I was fiddling around yesterday and decided that those squidward NPCs looked awfully mute, so I decided to whip up a language for them. Here is a quick technical overview, for anyone with knowledge of linguistics and conlanging. It's nowhere near at the level where I can write a full babel text, but it has enough to make it a nice naming language once some more vocabulary is flushed out.
here's a sketch of it so far. If enough people are interested, I could TRY to write a less technical introduction, but I'm not a teacher by any means.
PHONOLOGY
consonants: /p, t, k, f, s, x, m, n, l, r/ (all letters are written as in the IPA, except /x/ which is written <h> for aesthetic purposes.
vowels: /i, e, a, o/ (again spelled as in the IPA)
phonetactic constraints and allophones:
syllables can be (C)V(C) where the syllable coda cannot be a stop (p, t, or k) If a compound word or affix is appended to a word with a stop at the end, the stop changes to the corresponding fricative (/p/ > [f], /t/ > [s], /k/ > [x]).
However, all consonants can be geminated as in Italian, so "akka" is a valid string)
There are no diphthongs, so an epenthetic [k] is inserted between morphemes which would otherwise result in two vowels next to each other
[i] is used as an epenthetic vowel as well.
(for the one person who is still reading, the phonology of a language is how many sounds it has. Humans can produce ~150 sounds that are used in at least one language, but no language uses ALL of these sounds. Phonetactics (or phonetactic constraints) in a language say how these sounds are allowed to come together to form syllables and words. There are also features like tone and stress that are called supersegmetnal features, but sometimes tone can make a difference in meaning as in chinese, so can stress, as in Spanish (amo vs amó))
phonology and phonetactics are the two most important features when constructing a language that will be used in media, because it dictates how the language sounds to foreign ears. Do you want people to say "that sounds kinda like French" or "kinda like Hebrew", its all in the phonology and phonetactics.
This language will sound a bit like italian (because consonants can be long or short) and a bit like Japanese (because the syllable structure is so constrained), and perhaps a bit like Hawaiian (because there are so few phonemes)
Now on to the grammar!
word order in regular sentences is subject verb object, as in english.
ex: Hasti kek tokko. The ghast eats the wolf. (contrived, I know)
Adjectives can act like verbs in sentences like "the wolf is small", "is small" is a special kind of verb
ex: Tokko mekapi. The wolf is small.
If a noun with an adjective is the subject or object of a sentence, like "the small wolf runs", the adjective is added as a suffix to the noun
"tokkomekap" = "the small wolf".
It should be apparent by now that "Minecraftian" as I will call the language for now, does not have words for "a" and "the", just like Latin.
Nouns have 3 numbers: singular (which is unmarked), plural (indicated by reduplicating the root (saying the word twice)) and another kind of plural that I can't quite decide on yet, but for now, it's a collective plural like in some of Tolkien's languages, and it's formed by reduplicating the first syllable of the root minus the final consonant if there is one.
Tokko = the wolf/a wolf
tokkotokko = wolves
totokko = all the wolves/the whole group of wolves/ the wolves considered as a unit detc.
The present tense of verbs is unmarked
tokko kek = the wolf eats
past tense is formed by adding -am
tokko kekam = the wolf ate
reduplicating the verb changes it from simple aspict to continuous aspect
tokko kekkek = the wolf is eating (there's a difference between "I eat" and "I am eating")
It works for past tense as well, forming more or less the imperfect of Spanish or Latin.
tokko kekkekam = the wolf was eating.
That's about it for now. Wake up, wipe the drool off your keyboard, and tell me what you think! :smile.gif:
Excellent work, sir or madam. Linguistics is well beyond my level of expertise, but I like the staccato sound in the vocabulary, what with all the 'k's and 't's. It reminds me of the noises you hear when playing the game. For example, the "kruk kruk kruk" of digging dirt or the "tok tok tok" of mining stone. Whether it was intentional or not, you've successfully emulated the way (I'm guessing) primitive languages form, which (again, totally guessing) comes from imitating the noise of the object to take the place of the object when the object isn't there to point at. Feel free to use 'kruk' and 'tok' to mean dirt and stone if you'd like, and if you'd like more suggestions, I'd be glad to offer them.
Well, it wasn't so much intentional, but it's nice to hear that the language evokes the right kind of emotions.
I'll try to flesh it out enough so people can use it to name things if they wish.
For now, here's some vocabulary and a few example phrases to get the idea of how to form compound words and descriptive nouns:
sah: house, shelter (think of the first dirt shack you put together on your very first night)
mekapi: small, little
sesan: creeper (think "sssssss BOOM!")
tokko: wolf (normally a tamed wolf)
nor: pig (think OINK)
mop: animal/monster (from "mob")
nedan: the nether (from Swedish)
mohe: cow (MOOOO)
kek: to eat
fahi (fun, entertaining)
posak: wood
O: I/me
Oko: We (exclusive)
i: you (singular
Iko we (inclusive)
tete: this (it acts like and adjective so it is attached to the end of a noun)
sarra: meat or flesh
(note that there are two words for "we". iko includes the listener in the group, and Oko excludes the listener. Oko kekkek means We are eating, but not you, and Iko kekkek means you and I, or you and us, are eating. Think of when you were a kid and your mom said "We're going to clean the house today", I always said "whose included in this "we"? :smile.gif:
Here are some compound words (two nouns mashed together to make a new noun)
mofnedan: nether monster (a nether mob like a ghast or blaze)
(note that in English, the main word comes last in the compound. A doghouse is a kind of house, not a kind of dog. It is the opposite here. The first word of the compound is the "head", so mofnedan is a "nether-mob" not a "mob-nether".
sahtokko: wolf shelter (that place you inevitably shove all your wolves when you realize they're more annoying than helpful.
One last note: Adjectives usually are written with a -i suffix. This is the form of the word when it is used like a verb. Tokko mekap-i means "the wolf is small. To make it past tense, chop off the -i and add -a. Tokko mekapa (the wolf was small) Another contrived example, I know. To say "the wolf is not small", you chop off the -i and add -nin, or -nan for past tense. "Tokko mepafnin" the wolf is not small.
Note also that the final -p changes to -f. This was discussed in the first post, because p t and k cannot come right before another consonant in the middle of a word. They can at the end of a word if the next word starts with a consonant, but in rapid speech, it would probably be switched to a fricative. (in linguistic terms, this is sometimes called "softening")
Sesan kekam O sahposamekapi.
The creeper ate my small wooden house.
I'm guessing you have a better way to use the possessive in mind, but it doesn't sound bad. It has a nice East Asian, almost Arabic sound to it. I can imagine villager's screaming this in terror, though they might use whatever "blew up" is. Also, how would you have arranged the "small wooden house?" Do you keep the order the same, just inverted? Or would you keep the order of the adjectives, but tack them on to the end of the noun? Basically, 'house wooden small' versus 'house small wooden.'
It works for past tense as well, forming more or less the imperfect of Spanish or Latin.
Mr./Ms./Mrs. Linguist Person, I'm shocked! We DO have the imperfect tense in English; it just can't be said in one word like in Latin and Spanish (can it in Spanish? Hey, I speak Latin, not Spanish :tongue.gif:). Here's a Latin-English comparison of the imperfect tense:
Latin: Portabam.
English: I was carrying. See?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Did I write something good? Click the + over here!----->
Mr./Ms./Mrs. Linguist Person, I'm shocked! We DO have the imperfect tense in English; it just can't be said in one word like in Latin and Spanish (can it in Spanish? Hey, I speak Latin, not Spanish :tongue.gif:). Here's a Latin-English comparison of the imperfect tense:
Latin: Portabam.
English: I was carrying. See?
Well, yes and no. The romance/latin imperfect bas a few different uses.
For instance. In spanish, you might say íbamos a la playa cada fin de semana. we WOULD go to the beach every weekend.
I also want to avoid making a 1:1 comparison between minecraftian and english.
Another little tidbit I forgot to mention is that the k epenthetic consonant changes to p when the previous consonant is a k. So we get tokkopo (my wolf) instead of tokkoko. Also note that possessive adjectives are just the regular pronouns suffixed to the word. Its a little like Hebrew or Arabic
Thanks for catching the /d/! Ok, now it's Nelan (don't see a lot of l's yet). I'm gonna try an automatic word generator to come up with some more vocab. When you make up words yourself, you tend to favor some phonemes over others, I've found.
Sesan kekam O sahposamekapi.
The creeper ate my small wooden house.
I'm guessing you have a better way to use the possessive in mind, but it doesn't sound bad. It has a nice East Asian, almost Arabic sound to it. I can imagine villager's screaming this in terror, though they might use whatever "blew up" is. Also, how would you have arranged the "small wooden house?" Do you keep the order the same, just inverted? Or would you keep the order of the adjectives, but tack them on to the end of the noun? Basically, 'house wooden small' versus 'house small wooden.'
hmmmm. I've been meaning to come up with another way of expressing multiple adjectives attached to one noun, but we'll go with the suffixing for now. You're right on the money on the adjective order. There should be one, as there is in English. You don't say the white big house, you say the big white house. I've forgotten the order of adjectives in English, but for now, just think of the adjective that's most integral to the noun and put that one closest to it.
try "pom" for "explode" or "blow up". It can be transitive or intransitive.
gosh how many time did this took? :ohmy.gif:
such a great work
Not long, really. About 10 minutes to complete as much grammar as detailed in the first post plus some more that I haven't mentioned yet. It took me longer to write the first post. I usually have ideas bouncing around my head all the time that don't really get written down, so it's more a matter of sketching it out when my muse decides to show up.
If more people are interested, I'll get a word list going and keep working on the grammar. keep in mind that things might change drastically as the language develops. (just like the game XD)
Another mind bending question is, Do the characters in minecraft perceive the world as we do when playing? Do they see everything as 3x3 cubes? Would they recognize concepts like spawning, chunks, and blocks that don't obay gravity, or is the blocky style just that, style, and the characters see the world as normal, or close to normal, if you count walking kamikaze shrubs? These are important questions when creating language.
Whoever watned to use this in a mod: Let me think about it. I don't want to end up like Alexi Pajitnov.
Artificial language as intellectual property is still a largely uncharted legal matter, and I think the only precedent we have is Na'vi from that horrible movie Avatar. I think there's some legal stuff going around that right now.
ok im glad that you actually took the time to do this but think about it players dont want to learn a new language we want to play minecraft learning an entire new language is insane
ok im glad that you actually took the time to do this but think about it players dont want to learn a new language we want to play minecraft learning an entire new language is insane
You didn't have to learn Na'vi to watch pokahontes in space er I mean avatar did you? Giving a fictional world a consistent language (or languages) gives it huge depth and makes it more compelling. Whether minecraft needs a language is another matter, but this is just a fun little project I'm on.
omg i bet if this is put in everyone is going to start posting on the forums in this language or worse.. Rosetta stone-Minecraftian, its cool though i suppport though its gunna get annoying studying 2 different languages in school
OK, so now creeper is "sessan" I liked the idea of geminating the second s. Also, I'll scrap the extra plural and just have words with more than 2 syllables use the 1st syllable reduplication thing.
Noun phrases with more than one adjective are all separate words instead of strung together. An exception is made for noun+posessive+adjective.
Some more grammar notes.
When you want to say noun A is noun B, the word order switches to Subject object verb.
Hasti sessan e. = The ghast is a creeper (yes, stupid, but I still need more vocab.)
change e to nen to make it negative
Nelki = to like/enjoy
o nelki sessantete
I like this creeper
To make a verb negative, you add an n at the beginning (and an i if necessary) as well as at the end. This is call a circumfix.
First off, ignore the haters. This is one of the most interesting and intellectual threads I've had the pleasure of reading and participating in.
As for how the Testificates see the world, I think it should be treated like the "Far-Lands" were treated pre-1.8. To clarify, "normal" things like the world being blocky and the ability to carry 400 cubes of solid rock should be treated as though they were inconsequential; simply an aspect of living in this blocky world. However, unusual things, things that the player encounters and understands are part of the game, should be seen as mystical and mysterious events to the npcs. I don't know how easy it is to make a word to mean "chunk generation" sound mystical, but you seem smart enough to figure it out. Maybe make them conglomerates of other words, the way people describe things in this world that are hard to understand. For example, rather than Victoria Falls (which is boring), the local name, Mosi-oa-Tunya, translates to The Smoke That Thunders (which is awesome). So, rather than chunk generation, they would call it something like "The land that appears." Blocks that don't obey gravity could be "The earth that flies." Those might be a little cheesy, but I hope it gives you something to work with.
On to vocabulary. I'm not, as you can probably tell, much of a linguist, but from every language class I've ever taken, there seems to be an important stress on the verb "to be." It seems like this would be a good next step. "The house is destroyed," "I am hungry," and so on. As for other vocab, these Testificates are still lacking some basic words of self-expression. Good, bad, and so-so are basic forms of being that could be added to conversational Minecraftian. We've got 'fahi' for fun, fa or fah could be 'good'. Since you've got 'n' and sometimes 'i' to negate a verb, 'ni' would be my logical choice for 'bad'. No suggestion for so-so.
here's a sketch of it so far. If enough people are interested, I could TRY to write a less technical introduction, but I'm not a teacher by any means.
PHONOLOGY
consonants: /p, t, k, f, s, x, m, n, l, r/ (all letters are written as in the IPA, except /x/ which is written <h> for aesthetic purposes.
vowels: /i, e, a, o/ (again spelled as in the IPA)
phonetactic constraints and allophones:
syllables can be (C)V(C) where the syllable coda cannot be a stop (p, t, or k) If a compound word or affix is appended to a word with a stop at the end, the stop changes to the corresponding fricative (/p/ > [f], /t/ > [s], /k/ > [x]).
However, all consonants can be geminated as in Italian, so "akka" is a valid string)
There are no diphthongs, so an epenthetic [k] is inserted between morphemes which would otherwise result in two vowels next to each other
[i] is used as an epenthetic vowel as well.
(for the one person who is still reading, the phonology of a language is how many sounds it has. Humans can produce ~150 sounds that are used in at least one language, but no language uses ALL of these sounds. Phonetactics (or phonetactic constraints) in a language say how these sounds are allowed to come together to form syllables and words. There are also features like tone and stress that are called supersegmetnal features, but sometimes tone can make a difference in meaning as in chinese, so can stress, as in Spanish (amo vs amó))
phonology and phonetactics are the two most important features when constructing a language that will be used in media, because it dictates how the language sounds to foreign ears. Do you want people to say "that sounds kinda like French" or "kinda like Hebrew", its all in the phonology and phonetactics.
This language will sound a bit like italian (because consonants can be long or short) and a bit like Japanese (because the syllable structure is so constrained), and perhaps a bit like Hawaiian (because there are so few phonemes)
Now on to the grammar!
word order in regular sentences is subject verb object, as in english.
ex: Hasti kek tokko. The ghast eats the wolf. (contrived, I know)
Adjectives can act like verbs in sentences like "the wolf is small", "is small" is a special kind of verb
ex: Tokko mekapi. The wolf is small.
If a noun with an adjective is the subject or object of a sentence, like "the small wolf runs", the adjective is added as a suffix to the noun
"tokkomekap" = "the small wolf".
It should be apparent by now that "Minecraftian" as I will call the language for now, does not have words for "a" and "the", just like Latin.
Nouns have 3 numbers: singular (which is unmarked), plural (indicated by reduplicating the root (saying the word twice)) and another kind of plural that I can't quite decide on yet, but for now, it's a collective plural like in some of Tolkien's languages, and it's formed by reduplicating the first syllable of the root minus the final consonant if there is one.
Tokko = the wolf/a wolf
tokkotokko = wolves
totokko = all the wolves/the whole group of wolves/ the wolves considered as a unit detc.
The present tense of verbs is unmarked
tokko kek = the wolf eats
past tense is formed by adding -am
tokko kekam = the wolf ate
reduplicating the verb changes it from simple aspict to continuous aspect
tokko kekkek = the wolf is eating (there's a difference between "I eat" and "I am eating")
It works for past tense as well, forming more or less the imperfect of Spanish or Latin.
tokko kekkekam = the wolf was eating.
That's about it for now. Wake up, wipe the drool off your keyboard, and tell me what you think! :smile.gif:
I'm making a villagers mod. May I use this in the mod to make them say things?!
Twitter: @iPixeliMC
class Language{
public static void main(String args[]){
System.out.println("Hello, steve");
}
}
Thanks! I minored in it, (majored in Spanish)
I'll try to flesh it out enough so people can use it to name things if they wish.
For now, here's some vocabulary and a few example phrases to get the idea of how to form compound words and descriptive nouns:
sah: house, shelter (think of the first dirt shack you put together on your very first night)
mekapi: small, little
sesan: creeper (think "sssssss BOOM!")
tokko: wolf (normally a tamed wolf)
nor: pig (think OINK)
mop: animal/monster (from "mob")
nedan: the nether (from Swedish)
mohe: cow (MOOOO)
kek: to eat
fahi (fun, entertaining)
posak: wood
O: I/me
Oko: We (exclusive)
i: you (singular
Iko we (inclusive)
tete: this (it acts like and adjective so it is attached to the end of a noun)
sarra: meat or flesh
(note that there are two words for "we". iko includes the listener in the group, and Oko excludes the listener. Oko kekkek means We are eating, but not you, and Iko kekkek means you and I, or you and us, are eating. Think of when you were a kid and your mom said "We're going to clean the house today", I always said "whose included in this "we"? :smile.gif:
Here are some compound words (two nouns mashed together to make a new noun)
mofnedan: nether monster (a nether mob like a ghast or blaze)
(note that in English, the main word comes last in the compound. A doghouse is a kind of house, not a kind of dog. It is the opposite here. The first word of the compound is the "head", so mofnedan is a "nether-mob" not a "mob-nether".
sahtokko: wolf shelter (that place you inevitably shove all your wolves when you realize they're more annoying than helpful.
One last note: Adjectives usually are written with a -i suffix. This is the form of the word when it is used like a verb. Tokko mekap-i means "the wolf is small. To make it past tense, chop off the -i and add -a. Tokko mekapa (the wolf was small) Another contrived example, I know. To say "the wolf is not small", you chop off the -i and add -nin, or -nan for past tense. "Tokko mepafnin" the wolf is not small.
Note also that the final -p changes to -f. This was discussed in the first post, because p t and k cannot come right before another consonant in the middle of a word. They can at the end of a word if the next word starts with a consonant, but in rapid speech, it would probably be switched to a fricative. (in linguistic terms, this is sometimes called "softening")
Sesan kekam O sahposamekapi.
The creeper ate my small wooden house.
I'm guessing you have a better way to use the possessive in mind, but it doesn't sound bad. It has a nice East Asian, almost Arabic sound to it. I can imagine villager's screaming this in terror, though they might use whatever "blew up" is. Also, how would you have arranged the "small wooden house?" Do you keep the order the same, just inverted? Or would you keep the order of the adjectives, but tack them on to the end of the noun? Basically, 'house wooden small' versus 'house small wooden.'
Mr./Ms./Mrs. Linguist Person, I'm shocked! We DO have the imperfect tense in English; it just can't be said in one word like in Latin and Spanish (can it in Spanish? Hey, I speak Latin, not Spanish :tongue.gif:). Here's a Latin-English comparison of the imperfect tense:
Latin: Portabam.
English: I was carrying. See?
Well, yes and no. The romance/latin imperfect bas a few different uses.
For instance. In spanish, you might say íbamos a la playa cada fin de semana. we WOULD go to the beach every weekend.
I also want to avoid making a 1:1 comparison between minecraftian and english.
Another little tidbit I forgot to mention is that the k epenthetic consonant changes to p when the previous consonant is a k. So we get tokkopo (my wolf) instead of tokkoko. Also note that possessive adjectives are just the regular pronouns suffixed to the word. Its a little like Hebrew or Arabic
hmmmm. I've been meaning to come up with another way of expressing multiple adjectives attached to one noun, but we'll go with the suffixing for now. You're right on the money on the adjective order. There should be one, as there is in English. You don't say the white big house, you say the big white house. I've forgotten the order of adjectives in English, but for now, just think of the adjective that's most integral to the noun and put that one closest to it.
try "pom" for "explode" or "blow up". It can be transitive or intransitive.
So we have Sesan poma sahomekap.
the creeper exploded my small house.
Not long, really. About 10 minutes to complete as much grammar as detailed in the first post plus some more that I haven't mentioned yet. It took me longer to write the first post. I usually have ideas bouncing around my head all the time that don't really get written down, so it's more a matter of sketching it out when my muse decides to show up.
If more people are interested, I'll get a word list going and keep working on the grammar. keep in mind that things might change drastically as the language develops. (just like the game XD)
Another mind bending question is, Do the characters in minecraft perceive the world as we do when playing? Do they see everything as 3x3 cubes? Would they recognize concepts like spawning, chunks, and blocks that don't obay gravity, or is the blocky style just that, style, and the characters see the world as normal, or close to normal, if you count walking kamikaze shrubs? These are important questions when creating language.
Artificial language as intellectual property is still a largely uncharted legal matter, and I think the only precedent we have is Na'vi from that horrible movie Avatar. I think there's some legal stuff going around that right now.
You didn't have to learn Na'vi to watch pokahontes in space er I mean avatar did you? Giving a fictional world a consistent language (or languages) gives it huge depth and makes it more compelling. Whether minecraft needs a language is another matter, but this is just a fun little project I'm on.
Noun phrases with more than one adjective are all separate words instead of strung together. An exception is made for noun+posessive+adjective.
Some more grammar notes.
When you want to say noun A is noun B, the word order switches to Subject object verb.
Hasti sessan e. = The ghast is a creeper (yes, stupid, but I still need more vocab.)
change e to nen to make it negative
Nelki = to like/enjoy
o nelki sessantete
I like this creeper
To make a verb negative, you add an n at the beginning (and an i if necessary) as well as at the end. This is call a circumfix.
O ninelkin sessantete.
I don't like this creeper.
As for how the Testificates see the world, I think it should be treated like the "Far-Lands" were treated pre-1.8. To clarify, "normal" things like the world being blocky and the ability to carry 400 cubes of solid rock should be treated as though they were inconsequential; simply an aspect of living in this blocky world. However, unusual things, things that the player encounters and understands are part of the game, should be seen as mystical and mysterious events to the npcs. I don't know how easy it is to make a word to mean "chunk generation" sound mystical, but you seem smart enough to figure it out. Maybe make them conglomerates of other words, the way people describe things in this world that are hard to understand. For example, rather than Victoria Falls (which is boring), the local name, Mosi-oa-Tunya, translates to The Smoke That Thunders (which is awesome). So, rather than chunk generation, they would call it something like "The land that appears." Blocks that don't obey gravity could be "The earth that flies." Those might be a little cheesy, but I hope it gives you something to work with.
On to vocabulary. I'm not, as you can probably tell, much of a linguist, but from every language class I've ever taken, there seems to be an important stress on the verb "to be." It seems like this would be a good next step. "The house is destroyed," "I am hungry," and so on. As for other vocab, these Testificates are still lacking some basic words of self-expression. Good, bad, and so-so are basic forms of being that could be added to conversational Minecraftian. We've got 'fahi' for fun, fa or fah could be 'good'. Since you've got 'n' and sometimes 'i' to negate a verb, 'ni' would be my logical choice for 'bad'. No suggestion for so-so.
Keep up the good work.