July 2004 Weblog

July 2004 Weblog	Advanced
This Month's Posts: Excavating Babel · Conlang Linkapalooza · Mailing It In · Lost in Translation · Neography Neophytes Need Neon Lights · Checking the Checks · The Patchwork Words of Oz Next Month's Entries Excavating Babel - 7/18/04 - 9:06 am In a recent CONLANG-L post, I came across a reference to Tarnese, which at the time sounded to me like it was a Narnian language. It isn't, being instead Etak's conlang, of which only a Babel text is online. I found the Babel text by searching the CONLANG-L archives, at which point I realized that there were quite a few Babel texts there that no one has ever indexed. So I've divided up the archive and am looking for volunteers to search for other Babel texts that aren't currently indexed. Contact me if you are interested in helping with this archeological project. Conlang Linkapalooza - 7/18/04 - 1:06 am In 1999 when I scoured the home pages of Chris Bogart, Dirk Elzinga, Rick Harrison, Donald Harlow and Richard Kennaway for links to conlangs, I never imagined that they would all stop updating their link pages. In fact, when I first unveiled my ModLang Links: Afrihili to Zireenka, I pointed back to them, saying, "Check out their pages for different perspectives on these languages and for languages that I missed." These different perspectives -- different ways of organizing and presenting conlang links -- are still valuable. In fact, Google rates three of these sites higher than Langmaker.com for "conlang", even though all have been abandoned. In an effort to preserve these perspectives and pay homage to these sites, I'm rolling out a new feature on Langmaker: conlang pages structured and inspired by them. The new listings are: Conlang Directories - Chris Bogart's Constructed Human Language page (last updated 1998) is what you get if you go to Google, type "conlang" and click "I'm Feeling Lucky". His clean, simple pages organized languages by their types. Conlangs At A Glance - Richard Kennaway's Constructed Languages List (listings last updated 2003) gave sample quotations from many languages, giving you a flavor for each conlang in a powerful way. Conlang Yellow Pages - Joshua Shinavier's Yellow Pages (last updated 2001) provided a quick, colorful overview of the conlangs on the Web, listing their name and type. If you've linked to any of these obsolete sites, I encourage you to change that link to the appropriate new Langmaker.com directory. I promise to keep it updated. Mailing It In - 7/17/04 - 9:45 am Thomas Weir has shown an innovative way for the busy conlanger to document his (or her) language. The home page for Phaleran consists of links to archives from the CONLANG mailing list. He occasionally posts to CONLANG in detail about an aspect of one of his languages and then updates his language page with a link to the archived post. Pretty clever. Lost in Translation - 7/15/04 - 9:21 pm Lueyee writes, When the Babel text is translated from anything but the original Hebrew, it becomes less accurate. A translation from a translation is always less than optimal. However, not all can be expected to know Biblical Hebrew, and therefore the use of appropriate translations is easier if less accurate. Which would be more recommended for conlangers? The other problem with translating from translations is the difference between translations, even ones in the same language. Thus people are translating from different sources, leading to an even greater discrepancy in the content of Babel text translations. The phenomenon you refer to is actually part of a conlanger game known as the translation relay. Someone out there should host a Babel Text relay to see how far the drift can be taken. But for those of you serious about making an accurate translation, your best bet is to refer to multiple texts when translating. For instance, I used four English translations to prepare my Nadsat translation. Neography Neophytes Need Neon Lights - 7/14/04 - 8:54 pm Barry Garcia lights the path for you to take to create your own neography. His recent post on CONLANG-L illuminates the eight steps he follows in creating neographies such as Shukaraz. Checking the Checks - 7/04/04 - 9:36 pm Every now and then someone writes me to ask why we've unchecked items they've checked in their Conlang Profile. For consistency across our 1000+ profiles, we actually have some guidelines that we follow: Help Us Keep the Index Updated. The Patchwork Words of Oz - 7/01/04 - 11:36 pm John Osman of Australia writes, "The word in the B section - baka ('a kind of silly stupid') is simply the Japanese word for 'fool'. It can also refer to 'foolishness' or 'absurdity' in general. I believe you've been had." To which I replied, "The site is for invented words, so inventing an English word baka based on the Japanese term is completely acceptable by the rules of the entry. Most of the submissions are nonce words, though some are slang terms actually in use (e.g., metrosexual)." John wrote back, "Thank you for your prompt reply to my email about the inappropriateness of simply adopting a word from a foreign language and giving it the status of a neologism. Of course it's your website, and you set the rules regarding what's acceptable and what isn't. But don't you agree that there's no creativity in the practice I've just described? Where's the wit? Where's the novelty? Nonce or word or not, surely you agree that such a practice takes the neo out of neologism." To which I replied, "Well I guess I still disagree with you, John, since many English words have been borrowed from other languages. Think of billabong, budgerigar, dingo, kangaroo, koala, kookaburra, waddy, and wallaby. They were all neologisms in their day. Thanks for rement, and I hope you don't mind the liberty I took with polypromise." Prior Month's Entries

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