated at the time of this writing.

Although there are many International Auxiliary Languages (IAL's) such as Esperanto, Interlingue, Folkspraak, Slovianto and others, Sasxsek has some great potential, I think, because of its mixture of being an a-priori and a-posteriori (in my opinion) because it uses some vocabulary which is "international" and understood immediately and also creates its own vocabulary. Another feature I like is the fact that countries and languages are pronounced according to the local language, for example:
iqglis = English, haniu = Chinese, misr = Egypt.

At first glance the language looks difficult but once you really look at it and study it, even a little, I believe you will enjoy it as much as I do!

Hedon! (Enjoy!)

Kah Language

2012-12-14T06:45:00.002-06:00

Mai ninku! Good morning!

Kah is an artificial language which was designed to be very easy to learn, easy to master and easy to pronounce.
Having taken a look at this interesting language I am not 100% in agreement that it is easy to learn but the basic grammar is easy enough.

Weka Kah si. I speak a little Kah.

Here are the basic highlights of Kah:

Kah can be described rather quickly with the following list of features:

Feature Description Example

SVO Subject precedes the verb precedes the object Huan nenju shukiJuan     like candy
Juan likes candy

N Mod Nouns are followed by their modifiers sunda yam sun yebike     red two that
those two red bikes

topicalization Constituents which are the topic of the phrase are moved to the front shuki Huan nenjucandy juan   like
it is candy Juan likes

pro-drop Pronouns functioning as subject or object rarely are expressed joknow
I know

oligosynthetic The lexicon consists of several hundred roots which form new words by compounding ne + ni = nenibird + vehicle =  airplane

no inflection Words have one form and take no morphemes kaiko - book, books
kaiko wi - many books
kaiko yem - three books

serial verbs Subjects can have more than one verb with different objects each. yu za tuya tu sekishe take knife cut meat
she cut the meat with a knife

Possd Possr Possessed items precede the possessor linked by a marker kwando na Huanschool   of juan
Juan's school

The Kah website offers a 78 page of detailed grammar here.

Here is the Babel text in Kah:

Tau yula kwambe le yuka kwa
Now the whole world had one language

ai aka nyoshi.
and a common speech.

Eta uyu nudora tinuno,
As men moved eastward,

henyun huan la Shinaran ai nudora lai.
they found a plain in Shinar and settled there

Yunyo ka noyom:
They said to each other:

'Lo, om jam duzu ai shanzu tuntu.'
'Come, let's make bricks and bake them thouroughly,'

Za duzu yompo adu, ai toisau yompo doshum.
They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar.

Tai ka: 'Lo, om jando walonyo dola
Then they said: 'Come, let us build ourselves a city

ya le wendo ya deche tilan,
with a tower that reaches to the heavens,

eno jam walonyo senka
so that we make a name for ourselves

ai eno al nong membe wanyo
and not be scattered

tunu kuchi na yula kwambe,'
over the face of the whole earth,'

Esto Tifa vunu
But the Lord came down

eno yun dola ai wendo be uyu jando ya.
to see the city and the tower that the men were building.

Tifa ka: 'Tonto shi unyo kwa
The Lord said: 'If as one people

la kaza yuka kwashi,
speaking the same language

yunyo nuku jam awau,
they have begun to do this,

tontoye yayang be yunyo jankuren jam ya teneng tos yunyo.
then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.

Lo, om vunu ai moren yuka na yunyo.
Come, let us go down and confuse their language

eno nong denu jebo noyom,'
so they will not understand each other,'

Echu Tifa membe yunyo chu lai tunu yula kwambe,
So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth,

ai yunyo bas jando dola.
and they stopped building the city.

Amun chumunye en al kaka Babal --
That is why it was called Babel --

chumun lai Tifa moren yuka na yula kwambe.
because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world.

Chu lai Tifa membe yunyo tunu kuchi na yula kwambe.
From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

To me, Kah looks like a language which is totally unique, unlike Esperanto or Occidental which are based on Romance languages or Slovianto which is based on Slavic languages. Kah looks like something Tribal Afrika, over all, I like Kah but I still don't know how "easy" it is to learn or how useful it will be.

However it is a fun language to look at and study simply for the fun and enjoyment of language.

Om wayun (good bye)

Whistling languages

2012-12-05T14:54:00.003-06:00

There are approximately 70 languages throughout the world where whistling is the means of communication.
Wikipedia gives a listing of languages here.

Whistling Languages in Kuskoy Turkey YouTube.

Here is a longer example of Gomera Whistling:

Solresol is a musical language created by François Sudre beginning in 1827 the book Langue musicale universelle was published after his death in 1866 Solresol words are made up of from one to five syllables or notes. Each of these may be one of only seven basic phonemes, which may in turn be accented or lengthened. There is another phoneme, silence, which is used to separate words: words cannot be run together as they are in English.

More information about Solresol can be found here.

Bahasa Indonesia

2012-12-02T09:47:00.001-06:00

Compared to European languages, Indonesian has a strikingly small use of grammatically gendered words; the same word is used for he and she or for his and her. Most of the words that refer to people (family terms, professions, etc.) have a form that does not distinguish between the sexes; for example, adik can both refer to a (younger) brother or sister; no distinction is made between girlfriend and boyfriend. In order to specify gender, an adjective has to be added: adik laki-laki corresponds to brother but really means male younger sibling. There is no word like the English man that can refer both to a male person and to a human being in general.

Note: There are some words that are gendered, for instance putri means daughter, and putra means son; words like these are usually absorbed from other languages (in these cases, from Sanskrit through the Old Javanese language). In Jakarta and some other areas, abang may be used for older brother; kakak (older sibling) is then used to mean older sister.

Plurals are expressed by means of reduplication, but only when the plural is not implied by the context. Thus person is orang, and people is orang-orang, but one thousand people is seribu orang, as the numeral makes it unnecessary to mark the plural form. (Reduplication has many other functions, however).

There are two forms of we, depending on whether you are including the person being talked to.

The basic word order is SVO. Verbs are not inflected for person or number, and there are no tenses; tense is denoted by time adverbs (such as yesterday) or by other tense indicators, such as sudah, meaning already. On the other hand, there is a complex system of verb affixes to render nuances of meaning and denote active-passive voices. Such affixes include prefixes, infixes, suffixes, and their combinations; all of which are often ignored in daily conversations.

Vowles

a
like 'a' in "father"
e
like 'e' in "vowel"
é
like 'e' in "bed", usually the difference between a schwa and an e is not indicated in writing
i (ie, j)
like 'i' in "thin"
o
like 'ow' in "low", in open positions or like 'o' in "top" in close positions
u (oe)
like 'oo' in "hoop", in open positions or like 'o' in “hope” in close positions

Consonants

b
like 'b' in "bed"
bh
like 'b' in "bed", only in Sanskrit borrowings
c (ch, tj)
like 'ch' in "China"
d
like 'd' in "dog"
dh
like 'd' in "dog", only in Sanskrit borrowings
f
like 'ph' in "phone"
g
like 'g' in "go"
h
like 'h' in "help"
j (dj)
like 'dg' in "edge"
k
like 'c' in "cat", often silent at the end of a word
kh (ch)
like 'ch' in "loch"
l
like 'l' in "love"
m
like 'm' in "mother"
n
like 'n' in "nice"
ng
like 'ng' in "sing"
ny
like 'ny' in "canyon"
p
like 'p' in "pig"
q
like 'q' in "quest" (with "u", almost always, only in Arabic borrowings)
r
like 'rr' in Spanish "perro"
s
like 'ss' in "hiss"
sy (sj)
like 'sh' in "sheep"
t
like 't' in "top"
v
like 'ph' in "phone"
w
like 'w' in "weight"
x
like 'cks' in "kicks"
y (j)
like 'y' in "yes"
z
like 's' in "hiss", like 'z' in "haze", like 'dg' in "edge"

Dipthongs

ai
like 'ay' in "say"
au
like 'ow' in "cow"
oi
like 'oy' in "boy"

Basic phrases

Hello.
Halo. (HUH-lo)
Hello. (informal)
He. (Hey)
How are you?
Apa kabar? (AH-pAh KAH-bar?)
Fine, thank you.
Baik, terima kasih. (BAYK, TREE-muh KUS-see)

What is your name?
Namanya siapa? (NUM-muh-nyuh shah-puh?)
My name is ______ .
Nama saya ______ . (NUM-MUH suh-yuh _____ .)
Nice to meet you.
Senang bertemu anda. (SNUNG burr-tuh-moo UN-duh)
Please.
Silakan. (see-LUH-kunn)
Please. (request)
Tolong. (TOH-long)

Thank you.
Terima kasih.
You're welcome.
Terima kasih kembali.
Yes.
Ya. (EEYUH)
No.
Tidak. (TEE-duh), Tak (TAH)

Excuse me. (getting attention)
Maaf. (MUH-UFF)
Excuse me. (begging pardon)
Maaf, permisi.
I'm sorry.
Maaf.
Goodbye
Selamat tinggal.
Goodbye (informal)
Dadah. (DUH-DUH)

I can't speak Indonesian [well].
Saya tidak bisa berbahasa Indonesia [dengan baik].
Do you speak English?
Bisa bahasa Inggris?
Is there someone here who speaks English?
Ada orang yang bisa bahasa Inggris?
Help!
Tolong!
Look out!
Hati-hati!

Good morning.
Selamat pagi. (slum-mut PUH-GUEE)
Good afternoon.
Selamat siang.
Good evening.
Selamat sore.
Good night.
Selamat malam.
Good night (to sleep)
Selamat tidur.
I don't understand.
Saya tidak mengerti.
Where is the toilet?
Di mana toiletnya? (DEE muh-nuh TOY-leht-nyuh?)

Bahasa Indonesia is phonetic and easy to pronounce and since it does not change for gender or case it is easy to remember the words since they don't change or conjugate like Spanish does, for example.

Over all, I like Bahasa Indonesia and would love to learn this language better. Bahasa Indonesia is spoken by approximately 77 Million people or 1.16% of the worlds population.

Polyglot

2012-11-23T08:12:00.002-06:00

According to Wikipedia: Polyglotism is the ability to speak several languages with a high degree of proficiency. There is no consensus on exactly how many languages a person has to speak to be a polyglot. One could say "four or more", since speakers of two or three languages are commonly called bilingual and trilingual, respectively. The term multilingual is similar.
Linguist Richard Hudson uses the term "hyperpolyglot" for a person who can speak six or more languages fluently.

Fluent in 3 months is a website run by Benny the Irish Polyglot and has lots of information about various languages, Benny talks about different languages whats easy, whats difficult. Benny also offers the Speak from Day One video course + Language Hacking Guide which is his own language learning course. (Definitely worth checking out!) He also has a Youtube page where you can hear Benny talking in the different languages he knows.

PageF30 is another interesting website I like to peruse now and then in the language section.

Here is a video I just found of a 16 year old boy who can speak 20 languages! I am so jealous, I love languages very much (hence this blog) currently I can speak some basic Esperanto and I am a little better than basic Russian I am also dabbling with Afrikaans and Indonesian Bahasa.

A few sites worth checking out are:

internetpolyglot.com

Polyglot Club

The Polyglot Dream

Speaking Adventure

How To Learn Any Language

So here is to learning a new language or two or three...

Square Word Calligraphy...

2012-11-17T22:32:00.000-06:00

The Square Word Calligraphy system presented on this page and developed by Dr. David B. Kelley in 2012 is a new version of the original Square Word Calligraphy (英文方块字) system developed in 1994 by the Chinese artist, Xu Bing (徐冰).

Xu Bing attempted to fuse written English and written Chinese. He designed a system whereby English words are written in the format of a square, so as to resemble the consistent size of all Chinese characters. To achieve this, he utilized the fact that some of the 214 different radicals (component parts) used to write Chinese characters also resemble the letters in the Roman alphabet. Based on the similarities of certain of the Chinese radicals and the Roman alphabet, Xu Bing created his own Sino-Roman alphabet. Using those Sino-Roman symbols, he began to write English words by combining the letters of individual English words into squares, with all the letters of any English word present, but formatted into a square shape. Modern Korean writing does this with the 24 letters of the Hangul alphabet. The result is a Chinese-like grouping of symbols into single "characters" (or English "words") of the same size.

David's version of Square Word Calligraphy differs from the original system by creating a different set of symbols from the 214 radicals, thus forming a different Sino-Roman alphabet. David's alphabet uses different symbols because he thought that ten of Xu Bing's original Sino-Roman alphabetic symbols could be improved by replacing them with more Chinese-like ones, specifically the symbols for "A", "D", "E", "H", "K', "M", "Q", "R", "V" and "Z". David's goal is to aim for a more consistently Chinese-like appearance to SWC words.

Both Xu Bing's and David's versions initially appear indecipherable to English speakers; however, once they see the alphabet chart, they can read everything easily. Yet, many people say they feel really strange because of the sudden complete awareness of comprehension, after being so sure it was unreadable. Use the Sino-Roman alphabet chart below and see for yourself whether you can read the example text, and how quickly.

Notable features

Type of writing system: alphabet
Direction of writing words: left to right in horizontal or vertical lines. The letters do not follow one another linearly but are fitted together to form a square shape.
Used to write: English or any language employing the Roman alphabet.

Here is an example text.

Transliteration

Square Word Calligraphy by David B Kelley

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

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.

Links

Information about Xu Bing and his calligraphy

http://www.xubing.com

http://www.xubing.com/index.php/site/texts/xu_bings_square_work_calligraphy/

http://www.xubing.com/index.php/site/projects/year/1994/square_calligraphy_classroom

David's website

http://mysite.verizon.net/dbkelley1/

Slovianto

2012-11-10T17:50:00.002-06:00

Ok, I know I recently did a post about a Slavic/Russian conlang but this one is really worth looking at because it allows a very simplistic form, an intermediate form and advanced form of the language.

«Slovianto» is a highly simplified form of Interslavic, mostly intended for use by non-Slavic people who want to be able to express themselves at the very basic level...

So begins the opening words for the International Slavic Language: Medžuslovjanski jezyk - this language follows a simple, primitive, pidginesque grammar model that is characterized by regularity, minimalism and the absence of anything that is not really needed on the most basic level of communication. It has been constructed in such way that it does not look or sound too awkward to Slavic speakers, but rather like the kind of language used by children.

The working title Slovianto is a portmanteau word for „Slavic Esperanto”. This name, albeit somewhat tongue-in-cheek, refers to the simplicity of Slovianto: it has no gender, no cases, no aspect, little conjugation and no irregularity. Yet, that is where the similarity to Esperanto ends, because Slovianto's means of simplification are in fact far more similar to those used by Interlingua.

NOUNS:

Nouns can have the endings -Ø (= consonant), -a, -o and -e. In the Slavic languages they convey information about gender and declension, but in Slovianto gender doesn't play a role. All you need to know is that the plural is formed by replacing the final vowel by -i: muž - muži "man", žena - ženi "woman", jednost - jednosti "unit(y)", slovo - slovi "word". To make it feel a bit more natural, nouns on -o/-e (neuter nouns in Slavic) can have the plural -a instead of -i: slovo - slova.

When a word ends in a consonant, it can happen that the vowel preceding it dropped in the plural: pes - psi "dog", spisok - spiski "list". This is of course not mandatory.

Adjectives

Adjectives always have the ending -i. They are not inflected and should be placed before the noun.

An adjective can be made into an adverb by substituting -i with the ending -o: dobri "good" - dobro "well".

Adjectives are compared by means of the words više- (more), mene- (less), naj- (most) and najmene- (least). These words can best be connected to the adjective with a hyphen: dobri "good" - više-dobri "better" - naj-dobri "best", etc.

Pronouns

_______________________________________________________________________

Numerals

The cardinal numbers are:

1-10: jedin, dva, tri, četiri, pet, šest, sedm, osm, devet, deset.
The "-teens" (11-19) are formed by adding -nast: jedinnast, "11", dvanast "12"...
The "-ties" (20, 30... 90) are formed by adding -deset: dvadeset "20", trideset "30"...
The "-hundreds" (200, 300... 900) are formed by adding -sto: dvasto "200", tristo "300"...
Higher numbers: tiseč "1,000", milion "1,000,000", miliard "1,000,000,000".

Combinations of these are always made from high to low: pet-tiseč šeststo sedmdeset osm "5678".

Ordinal numbers are formed by adding -i to the corresponding cardinal number, except for the following: prvi "1st", drugi "2nd", treti "3rd", četvrti "4th", sotni or stoti "100th", tisečni "1000th".

Verbs

Verbs in Slovianto are conjugated for three persons, but not for number. There are three tenses: present tense, past tense and future tense. Furthermore, there are participles, imperatives and verbal nouns. Aspect does not play a role; from the dictionary we take the simplest form (usually the perfective form when a verb has a prefix and the imperfective form when it does not).

There is only one regular conjugation. Irregularity is allowed only when it really cannot be avoided. Endings are unitary, so that every form will be instantly recognisable.

Stem
The stem is formed by removing the ending -ti from the infinitive.

infinitive	dela-ti	prosi-ti	nes-ti
ja, mi	delam	prosim	nesem
ti vi	delaš delate	prosiš prosite	neseš nesete
on/ona/ono, oni	delat	prosit	neset

The present tense can be obtained by using the ending -t to the stem. If the present tense stem ends in a consonant, -e- is inserted between the stem and the ending. For example: ja delat "I do", vi prosit "you ask", oni kovat "they forge".

To the Slavic ear, however, this sounds clumsy. To prevent that from happening, it would be worth the effort to use -t only in the third person, and learn two additional endings: -m in the first person (singular and plural) and -te in the second person. A confidential second person (for family, friends, children etc.) the personal pronoun ti can be used, in which case the ending is -š instead of -te.

Past Tense
The past tense in formed by replacing the -ti of the infinitive by the ending -l (singular) or -li (plural).Present Tense

infinitive	dela-ti	prosi-ti	nes-ti
ja, ti, on/ona/ono	delal	prosil	nesl
mi, vi, oni	delali	prosili	nesli

Future Tense:

The future tense is formed by combining the future tense of the verb biti „to be” with the infinitive. The forms are the same as if a verb *bud-ti were conjugated in the present tense: ja budem delati, vi budete delati, on budet delati, etc.

Conditional:
The conditional is formed by adding the particle bi to the past tense: ja bi delal „I would do/I would have done”.

Imperative: The imperative has the endings -jte for the second person and -jmo for the first person, placed after the stem. If the stem ends in a consonant, -i- is inserted.

Participle The past passive participle is created by adding -ni to the infinitive stem: dela-ni "done". If the stem ends in -i- or consonant, then add -e- between the stem and the ending: govori-eni "spoken".

infinitive	dela-ti	prosi-ti	nes-ti
past passive	delani	prosieni	neseni

The passive voice
The passive voice is created as in English, by combining a form of the verb biti „to be” with the past passive participle:

ja jesm neseni „I am being carried”
ja bil neseni „I was being carried, I have been carried”
ja budem neseni „I will be carried”
ja bil bi neseni „I would be carried, I would have been carried”
The verb biti „to be”
The only irregular verb in Slovianto is biti "to be". It is conjugated as follows:

present tense: jes-: ja/mi jesm "I am/we are", vi jeste "you are", on/ona/ono/oni jest "he/she/it is, they are"
past tense: bil-: ja bil "I was, we were", mi bili "we were", ...
future tense: bud-: ja/mi budem "I/we will be", vi budete "you will be", on/ona/ono/oni budet "he/she/it/they will be"
conditional: bi bil-: ja bi bil "I would be/would have been", mi bi bili "we..."
imperative: bud-: budte "be!", budmo "let's be!"

Syntax

The preferred word order is subject – verb – object. It isn't mandatory, but because of the lack of cases in Slovianto any other word order might easily make a sentence unclear or ambiguous. Word order can be altered more easily when the subject or object of the sentence is a personal pronoun or a pronoun like kto, because they have separate accusative forms, so the meaning is always clear.

There are two types of questions:

Yes-no questions differ from normal indicative sentences only by intonation. Otec kupil kniga "Father has bought a book". Otec kupil kniga? "Has father bought a book?"
Other questions start with an interrogative pronoun or adverb. kotore kniga kupil otec? "Which book has father bought?", Gde otec kupil te kniga? "Where did father buy that book?

The easiest way for expressing possession (expressed by most natural Slavic languages with the genitive) is simply placing the possessor before the possessed: moj otec kniga "my father's book". When this is not clear enough, use the preposition od "from, of": kniga od moj otec.

Likewise, you don't have to use any special accessories for the indirect object (the Slavic languages use the dative): Dajte moj otec to kniga "Give that book to my father". Whenever this is not clear enough, use the preposition k "to": Dajte te kniga k moj otec.

Where the Slavic languages use the instrumental, you can use s "with" or posredstvom "by means of": Ja udaril svoj otec s to kniga "I hit my father with that book".

Example

Babel text

I celi zemja imal jedin jezik i podobni slova. Ale kogda ludi premestili se iz vozhod, oni nahodili ravnina v kraj Šinar i tam osadili se. I oni govorili jedin k drugi: "Hodijte, delajmo cegli i dobro palijmo ih!" I cegli služili dla ih kak kameni, a smola služila dla ih kak cement. I oni govorili: "Hodijte, budovajmo grad i veža, kotori budet dosegati do nebo, i delajmo dla sebe imeno, abi mi ne razsipali se na celi zemja."
Togda Bog shodil v dol, abi videti grad i veža, kotori deti od ludi budovali. I Bog govoril: "Vidijte! Jedin narod i jedin jezik dla vsi, a vidijte čo oni načeli delati. I sejčas ničo ne budet dla ih nemožlivi, čo oni ne hoteli bi delati. Vidijte! Mi shodim i razmešim ih jezik, abi oni ne razumeli se."
I Bog razsipal ih na celi zemja, a oni obstanovili budovati grad. Za to on nazivat se Babel, za to že tam Bog razmešil jezik od celi zemja i odtudi Bog razsipal ih na celi zemja.

И цели земја имал једин језик и подобни слова. Але когда луди преместили се из возход, они находили равнина в крај Шинар и там осадили се. И они говорили једин к други: "Ходијте, делајмо цегли и добро палијмо их!" И цегли служили дла их как камени, а смола служила дла их как цемент. И они говорили: "Ходијте, будовајмо град и вежа, котори будет досегати до небо, и делајмо дла себе имено, аби ми не разсипали се на цели земја."
Тогда Бог сходил в дол, аби видети град и вежа, котори дети од луди будовали. И Бог говорил: "Видијте! Једин народ и једин језик дла вси, а видијте чо они начели делати. И сејчас ничо не будет дла их неможливи, чо они не хотели би делати. Видијте! Ми сходим и размешим их језик, аби они не разумели се."
И Бог разсипал их на цели земја, а они обстановили будовати град. За то он називат се Бабел, за то же там Бог размешил језик од цели земја и одтуди Бог

You can discover more about this beautifully made InterSlavic language as well as the other 2 forms, Intermediate and Advanced, by going to the official website at: Interslavic

Newspaper online in Interslavic!

Interslavic Dictionary

Multilingua Mutterings

Blissymbolics

2012-11-05T13:32:00.002-06:00

Welcome to Blissymbolics Communication International

Blissymbolics is a symbolic, graphical language that is currently composed of close to 4,500 authorized symbols - or Blisswords. Bliss characters are semantically based and can be combined and recombined in endless ways to create new Blisswords. Blisswords can in turn be sequenced to form many types of sentences, and express many grammatical capabilities. Simple shapes are used to keep the symbols easy and fast to draw.

There is a grammar PDF here,

Blissymbolics is a communication system originally developed by Charles K. Bliss (1897-1985) for the purpose of international communication. It was first applied to the communication of children with physical disabilities by an interdisciplinary team led by Shirley McNaughton at the Ontario Crippled Children's Centre (now the Bloorview MacMillan Centre) in 1971.

The Blissymbolics language is currently composed of over 4,000 graphic symbols. Each symbol or Bliss-word is composed of one or more Bliss-characters which can be combined and recombined in endless ways to create new symbols. Bliss-words can be sequenced to form many types of sentences and express many grammatical capabilities. Simple shapes are used to keep the symbols easy and fast to draw and because both abstract and concrete levels of concepts can be represented, Blissymbolics can be applied both to children and adults and are appropriate for persons with a wide range of intellectual abilities.

Blissymbols:

Are quick and easy to learn
Can be used at a pre-reading level but are sophisticated enough to allow expression of thoughts, ideas and feelings

Can be expanded as ability grows

There is a complete dictionary here. What language would be complete without a learning course, found here.

Here are some pictures of Bliss with translations:

Are you here to teach or to learn?

We learn by teaching.

I think, therefor I am.

I will come to your house.

It does not matter what language we say this in, the picture remains the same:

Я приду в ваш дом. Ես կգամ ձեր տուն. אני אבוא לבית שלך. وسوف يأتي إلى منزلك.

Mi venos al via domo. 당신 집에 올 것이다. Saya akan datang ke rumah Anda.

Ek sal na jou huis toe kom. Beidh mé ag teacht ar do theach. მე მოვა თქვენს სახლში.

Tôi sẽ đến nhà bạn. நான் உங்கள் வீட்டிற்கு வருவேன். Θα έρθει στο σπίτι σας.

I think you get the idea! :)

What better form of International Communication is there than a pictorial language? Everyone can easily understand a picture and once it is understood, they can communicate with each other using pictures rather than trying to learn another language.

Imagine if millions of people knew this, or a similar pictorial language, and could easily communicate with each other without the need of a translator!

Omniglot has a short article explaining about Blissymbolics also.

Occidental Interlingue

2012-11-01T22:04:00.001-05:00

So, after my previous post about Esperanto I was asked if I knew about Occidental also known as Interlingue (Note the "e" at the end of the word not to be confused with Interlingua with an "a" at the end word, a separate language)

Edgar de Wahl was born on 11th August 1867 in Olwiopol (Ukraine) He studied Volapük and Esperanto
In 1894 he looked into a naturalistic solution of the problem and collaborated in 1906-7 with Rosenberger, the then president of the Akademi Internasional de lingu universal. His idea was the construction of an auxiliary language without submitting a complete language. The principal ideas in his memorandum were,

that none of the existing systems is satisfactory;
that the international language to be constructed, be founded on the international linguistic material;
that such project should have its own system of word formation, i.e., really international words should be obtained through a number of rules formulated for that purpose;
that it should possess a grammar which produces no unnatural forms, i.e., forms deviating from the ethnic languages; and
that it should possess an international orthography.

These are the ideas to which de Wahl imparted in his new language idea:

It should be an organic, autonomous entity, living and growing according to its own laws, harmonizing and assimilating new elements, and not be a conglomeration of different words put together at random.
For our special purpose it should be based on the international forms common to the European languages in phonetics, spelling, and mode of expression.

To further its introduction it should also have the following qualities,

it should be comprehensible at first sight and without previous instruction to all civilized Europeans,
it should not shock the public through incomprehensible forms but should have the aspect of an almost natural language, and
to secure adoption and use it should not only be easy to read, but also easy for practical use, and easy in its grammatical structure.

Since 1922 the theories of the Wahl have attracted serious minds and have influenced Jespersen and his Novial to some extent. IALA (The international Auxiliary Language Association) has classified it as one of the systems of demonstrated usefulness.

Below is a concise but short grammar of Occidental:

2. Grammar

The alphabet comprises 26 letters, y fulfilling a double rфle as consonant and vowel. The vowels are a [pr. as in father], e [fкte], i [machine], o [most], u [rule], y [F u, or D ь]. The 21 consonants are b, c, d, f, g, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, x, y, z. Several consonants have two pronunciations [c hard as "k" before a, o, u, or any consonant; soft as "ts" before e, i, y; g hard as in gold before a, o, u, or any consonant, soft as in general before e, i, y; t as "ts" before ie, ia, io].

The stress falls on the vowel before the last consonant. The plural endings [-(e)s] and the adverbial endings [-bil, -ic, -im, - ul, -um] remain unstressed. Further exceptions not falling under any of these rules are marked with the accent [ґ, or `]. The length of the vowels varies. Unstressed syllables have the short vowel [a in fan, e in bend, i in fit, o in drop, u in full]. Stressed vowels followed by two consonants are short. The rest are long except in some short words, mainly prepositions.

Occidental has four diphthongs, au, ay, ey, oy, as well as eu in D ц.

The definite article is li for all genders and numbers. The indefinite article is un; lu may be used for as an article if an adjective is used alone as an abstract conception.

The singular noun has no specific grammatical ending. The plural is formed by adding -s to the words ending in vowels, or in -c, -g, -um; -es to words ending in other consonants. An exception, however, is -e, -o, -a, respectively used to distinguish neuter, masculine, and feminine [camarad/e, /o, /a].

The pronouns are yo, tu, Vu, il, illa, it; noi, vu, ili. the reflexive pronoun is se.

The possessive pronouns are mi, tu(i), su; nor, vor, lor.

The verb in the infinitive ends in -r [ama/r]. The present indicative is obtained by removing the infinitive ending [yo ama, tu ama, il ama].

The imperative form is the same as the present indicative, followed by a mark of exclamation [!]. The composite imperative is formed with ples plus the infinitive [audi! ples audir].

The past tense is obtained by adding -t to the present tense [yo ama/t].

The future tense is formed by employing the auxiliary va where English used either "shall" or "will" [yo va ear = I shall go].

The conditional is formed by employing the auxiliary vell where English used either "should" or "would" [illa vell ear si yo vell consentir = she would go if I should consent].

The optative is distinguished from the imperative by using mey with the infinitive [que il mey trovar it = that he may find it]. The hortative is formed with the word lass and the infinitive [lass nos ear in li citй].

Two auxiliary verbs are used, ha/r (an abbreviation of have/r), and esse/r, for the latter the abbreviated form es as an auxiliary and for the present tense.

The perfect and pluperfect are formed by the auxiliary verbs preceding the past participle [yo ha amat = I have loved].

The passive voice is formed with the verb esse/r [yo es vocat, yo es videt = I am seen; yo esset videt = I was seen].

The conjugation of esse/r = to be is:

present tense past tense future tense

yo es (esse) yo esset yo va esser

tu (Vu) es (esse) tu (Vu) esset tu (Vu) va esser

il es (esse) il esset il va esser

illa (or ella) es (esse) illa (or ella) esset illa (or ella) va esser

it es (esse) it esset it va esser

noi es (esse) noi esset noi va esser

vu es (esse) vu esset vu va esser

ili es (esse) ili esset ili va esser

The present participle is essent; the past and passive participle is esset.

The adjectives are invariable in number and gender [litt, bon, micri].

The adverbs have no one grammatical ending. Some adjectives may be used as adverbs without alteration [tу esset bon fat = that was well done]. The adverbial endings -men, -li, -ъ may be used, but a number of adverbs have no particular grammatical ending.

The cardinal numbers are: un, du, tri, quar, quin, six, sett, ott, nin, deci, deci-ъn or ъundeci, deci-dъ or dъdeci; duant = 20, triant, quarant; cent, ducent, sixcent, etc.

The ordinal numbers are formed by the use of the suffix -esim [unesim, duesim, etc.].

The degrees of comparison are bon, plu bon, max bon; bell, minu bell, minim bell.

In word derivation Occidental accepts both the principle of direct and indirect derivation. Direct derivation is limited to certain cases which are indicated in the complete list of affixes below. For direct derivation we must apply the three rules of the Wahl. To form nouns from verbal roots we detach the infinitive -r or -e/r [vid, vid-e/r] to obtain the perfect stem.

Rule 1: If, after removing the grammatical ending [-r, -e/r] the stem ends in a vowel, add -t or change -y into -t [crea/r, crea/t, crea/t/or; atiny-e/r, atin/t, atin/t/ion].

Rule 2: If the final consonant of the stem should be either d or r, the letters are changed into -s [decide/r, deci/s, deci/s/ion].

Rule 3: In all other cases, except those especially cited below, the removal of the infinitive -r (or -er gives the required perfect stem [duct/e/r, duct-, duct/ion]. The six exceptions are cede/r, perfect stem cess-; sede/r, sess-; move/r, mot-; tene/r, tent-; verte/r, vers-; veni/r, vent-.

To form verbs from nouns and adjectives, we remove the endings and obtain the perfect stem. By adding -r or -er we will obtain, in most cases, the verb [decora/t/ion, decora/t, decora/r].

Syntax: The ordinary word order is subject-verb-object. [li monument es plazzat avan li palazzo = the monument is (placed) in front of the palace]. Short adjectives generally precede the noun [un bon idй = a good idea]; long adjectives may follow the noun [li lingue international = the international language]. The interrogative phrase begins with esque [esque vu va promenar? = are you going to walk?] or any other interrogative pronoun or adverb [qui, quo, quande]. Inversion may be used without the interrogative esque [have vu li libre? = have you the book?]. The negation is indicated by the word ne [il ne ha fat it = he has not done it].

Here are some examples of Occidental Interlingue:

Li material civilisation, li scientie, e mem li arte unifica se plu e plu. Li cultivat europano senti se quasi in hem in omni landes queles have europan civilisation, it es, plu e plu, in li tot munde. Hodie presc omni states guerrea per li sam armes. Sin cessa li medies de intercommunication ameliora se, e in consecuentie de to li terra sembla diminuer se. Un Parisano es nu plu proxim a un angleso o a un germano quam il esset ante cent annus a un paisano frances.

Material civilization, science, and even art unify themselves more and more. The educated European feels himself almost at home in all lands that have European civilization, that is, more and more, in the entire world. Today almost all states war with the same armaments. Without pause the modes of intercommunication improve, and in consequence from that the world seems to decrease. A Parisian is now closer to an Englishman or a German than he was a hundred years before to a French peasant.

Hodíe yo labora ci.

Today I work here.

Yer yo ha arivat.

Yesterday I have arrived.

Yo arivat per li tren de Paris, u yo hat laborat antey.

I arrived by the train from Paris, where I had worked before.

Deman yo va departer per auto pos har finit mi labor.

Tomorrow I will depart by car after having finished my work.

Yo vell restar plu long, ma on telegrafat me: Veni tam bentost quam possibil! Dunc lass nos finir nor maxim urgent labores.

I would rest longer, but one telegraphed me: Come as quick as possible! So let us finish our most urgent work.

Li altri labores queles yo ancor vell har devet far, yo va dever far plu tard; ples excusar to.

The other work that I still would have done, I will have to do later; please excuse that.

Quande yo fa bon mi labores, yo es estimat e yo va esser bon payat.

When I do my work well I am appreciated and I will be well-paid.

In Paris yo hat esset honorat per un special premie. To mey suficer.

In Paris I had been honoured by a special prize. That may suffice.

A concise grammar can be found here, a Yahoo group exists here and there is even a wikipedia in Occidental!

Rusanto: The Simplified Russian

2012-10-29T14:41:00.002-05:00

Wow, after writing my last blog post my site was picked up by another Esperantist blogger who locates lists of blogs in Esperanto. My blog is listed as number 2 currently and can be found here.

This post is about Rusanto, a simplified form of Russian with an Esperanto-like grammar. I provided a link to the site but the site is very small (only 1 page) but does have a forum and starter dictionary, its well worth checking out!

NOUNS		Apart from the plural form, nouns don't change. Exception: object or direction. (The object ending can be left out if object follows subject or if object is preceded by a preposition)
noun plural		-(n)i
object / direction (noun singular)		-(u)m
object / direction (noun plural)		-(ni)m

BASIC WORDS		root + ending:
adverbs		-(n)o
adjectives		-(n)oi

COMPARATIVES - SUPERLATIVES
more		bolsx + adverb / adjective
most		naibolsx + adverb / adjective
less		mensx + adverb / adjective
least		naimensx + adverb / adjective
than		cxem
as		kak

PRONOUNS		ya, ti, on, ona, ono, mi, vi, oni

GENDER		Rusanto has no grammatical gender. Only gender of obviously female beings is being accepted.
TO BE		present: ( ) none
		future: bu
		past: bil, bila, bili
		conditional: bi

RUSANTO GRAMMAR: VERBS

VERBS NEUTRAL		root +li -(i)t

VERBS CONDITIONAL		pronoun + bi + neutral

VERBS FUTURE		pronoun + bu + neutral

VERBS PAST SINGULAR		pronoun + root-(i)l

VERBS PAST SINULAR FEMININE		pronoun + root-(i)la

VERBS PAST PLURAL		pronoun + root-(i)li

VERBS PRESENT
verb present "I"		root + -yu
verb present "you" (singular + familiar)		root + -(i)sx
verb present "he"		root + -yet
verb present "she"		root + -yet
verb present "it"		root + -yet
verb present "we"		root + -yeme
verb present "you" (plural or polite)		root + -yete
verb present "they"		root + -yut

IMPERATIVE

PARTICIPLES
present active participle (adverb)		verb-root + -yucx
present active participle (adjective)		verb-root + -yucxi

passive participle		verb-root + -noi
passive participle past		verb-root + -(e)nsxoi

NOUN FROM VERB		verb-root + -(e)nie

So that is the entire grammar in a nutshell! Russian grammar is full of complex conjugation which must match in gender and number. Rusanto is perfect for the beginner to understand the vocabulary and could be very useful as a stepping-stone into proper Russian.

I like to think of Rusanto in the same regard as Basic English. Both are based on the natural language but with simplified grammar, especial for those just starting out learning.

Esperanto a fresh start...

2012-10-26T18:37:00.001-05:00

Nu, mi prenis renovigitan intereson en Esperanto. Esperanto estis la unua Konstruita lingvo mi neniam lernis kaj ĝis nun, estis la plej facila. Tia estas kun nova dediĉo al mia amo al lingvoj kiujn mi refreŝigi min en la lingvo kaj provu memori ĉiujn vortojn mi iam konis kaj lerni novaj en esperoj de esti pli duagrada.

Mi studis malsamaj planlingvoj iuj estas pli bonaj ol Esperanto kaj iuj multe pli malbone sed la problemo kuŝas en la fakto ke Esperanto estas pli bona konata kaj uzata kompare kun la aliaj lingvoj. Ekzemple Ido estis desegnita por plibonigi sur Esperanto kaj faras mirindan laboron, tamen, estas tiel malmultaj parolantoj kaj iom disponeblas en la vojo de lernado kaj praktikado ... ĝin faras malfacile uzi tian lingvon.

Cxar nun Mi enfokusigante la 3 lingvoj: la rusa, afrikansa kaj Esperanton. Rusa lingvo pro mia edzino kaj bopatroj paroli ĝin. Afrikaans ĉar estas ĝermana lingvo (kiun mi volis studi) kaj liaj vortoj estas similaj al la nederlanda sed ĝia gramatiko estas simpligita, plisimpligita kaj facila. Laste, Esperanto, ĉar ĝi estas ankaŭ tre facile por lerni kaj estas miloj da parolantoj monde kun kiu mi povas komuniki kun.

Do, jen mi iras, studante Esperanton denove. Espereble ĉi tiu tempo Mi lernas pli kaj fariĝi bona parolanto.

___________________________________________

Well, I have taken a renewed interest in a Esperanto. Esperanto was the first Constructed language I ever learned and so far, has been the easiest. So it is with a new dedication to my love of languages that I refresh myself in the language and try to remember all the words I once knew and learn new ones in hopes of being more than mediocre.

I have studied different constructed languages some are better than Esperanto and some much worse but the problem lies in the fact that Esperanto is better well known and used compared to the other languages. For example Ido was designed to improve upon Esperanto and does a wonderful job, however, there are so few speakers and little available in the way of learning and practicing... it makes it difficult to use such a language.

For now, I am focusing on 3 languages: Russian, Afrikaans and Esperanto. Russian language because my wife and in-laws speak it. Afrikaans because it is a Germanic language ( which I have wanted to study ) and its words are similar to Dutch but its grammar is simplified and easy. Lastly, Esperanto because it is also very easy to learn and there are thousands of speakers world-wide with whom I can communicate with.

So, here I go, studying Esperanto again. Hopefully this time I will learn more and become a better speaker.

Languages with minimal vocabulary

2012-10-16T19:52:00.000-05:00

Hiklaa! (Pronounced: Hai-klah) Toki! (Pronounced: Toe-key)

These words are greetings in E-minimal language and Toki Pona respectively, there is a third language I will introduce called Tika, but I cannot find a greeting in that language. E-minimal, Toki Pona and Tika are examples of minimalist vocabulary languages. Each language only has a few hundred words with must be compounded with other words to make a sentence.

Lets start with E-minimal:

LEGEND
255 Default Nouns + below

aa = ah
i = eye
a = aye
e = ee
o = oh
u = oo

VERBS
suffix-transitive

(with short e)
EM Past
EN Present
EL Future
ER- a question?

prefix-intransitive
- N That which Acts
- L That Acted on
- M Adjective
- J Adverb
- Z Plural
- EV Possessive (ehv)

pro- = preposition
di- = conjunction
te- = mated principle
pi- = the study of
-po = the opposite of
-to = an increment of
________________________________________________________________________

E-minimal is a small language with 255 nouns ( I won't list them all here ), and what is written above, the language is ambiguous but has enough of a vocabulary to get your point across.

Minimal languages are very small and use many words over again and again or compound words and/or root words to make new words and express new concepts. Although it might seem impossible to speak efficiently with such a limited vocabulary, it really isn't all that difficult. What it does is force the speaker to forgo the vast majority of words and simply focus on the most basic form of communication. For example, instead of saying "he is insubordinate" the same could be said in the most basic form of communication: "he no listen me"

While this might sound strange to your English ears, "Ti naa spa ni!" Literally: "He no listen me" actually gets the message across with little problem.

________________________________________________________________________

Next we have Toki Pona, while E-minimal has a larger vocabulary than Toki Pona, there is more information about Toki Pona available and it offers a learning course!

There are fourteen letters in the Toki Pona alphabet: nine consonants (j k l m n p s t w), and five vowels (a e i o u).

letter pronounced as in

k kill
l let
m met
n net
p pit
s sink
t too
w wet
j yet

Okay, one of the first principles you'll need to learn about Toki Pona is that there is no form of the verb to be like there is in English. For example:

mi pona. = I (am) good.

sina suli. = you (are) big/important.

Simply state mi or sina, then complete the sentence with a verb or adjective. These are the absolute simplest type of sentences in Toki Pona, but already you've come across something that you're probably not accustomed to: All those beloved words like is, was, and will be are gone. Say goodbye! Although this might seem strange to you, it's actually simpler, if you think about it. There are other languages that don't have a form of to be, so don't think this lack of to be is completely strange. It'll just take some practice to get used to the idea.

e - introduces direct object li - separates a 3rd person subject from its verb

Phrases such as mi moku could have two potential meanings: I'm eating or I am food. You have to rely on context heavily in these situations. However, there is one way to specify that you want to say I'm eating versus I am food. Observe:
mi moku e kili. = I eat fruit.
ona li lukin e pipi. = He's watching the bug.
Whatever is getting action done on itself is the "direct object," and in Toki Pona, we separate the verb and the direct object with e so that there is no confusion. [ while that sounds easy, it is harder to do in practice ]

For sentences that don't use mi or sina as the subject, there is one small catch that you'll have to learn. It's not very complex; it'll just take some practice to remember to use it. Look at how li is used:
telo li pona. = Water (is) good.
suno li suli. = (The) sun (is) big.
moku li pona. = Eating/food (is) good.
li is a grammatical word that separates the subject from its "verb". Remember: It's only used when the subject is not mi or sina. Although li might seem worthless right now, as you continue to learn Toki Pona you will see that some sentences could be very confusing if li weren't there.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Lastly we come to Tika:

Phonemes	Pronunciation # 1	Pronunciation # 2
a	/a/ which is pronounced like the a in father	/ə/ which is pronounced like the a in about
i	/i/ which is pronounced like the i in machine	/e/ which is pronounced like the e in net
k	/k/ which is pronounced like the k in kangaroo	/g/ which is pronounced like the g in goal
l	/l/ which is pronounced like the l in lime	/ɾ/ which is pronounced like the tt in American English kitty; any pronunciation of the letter r is acceptable
n	/n/ which is pronounced like the n in name	/m/ which is pronounced like the m in money
p	/p/ which is pronounced like the p in plant	/b/ which is pronounced like the b in banana
t	/t/ which is pronounced like the t in tiger	/d/ which is pronounced like the d in doughnut
u	/u/ which is pronounced like the oo in food	/o/ which is pronounced like the o in gold

Tika is an extraordinarily easy language. It only has 8 phonemes (5 consonants and 3 vowels), and 100 words which can be compounded to make even more words. The language is SVO meaning that the order is the subject, the verb, then the direct object, which is exactly like English. The only difference is that, in all cases, the indirect object comes after the direct object. The proper way to say "I gave you the ball" in Tika, would be, "I gave the ball to you". Just like in English, the adjectives precedes the nouns (example: red cat, not cat red). Vowels can be pronounced as diphthongs or separately. Capital letters are never used. Any punctuation besides the period (.), is never used in Tika. Tika follows the Chinese way of forming questions. For example, take the sentence "You see me". If you wanted to make this into a question, you would say "Do you see me?", well in Tika, the way to turn it into a question is by asking "you see not see me?".

Because the phonology is so small, there are alternate ways to pronounce some of the phonemes. Choose the pronunciation that feels most natural to you.

Lord's Prayer

nuita puku patinu pila ni kiali. nuita puku kia puna tua tupi titula. nuita puku pili tupi natiu nupi tua. nuita puku pili tupi pili pila kapi piti. lilu kapi piti ni puanita ku kiali. nuita puku pili nuita puku luka tipu kunali kita ku nuita puku pili tupi lana nuita puku nala kuali nuita puku lana nala pua tipi pikua. nuita puku pili tupi kapi nuita puku pua tipu pua tupi kapu pua nuita puku puna ku kapi nuita puku pua nala. pila.

Literal translation:

Our parent is truly in the sky. We do goodness towards your name. We want your nation to move toward. We want your desires to truly give view. It'll give view in Earth and in the sky. We want our daytime eating stuff and we want you to accept our evil like we accept the evil of other people. We want you to hold us from the time of your opinions of our purity and keep us away from evil. Truly!

_________________________________________________________________________________

There you have it folks, 3 complete minimal languages you can actually use! If you want to learn more about these languages check out the following sites:
E-minimal, Toki Pona, Tika.

Spelling Reform

2012-10-06T19:38:00.001-05:00

Unlike many other languages, English spelling has never been systematically updated and thus today only partly holds to the alphabetic principle. As an outcome, English spelling is a system of weak rules with many exceptions and ambiguities.

The English alphabet has several letters whose characteristic sounds are already represented elsewhere in the alphabet. These include X, C or K, and Q.

It is argued that spelling reform would make the language easier to learn, raise literacy levels, and save time, money and effort.

Advocates note that spelling reforms have taken place already, just slowly and often not in an organized way. There are many words that were once spelt un-phonetically but have since been reformed. For example, music was spelt musick until the 1880s, and fantasy was spelt phantasy until the 1920s. For a time, almost all words with the -or ending (such as error) were once spelt -our (errour) and almost all words with the -er ending (such as member) were once spelt -re (membre). In American spelling, most of them now use -or and -er, but in British spelling, only some have been reformed.
Pronunciations gradually change and the alphabetic principle that lies behind English (and every other alphabetically-written language) gradually becomes corrupted. Advocates argue that if we wish to keep English spelling regular, then spelling needs to be amended to account for the changes.

Here is an example of "Cut Spelling" a reform proposal: "Wen readrs first se Cut Spelng, as in this sentnce, they ofn hesitate slytly, but then quikly becom acustmd to th shortnd words and soon find text in Cut Spelng as esy to read as Traditionl Orthografy, but it is th riter ho really apreciates th advantajs of Cut Spelng, as many of th most trublsm uncertntis hav been elimnated."

Phonetics
Phonemes are represented as follows, with nearest possible IPA equivalent.

Notation IPA Example
a /æ/ sat
e /ɛ/ set
i /ɪ/ did
o /ɑː/ dot
u /ʌ/ cut

Notation IPA Example
ae /eɪ̯/ sundae
ee /iː/ see
ie /aɪ̯/ die
oe /oʊ̯/ toe
ue /jʊː/ cue

Notation IPA (Gen. Amer.) IPA (RP) Example
ar /ɑr/ /ɑː(r)/ bar
er /ɛr/ /ɛː(r)/ merger
or /ɔr/ /ɔː(r)/ for

Notation IPA (Gen. Amer.) IPA (RP) Example
arr /ær/ /ar/ marry
err /eɪ̯r/ /ɛɪ̯r/ cherry
orr /ɔr/ /ɒr/ sorry

Notation IPA (Gen. Amer.) IPA (RP) Example
air /eɪ̯r/ air
aa /ɑː/ alm
eer /iːr/ beer
oo /uː/ moon
uu /ʊ/ book
oi /ɔɪ̯/ oil
ou/ow /aʊ̯/ out
au/aw /ɑː/ saw
ur /ɔr/ /ʊə(r)/ tour
uer /jər/ /jʊə(r)/ cure

Notation IPA Example
b /b/ bat
c/k /k/ cat, kit
ch /t͡ʃ/ chat
d /d/ did
f /f/ fat
g /ɡ/ gag
h /h/ hat
j /d͡ʒ/ jet
l /l/ let
m /m/ met
n /n/ net
ng /ŋ/ singing
nk /ŋk/ ink
p /p/ pep
q /kʷ/ quake
r /ɹ/ red
s /s/ set
sh /ʃ/ shed
t /t/ tot
th /θ/ thin
th /ð/ this
v /v/ van
w /w/ war
wh /ʍ/ why
x /ks/ box
y /j/ yes
z /z/ zoo
zh /ʒ/ azure

Exceptions and other differences

U, meaning "you", is capitalized.

Common words

There is no change in the words was, as, of, the, he, she, me, we, be, do, to, and off. Words derived from these (such as being, together, and thruout) also remain unchanged. Words ending in -ful remain unchanged.

Word-final S

There is no change in the plural suffix -s (as in jobs), the possessive suffix -'s (as in man's), and in the third person present singular verb suffix -s (as in he runs), even though in all these cases the s is sometimes pronounced [z].

"Th" digraph

There is no change in the digraph th, even though it can be pronounced as voiced [ð] or unvoiced [θ]. Similarly the letter x is retained for both voiced [gz] and unvoiced [ks]. The reason may be that unvoiced occurrences outnumber the voiced 5 to 1, and words normally calling for a voiced x are understood even if pronounced unvoiced.

Schwa

There are usually no changes in the spelling of short (schwa) vowels in the unstressed syllables of words like organ, novel, pencil, and lemon, unless the spelling would otherwise indicate an over-pronunciation of the word (as in mountain).

Stress

Depending on its position in the word or root, the unstressed "half ee" (as in between, detect, reform, champion, editorial, hapyer, and fifty) continues to be spelled as e, i, or y.

Double "rr"

As in traditional orthography, indicates that the preceding vowel is short (as in carry, merry, and sorry).

Double ll

Indicates that the preceding a is pronounced English pronunciation: /ɔː/, as in fall, tall, and call.

Word-final O and I

The long o or long i sound at the end of a word may be written with a single letter, as in banjo, go, so, alibi, hi, fli, mi (but banjoes, alibieing, flies, etc., since the vowel is no longer at the end of the word).

Ambiguous syllable breaks

A hyphen following a vowel unambiguously separates a long vowel from another vowel following, as in re-enter and co-operate.

False diphthongs

If two vowels—such as ea—do not match a digraph on the SoundSpel chart, then the syllable ends with the first vowel: react (ea is not a digraph), jeenius, memorial, creaetiv. In cases of more than two vowels the syllable ends with the first digraph: flooid (oo, being the first digraph, ends the syllable—it is not flo-oid), hieest, freeing, inueendo, power, continueing, paeabl, evalueaet.

An example: The Star by Herbert George Wells

It was on the ferst dae of the nue yeer the anounsment was maed, allmoest siemultaeniusly frum three obzervatorys, that the moeshun of the planet Neptune, the outermoest of all planets that wheel about the Sun, had becum verry erratic. A retardaeshun in its velosity had bin suspected in Desember. Then a faent, remoet spek of liet was discuverd in the reejon of the perterbd planet. At ferst this did not cauz eny verry graet exsietment. Sieentific peepl, however, found the intelijens remarkabl enuf, eeven befor it becaem noen that the nue body was rapidly groeing larjer and brieter, and that its moeshun was qiet different frum the orderly progres of the planets.

Lastly lets look at Benjamin Franklin's idea for English spelling reform:

Benjamin Franklin took great interest in the promotion of spelling reform. While living in London in 1768 he wrote A Scheme for a new Alphabet and a Reformed Mode of Spelling in which he proposed a fairly accurate phonetic system for spelling English. The alphabet was published in 1779 in Franklin's Political, Miscellaneous, and Philosophical Pieces.

His new phonetic alphabet consisted all the lowercase letters of the Latin alphabet, minus c, j, q, w, x, and y, which he thought redundant, plus six new letters for sounds which he thought lacked unambiguous orthographic representation. The other letters all adhered to the principle of one symbol (or unique digraph) per one sound.

Franklin commissioned a type foundry to prepare a suitable type including for the 6 new letters, but soon lost interest in his alphabet. The only other person to show an interest was Noah Webster.

Notable features
Double vowels represent long vowel sounds, e.g. aa = [ a: ] and ii = [ i: ].
Only one accented letter appears in the alphabet: ê, which represents the a in mane and lane.
Consonant combinations are used to represent such sounds as the ch in chew and the j in jaw.

Here is a sample of text:

Transliteration:

Much as the imperfections of the alphabet will admit of; the present bad spelling is only bad because contrary to the present bad rules: under the new rules it would be good -- the difficulty of learning to spell well in the old way is so great, that few attain it; thousands and thousands writing on to old age, without ever being able to acquire it. 'Tis, besides a difficulty continually increasing; as the sound gradually varies more and more from the spelling: and to foreigners.

Old English, Germanic derived languages and Conlangs

2012-10-02T21:58:00.000-05:00

Welcumen! No, I did not spell that incorrectly, what you are seeing is the word "Welcome" in Old English. Old English is much different than what we speak today. It is amazingly similar in some ways, and yet drastically different in others. OE sounds more like German and you can listen to what OE might have sounded like by watching this video here.

In modern English we do not change, very much, or inflect words when talking about: me, you, he, she, it, they etc. for example: I make, you make, he, she it makes. However, OE was different and the variations of OE Conlangs keep with the idea of inflection. As in our example above from the Conlang Englisc Ic make, þu makest, he, sci, it makeþ.

Another great site is The Anglish Moot, a place for linguistic purism (that is, removing words that are not from the base language from the language itself, in the case of English, removing all the Romance words from Latin, Greek, French etc.) Replacing borrowed words from the Romance languages with updated varioations of OE or Germanic-based words. Below is a smaple of the 23rd Psalm in Anglish.

(Brought from the Hebrew tung over to Anglish by MDS)1 A song of David.The LORD is my shepherd. I cannot fail.

2 In green abodes He lays me down, upon springs of stillness He leads me.

3 My soul does He fill, and guide me in my paths of rightwisness for the sake of His Name.

4 Yea, were I even to walk in deathly hallows, I would not fear evil since You are with-me; Your rod and Your staff: they soothe me.

5 You set up before me a meal board against my downtrodders. You heap rich oil on my head and fill my cup to the brim.

6 Oh, that Goodness and godkindness would run after me every day of my life, that I could abide in the house of LORD forever! So be it. Wouldn't it be cool to talk like this once more? English has changed so much from its beginnings. I, for one, would love to see English change to a more German-like language. Some might think of this as a reversal but I think it would be good to get English back to the way it should have been all along. If Normandy hadn't won the war with England in 1066, it is quite possible English would have evolved like Frisian and would have been even closer to the Frisian language today.

Other languages worth taking a look at are: Afrikaans which is very easy to learn because of its very regular and simplistic grammar, Chathan (a Conlang) Here is a sample of Chathan with other natural Germanic languages:

Chathan Ek vejst niek velk honden sin scvart. /ɛk veɪst nik vɛɫk hɔndɛn sɪn ʃvɑɚt/

English I don't know which hounds (dogs) are black.       
Dutch Ik weet niet welke honden zwart zijn.
Afrikaans Ek weet nie wat honde swart is nie. 
German Ich weiß nicht, welche Hunde schwarz sind.
Danish Jeg ved ikke, hvilke hunde er sorte.
Swedish Jag vet inte vilka hundar är svarta.
Icelandic Ég veit ekki hver hundarnir eru svartir.
Auregan Ikt witte whilch honde swarthe zischens nick.
Dearish Ick wid neet wilk hoend swaard aar.
Oxman Ik weat neat welke hounds sy'n swart.

NOTE: the last three languages compared, Auregan, Dearish and Oxman are also conlangs!

After Esperanto

2012-09-25T19:58:00.001-05:00

After Esperanto I started looking at different languages based on the Romance languages and/or Esperanto Reform projects. Ido was the first successful language reform for Esperanto and is the short form of the word Esperantido.

Ido has some support but not as much as Esperanto. Ido's philosophy was to correct some the grammar of Esperanto and make it even easier to learn and use.

Let's do a quick comparison of Ido vs. Esperanto with the Lord's prayer.

Ido

Patro nia, qua esas en la cielo,
tua nomo santigesez;
tua regno advenez;
tua volo facesez quale en la cielo,

tale anke sur la tero.

Donez a ni cadie l'omnadiala pano,
e pardonez a ni nia ofensi,
quale anke ni pardonas a nia ofensanti,
e ne duktez ni aden la tento,
ma liberigez ni del malajo.

Esperanto

Matthew (La evangelio laŭ Mateo) 6:9-13
9 Vi do preĝu jene:Patro nia, kiu estas en la ĉielo,
Via nomo estu sanktigita.10 Venu Via regno, plenumiĝu Via volo, kiel en la ĉielo,
tiel ankaŭ sur la tero.11 Nian panon ĉiutagan donu al ni hodiaŭ.
12 Kaj pardonu al ni niajn ŝuldojn, kiel ankaŭ ni pardonas al niaj ŝuldantoj.
13 Kaj ne konduku nin en tenton, sed liberigu nin de la malbono.

The first thing I notice is that Ido looks more like Spanish or Italian, the endings are different and the words words such as: "Who" in Ido is "qua" soft instead of the hard "kiu" in Esperanto. Also the word for "and" in Ido is "e" vs. the word "kaj" in E-o.

From the looks of it, Ido has softer sounds overall and has a better flow to the wording allowing it to be easier spoken and possible better understood by speakers of Spanish, French and Italian.

There is a free online Ido course here with 8 lessons if you are interested in learning more about this Esperanto reform language; Ido. Also take a look at the Uniono por la Linguo Internaciona Ido (ULI)

Well, this posting is rather short compared to my others but I guess short, concise and to the point is good at times! I hope you will take a look at Ido, even if you have no intention of learning it, just to see what a constructed language looks like and how people all around the world can use it!

Bona fortuna per tua lingua studio! (Good luck with your language study!)

Basic English

2012-09-23T14:58:00.003-05:00

According to the Oxford Dictionary Online, there are about a quarter of a million words in the English language. That's a lot of words! But how many of them do we use on a daily basis? One man took the challenge to find out. Charles K. Ogden condensed the enormous English language to a mere 850 words. These Basic words became the foundation of "Basic English" a planned language which was designed to make English an International Auxiliary Language.

Today, English is spoken around the world as a second language in almost every country abroad. English truly is an International Auxiliary Language. The problem is that English is difficult to learn with complex grammar rules, irregular verbs in the past tense and lack of conjugation (not totally lacking but minimized) which many languages use, as well as a definite and indefinite article.

Grammar was greatly reduced to the following table:

Plurals are formed with a trailing "S". The normal exceptions of standard English also apply, notably "ES" and "IES".
There are four derivatives for the 300 nouns: -"ER" and -"ING", and two adjectives, -"ING" and -"ED".
Adverbs use -"LY" from qualifiers.
Degree is expressed with "MORE" and "MOST". Be prepared to find -"ER" and -"EST" in common usage.
Negative adjectives are formed with "UN"-
Questions are formed by inversion and by "DO".
Operators and pronouns conjugate in full.
Compound words may be combined from two nouns (milkman) or a noun and a directive (sundown).
Measurement, numerals, currency, calendar, and international terms are in English form.
Technical expressions required and customary for the immediate task are included in the locally used form.

A list of the 850 words in categories can be found here.

Also established is a list of compound words which can be found here.

A list of expanded rules more apt for the intermediate speaker was developed here.

Even the Bible has been translated into Basic English! Although one does not get as much deep-theology from this translation, it does serve a need to allow a learner to begin reading and understanding the basics of the Word of God! New Testament and Old Testament.

Here is a sample of the Babel Text in Basic English:

1.	And all the earth had one language and one tongue.
2.	And it came about that in their wandering from the east, they came to a stretch of flat country in the land of Shinar, and there they made their living-place.
3.	And they said one to another, Come, let us make bricks, burning them well. And they had bricks for stone, putting them together with sticky earth.
4.	And they said, Come, let us make a town, and a tower whose top will go up as high as heaven; and let us make a great name for ourselves, so that we may not be wanderers over the face of the earth.
5.	And the Lord came down to see the town and the tower which the children of men were building.
6.	And the Lord said, See, they are all one people and have all one language; and this is only the start of what they may do; and now it will not be possible to keep them from any purpose of theirs.
7.	Come, let us go down and take away the sense of their language, so that they will not be able to make themselves clear to one another.
8.	So the Lord God sent them away into every part of the earth; and they gave up building their town.
9.	So it was named Babel, because there the Lord took away the sense of all languages; and from there the Lord sent them away over all the face of the earth. So it is possible to learn to speak English with only a vocabulary of 850 words and communicate with anyone! You can find a lot of information about Basic English here on the main website for Basic.

English spelling and reform.

2012-09-20T21:49:00.000-05:00

How about spelling? English has the absolute worst spelling system ever! We use 26 letters to produce between 40-44 sounds making it necessary to combine letters into special combinations to produce a certain sound. The only problem is that it is not consistent.

Yes, this poem is VERY long but I think you will find it enjoyable to see how difficult English can really be and how absurd our spelling system is. If you feel the poem is too long, please skip to the end and finish reading the blog post about an alternative writing style!

The Chaos
by G. Nolst Trenite' a.k.a. "Charivarius" 1870 - 1946

Dearest creature in creation
Studying English pronunciation,
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse
I will keep you, Susy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye your dress you'll tear,
So shall I! Oh, hear my prayer,
Pray, console your loving poet,
Make my coat look new, dear, sew it!
Just compare heart, beard and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written).
Made has not the sound of bade,
Say said, pay-paid, laid, but plaid.
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as vague and ague,
But be careful how you speak,
Say break, steak, but bleak and streak.
Previous, precious, fuchsia, via,
Pipe, snipe, recipe and choir,
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, shoe, poem, toe.
Hear me say, devoid of trickery:
Daughter, laughter and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles.
Exiles, similes, reviles.
Wholly, holly, signal, signing.
Thames, examining, combining
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war, and far.
From "desire": desirable--admirable from "admire."
Lumber, plumber, bier, but brier.
Chatham, brougham, renown, but known.
Knowledge, done, but gone and tone,
One, anemone. Balmoral.
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel,
Gertrude, German, wind, and mind.
Scene, Melpomene, mankind,
Tortoise, turquoise, chamois-leather,
Reading, reading, heathen, heather.
This phonetic labyrinth
Gives moss, gross, brook, brooch, ninth, plinth.
Billet does not end like ballet;
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet;
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Banquet is not nearly parquet,
Which is said to rime with "darky."
Viscous, Viscount, load, and broad.
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation's O.K.,
When you say correctly: croquet.
Rounded, wounded, grieve, and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive, and live,
Liberty, library, heave, and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven,
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the difference, moreover,
Between mover, plover, Dover,
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police, and lice.
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label,
Petal, penal, and canal,
Wait, surmise, plait, promise, pal.
Suit, suite, ruin, circuit, conduit,
Rime with "shirk it" and "beyond it."
But it is not hard to tell,
Why it's pall, mall, but Pall Mall.
Muscle, muscular, gaol, iron,
Timber, climber, bullion, lion,
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, and chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor,
Ivy, privy, famous, clamour
And enamour rime with hammer.
Pussy, hussy, and possess,
Desert, but dessert, address.
Golf, wolf, countenance, lieutenants.
Hoist, in lieu of flags, left pennants.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rime with anger.
Neither does devour with clangour.
Soul, but foul and gaunt but aunt.
Font, front, won't, want, grand, and grant.
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say: finger.
And then: singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, age.
Query does not rime with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post; and doth, cloth, loth;
Job, Job; blossom, bosom, oath.
Though the difference seems little,
We say actual, but victual.
Seat, sweat; chaste, caste.; Leigh, eight, height;
Put, nut; granite, and unite.
Reefer does not rime with deafer,
Feoffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Dull, bull, Geoffrey, George, ate, late,
Hint, pint, Senate, but sedate.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific,
Tour, but our and succour, four,
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, guinea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria,
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean,
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.
Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion with battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay.
Say aver, but ever, fever.
Neither, leisure, skein, receiver.
Never guess--it is not safe:
We say calves, valves, half, but Ralph.
Heron, granary, canary,
Crevice and device, and eyrie,
Face but preface, but efface,
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust, and scour, but scourging,
Ear but earn, and wear and bear
Do not rime with here, but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, clerk, and jerk,
Asp, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.
Pronunciation--think of psyche--!
Is a paling, stout and spikey,
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing "groats" and saying "grits"?
It's a dark abyss or tunnel,
Strewn with stones, like rowlock, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict, and indict!
Don't you think so, reader, rather,
Saying lather, bather, father?
Finally: which rimes with "enough"
Though, through, plough, cough, hough, or tough?
Hiccough has the sound of "cup."
My advice is--give it up!

Crazy huh? All these spelling variations is enough to make a person sick! So, here is an idea:

Each symbol represents a single sound and each word is spelled as it sounds not as it is currently spelled. Here is an example of what the Unifon alphabet looks like with two font variations.

With a little practice one could easily be writing in Unifon or any of the other spelling reform alphabets out there. I will discuss other spelling reform systems in the future but I really like this one, it gives English a special look and feel.

Esperanto!

2012-09-19T21:50:00.003-05:00

Ok, so Esperanto was the first "real" language I used to communicate with people from other countries. I still use it somewhat but, I must admit, I am a bit rusty now. So, here I want to give you the basics of Esperanto so you will understand why I chose to learn this wonderful language. Lets start with the alphabet.

One of these grammatical endings should appear on the end of most
words,  and defines that words role in a sentence. Other suffixes
and prefixes may precede this final identifier. 

-o      noun                            amo   "love"
-a      adjective                       ama   "loving"
-e      adverb                          ame   "lovingly"
-n      direct object of a verb         amon  "love"
-j      plural                          amoj  "loves"  "j" pronounced "y"/"ee"
-jn     plural of the direct object     amojn "loves"

-i      verb, infinitive                ami   "to love"
-u      verb, imperative                amu   "love!"
-is     verb, past tense                amis  "loved"
-as     verb, present tense             amas  "loves"
-os     verb, future tense              amos  "will love"
-us     verb, conditional               amus  "would love"

As you can see, it is very easy to know what is a verb, adjective, adverb etc and the tenses are very regular and easy as well.

A complete list of pronouns. As in English, the plural  "you"  is
identical to the singular and does not take  the  plural  suffix.
Possesives take the adjectival form by adding the -a suffix.

                        mi      I       
                        vi      you
                        li      he
                        ŝi      she
                        ĝi      it
                        ni      we
                        ili     they
                        oni     one
                        ci      thou (archaic)
                        si      reflexive - refers back to subject
                        ri*      he or she (genderless, neoligism)
*This form is very seldom every used, I have never used nor seen this form in regular communication.

Numbers follow a consistent pattern, best illustrated by example.

nulo zero dek unu eleven
unu one dek du twelve
du two dek tri thirteen
tri three dudek tri twenty three
kvar four kvindek ok fifty eight
kvin five cent sesdek a hundred and sixty
ses six sepcent okdek seven hundred and eighty
sep seven dekmiliono ten million
ok eight
naŭ nine
dek ten
cent hundred
mil thousand
miliono million
miliardo billion (thousand million)

Below is a sample of Esperanto with the Tower of Babel text:

Sur la tuta tero estis unu lingvo kaj unu parolmaniero.
Kaj kiam ili ekiris de la oriento, ili trovis valon en la lando Ŝinar kaj tie ekloĝis.
Kaj ili diris unu al alia: Venu, ni faru brikojn kaj ni brulpretigu ilin per fajro. Kaj la brikoj fariĝis por ili ŝtonoj, kaj la bitumo fariĝis por ili kalko.
Kaj ili diris: Venu, ni konstruu al ni urbon, kaj turon, kies supro atingos la ĉielon, kaj ni akiru al ni gloron, antaŭ ol ni disiĝos sur la supraĵo de la tuta tero.
Kaj la Eternulo malleviĝis, por vidi la urbon kaj la turon, kiujn konstruis la homidoj.
Kaj la Eternulo diris: Jen estas unu popolo, kaj unu lingvon ili ĉiuj havas; kaj jen, kion ili komencis fari, kaj ili ne estos malhelpataj en ĉio, kion ili decidis fari.
Ni malleviĝu do, kaj Ni konfuzu tie ilian lingvon, por ke unu ne komprenu la parolon de alia.
Kaj la Eternulo disigis ilin de tie sur la supraĵon de la tuta tero, kaj ili ĉesis konstrui la urbon.
Tial oni donis al ĝi la nomon Babel, ĉar tie la Eternulo konfuzis la lingvon de la tuta tero kaj de tie la Eternulo disigis ilin sur la supraĵon de la tuta tero.

Well, that gives you a brief overview of the Esperanto Language. If I have piqued your interest and you would like to learn more about this language visit Lernu!

Intro to my life and language...

2012-09-18T20:38:00.002-05:00

I love languages, I could talk for hours about them; the differences, the similarities, syntax, sounds, structure, diphthongs, morphemes, declension, elision, etc. When I was younger I wanted to learn a foreign language so I went to the library and checked out books on every language I could find: Spanish, German, Italian, Chinese, French, Russian... Well, Russian is the one I chose because I like the way it looked, sounded and the fact it can be used in 15 countries (Former Soviet Republics).

Russian proved to be challenging as I had no one to speak to or practice with. But I bought books, tapes (yes, I had those when I was young) and computer software. I was determined to learn this language one way or another! I did manage to learn some words and then a few sentences but I never became anywhere near fluent due to the fact I still had no one to practice with.

So one day I was surfing the ole' web and came across Esperanto, the most well-known ConLang (Constructed Language) out there. It was easy to learn and there were many people to speak/write to. The language is based on Latin and Greek words so words are familiar to English speakers as well as speakers of other Romance-based languages such as Spanish, French, Italian etc. The only problem I had was the troublesome "-n" ending on the Subject. It is there to clarify the subject but I always had problems knowing when to use it or not. But I was delighted to be able to speak with people in China, Iran, Spain, Germany, Estonia and many others in a common language.

Well, I think this is a good introduction to my life and languages, don't worry, there is much more to be written and I will explain more about the languages I know, am studying and want to study in the future both Natural and Constructed.

Feature	Description	Example
SVO	Subject precedes the verb precedes the object	Huan nenju shukiJuan like candy Juan likes candy
N Mod	Nouns are followed by their modifiers	sunda yam sun yebike red two that those two red bikes
topicalization	Constituents which are the topic of the phrase are moved to the front	shuki Huan nenjucandy juan like it is candy Juan likes
pro-drop	Pronouns functioning as subject or object rarely are expressed	joknow I know
oligosynthetic	The lexicon consists of several hundred roots which form new words by compounding	ne + ni = nenibird + vehicle = airplane
no inflection	Words have one form and take no morphemes	kaiko - book, books kaiko wi - many books kaiko yem - three books
serial verbs	Subjects can have more than one verb with different objects each.	yu za tuya tu sekishe take knife cut meat she cut the meat with a knife
Possd Possr	Possessed items precede the possessor linked by a marker	kwando na Huanschool of juan Juan's school

present tense	past tense	future tense
yo es (esse)	yo esset	yo va esser
tu (Vu) es (esse)	tu (Vu) esset	tu (Vu) va esser
il es (esse)	il esset	il va esser
illa (or ella) es (esse)	illa (or ella) esset	illa (or ella) va esser
it es (esse)	it esset	it va esser
noi es (esse)	noi esset	noi va esser
vu es (esse)	vu esset	vu va esser
ili es (esse)	ili esset	ili va esser

Lance's Languages

21E™

Norwegian - easy or difficult?

Lingua Franca Nova

Sranan Tongo

Sousic - a brief introduction

Python

What is Python? It is a computer programming language. While programming languages are strictly for computers (and programmers) and used for actual communication between people but it is nonetheless very interesting to see how a computer language works.

Sasxsek

Kah Language

Whistling languages

Bahasa Indonesia

Polyglot

Square Word Calligraphy...

Slovianto

Syntax

Example

Babel text

Blissymbolics

Occidental Interlingue

2. Grammar

Rusanto: The Simplified Russian

Esperanto a fresh start...

Languages with minimal vocabulary

Spelling Reform

It is argued that spelling reform would make the language easier to learn, raise literacy levels, and save time, money and effort.

Old English, Germanic derived languages and Conlangs

After Esperanto

Basic English

A list of the 850 words in categories can be found here.

Also established is a list of compound words which can be found here.

English spelling and reform.

The Chaosby G. Nolst Trenite' a.k.a. "Charivarius" 1870 - 1946

Esperanto!

Intro to my life and language...

Until next time, до свидания, adiaŭ and totsiens...

The Chaos
by G. Nolst Trenite' a.k.a. "Charivarius" 1870 - 1946