Download or read book The Conlanger s Lexipedia written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by . This book was released on 2017-07-15 with total page 420 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After creating a grammar, there's the 800-pound gorilla of the lexicon to deal with. This book gives you everything you need to know to create words. The first stop is etymology: it contains thousands of etymologies from a wide variety of languages. Borrow them or let them spark your own ideas! It's easy to let the lexicon be a coded version of your native language. The book contains tips on how to avoid this, including plenty of fascinating examples from non-English languages. You want to know which words to create first. It includes the 1500 words most commonly found in fantasy and science fiction, sorted by frequency. Many parts of the lexicon require real-world knowledge to handle. The Lexipedia contains just enough information on biology, physics, and human cultures to help you out. Plus, there's a discussion of the basic tools of the word creator: categories, metaphors, and derivation. Though aimed at conlangers, this book will be instructive and entertaining for anyone who's interested in words.

Download or read book The Language Construction Kit written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A guide to creating realistic languages for RPGs, fantasy and science fiction, movies or video games, or international communication... or just an unusual way to learn about how languages work.

Download or read book Advanced Language Construction written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by Createspace Independent Pub. This book was released on 2012 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The sequel to the Language Construction Kit: learn more about constructed languages and about linguistics: logic, pidgins and creoles, sign languages, the linguistic life cycle, and a meaty step-by-step survey of morphosyntax. Create detailed and plausible languages for RPGs, fantasy and science fiction, movies, or video games... or just learn more about how languages work with the same accurate yet fun approach as the original LCK.

Download or read book The Planet Construction Kit written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by . This book was released on 2010-10 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A companion volume to the Language Construction Kit, this book explains everything you need to know about creating your own world with its own geology, creatures, cultures, religions, technology, and styles of war- plus how to create maps, illustrations and 3-D models. An essential whether you're writing science fiction or fantasy, designing RPGs, creating movies or video games, or remodeling a spare asteroid.

Download or read book Langmaker written by Jeffrey Henning and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2020-02-08 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jeffrey Henning's Langmaker was a key resource for conlangers in the early 2000s. This book, from Yonagu Books, contains most of his writing for the site: All the issues of his Model Languages newsletter which introduced conlanging and linguistics to newcomers. Reviews of major conlangs that influenced this generation of conlangers, from Tolkien to Edgar Rice Burroughs to Richard Adams. Descriptions of Jeffrey's own languages, including Fith, Dublex, Kali-sise, Tev'Meckian, and Ilish. The material includes an entirely new chapter on case and a new conlang, Denju.In addition, the Conlangs at a Glance section of Langmaker has been reproduced and corrected. This is the listing of 1100 conlangs that were described on the site as of 2005- a wide variety of historical auxlangs, professional languages, and those contributed by readers during the heyday of the site. Your name may be here! "The best thing about Langmaker was its universality. From the beginning, conlanging and the conlang community have been prone to factionalism (cf. the Conlang-Auxlang schism of 1996). Langmaker somehow transcended that. Every conlanger from every conlang community-or from no conlang community-was welcome there, and every conlanger found value in it. It was the Rick's of conlanging." -from the preface by David J. Peterson, creator of Dothraki and author of The Art of Language Invention This book is part of conlanging history. If you've read the Language Construction Kit, it takes a naturalistic approach to conlanging. Jeffrey casts a wider net, being interested in philosophical languages (like his Roxhai), logical languages (such as the fascinating stack-based Fith), and auxlangs (Kali-sisi, Simpenga). And don't miss his playful Tev'Meckian, the language of Galaxy Quest.Though you can seek out much of this material by judicious use of the Wayback Machine, all the material has been edited, errors corrected, phonemes converted to IPA, and extra material included, such as more on how Fith works, and the Tev'Meckian lexicon. The Conlangs at a Glance section was largely rewritten to give more and better information on the languages included.

Download or read book Against Peace and Freedom written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by . This book was released on 2011-03-01 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It's the 50th century. Socionomics makes the fifty human worlds of the Incatena prosperous and stable, if a bit raucous on Saturday nights. But socionomics doesn't cover crises, such as the dictatorship that's taken over Okura, or the unscrupulous tycoon who's plotting something over on New Bharat. For that we have Diplomatic Agents. Like Morgan. Is Morgan up to the task? The boss isn't sure. The station AI is doubtful. But our best Agents are out of town; time to see what Morgan can do. "A science fiction comedy, set in a future where the speed of light is respected, though grudgingly, and lives are measured in centuries."

Download or read book The Syntax Construction Kit written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2018-11 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An accessible but incisive introduction to modern syntax and generative grammar, for conlangers and anyone interested in languages or linguistics. Syntax can be frustrating, because there are multiple schools that seem to fight over inessential things. I hope I can show you that this is normal for a new field, and that it actually makes syntax fun. New discoveries are being made, and you can participate- something that's a lot harder to do in, say, quantum mechanics. The emphasis here is on doing syntax-- learning how to make and how to evaluate syntactic arguments.What's in it? An introduction to the Chomsky Hierarchy, a classification of grammars that's used both in linguistics and computer science, as well as a comparison to other generative techniques, such as Markov text generators. A tour of Chomsky's methods- production rules and transformations- with overnight stays in the Syntactic Structures, X-bar, and Minimalist stages in his thought. A leisurely stroll through interesting bits of syntax: the English verbal complex, pronouns and other anaphors, relative clauses, quantifiers and more. The emphasis is on doing syntax- not just learning rules and drawing trees, but learning how syntactic arguments are made. An overview of alternatives to Chomsky's approach: generative syntax, cognitive linguistics, relational grammars, word grammar, construction grammar, Jackendoff's Simpler Syntax, and Comrie's universals. A chapter on production which asks, how real are these grammars? Do we really have syntactic categories and transformations in the brain, or in the genome? A chapter on how you can apply all this to your conlangs. The Syntactic Bestiary- an annotated list of transformations and constraints, which you can think about for conlanging, or use to evaluate syntactic theories. Plus, unlike most syntax textbooks, this one comes with a set of web toys so you can see the rules in action and write your own. It makes the ideas come alive much more than mere diagrams can.

Download or read book The Art of Language Invention written by David J. Peterson and published by Penguin Books. This book was released on 2015-09-29 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From language creator David J. Peterson comes a creative gui de to language constructio, offering an overview of language creation, covering its history from Tolkien's creations and Klingon to today's thriving global community of conlangers. He provides the essential tools necessary for inventing and evolving new languages, using examples from a variety of languages including his own creations.

Download or read book Linguistic Legitimacy and Social Justice written by Timothy Reagan and published by Springer. This book was released on 2019-02-28 with total page 448 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the nature of human language and the ideology of linguistic legitimacy – the common set of beliefs about language differences that leads to the rejection of some language varieties and the valorization of others. It investigates a broad range of case studies of languages and dialects which have for various reasons been considered 'low-status' including: African American English, Spanglish, American Sign Language, Yiddish, Esperanto and other constructed languages, indigenous languages in post-colonial neo-European societies, and Afrikaans and related language issues in South Africa. Further, it discusses the implications of the ideology of linguistic legitimacy for the teaching and learning of foreign languages in the US. Written in a clear and accessible style, this book provides a readable and pedagogically useful tool to help readers comprehend the nature of human language, and the ways in which attitudes about human language can have either positive or negative consequences for communities and their languages. It will be of particular interest to language teachers and teacher educators, as well as students and scholars of applied linguistics, intercultural communication, minority languages and language extinction.

Download or read book The World s Major Languages written by Bernard Comrie and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-04-17 with total page 1125 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The World's Major Languages features over 50 of the world's languages and language families. This revised edition includes updated bibliographies for each chapter and up-to-date census figures. The featured languages have been chosen based on the number of speakers, their role as official languages and their cultural and historical importance. Each language is looked at in depth, and the chapters provide information on both grammatical features and on salient features of the language's history and cultural role. The World’s Major Languages is an accessible and essential reference work for linguists.

Download or read book Middle East Construction Kit written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2021-10-25 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A very readable introduction to the ancient Middle East, for conlangers and anyone interested in history and languages. The regions covered are Egypt, Canaan/Israel, Mesopotamia, and Persia, from prehistory to the Greek conquest. The book covers literature, history, religion, and everyday life, and contains meaty grammatical sketches of Sumerian, Akkadian, and Biblical Hebrew, including an explanation of how cuneiform evolved and how it worked. This part of history is of particular interest because it's full of firsts- the first agriculturalists, the first cities, the first writing systems. It's also full of colorful characters, from Gilgamesh and Enkidu, to the first named poet Enheduana, to the female pharaoh Hatshepsut, to the surprisingly anti-royalist prophet Samuel.

Download or read book India Construction Kit written by Mark Rosenfelder and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2017-10-24 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An engaging introduction to India (and all of South Asia) for conlanger, conworlders, linguists, and anyone who'd like to learn more about the world. It starts with the topography and history of India, deals with all its major religions, and goes on to cover astronomy, mathematics, daily life, cuisine, clothing, and architecture. In addition there are meaty grammatical sketches of Sanskrit, Hindi, and Tamil, and a discussion of the writing systems that have been used in the subcontinent.

Download or read book The Routledge Companion to Imaginary Worlds written by Mark J.P. Wolf and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-09-27 with total page 446 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This companion provides a definitive and cutting-edge guide to the study of imaginary and virtual worlds across a range of media, including literature, television, film, and games. From the Star Trek universe, Thomas More’s classic Utopia, and J. R. R. Tolkien’s Arda, to elaborate, user-created game worlds like Minecraft, contributors present interdisciplinary perspectives on authorship, world structure/design, and narrative. The Routledge Companion to Imaginary Worlds offers new approaches to imaginary worlds as an art form and cultural phenomenon, explorations of the technical and creative dimensions of world-building, and studies of specific worlds and worldbuilders.

Download or read book A Fan s Guide to Neo Sindarin written by Fiona Jallings and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2017 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Enchanted with Elvish? This is Neo-Sindarin, the language as it has flourished on the Internet using Tolkien's creation as a roadmap. This book functions as a friendly introduction to the Neo-Sindarin community. Included is the most current information available to fans. Within explore Neo-Sindarin academics, learn simple linguistic concepts, practice useful phrases while studying grammar, and look at the world through Elven eyes: from how they count on their fingers to how they organize the cosmos. Govano ven! (Join us!)

Download or read book The Life of Slang written by Julie Coleman and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2012-03-08 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book traces the development of English slang from the earliest records to the latest tweet. It explores why and how slang is used, and traces the development of slang in English-speaking nations around the world. The records of the Old Bailey and machine-searchable newspaper collections provide a wealth of new information about historical slang, while blogs and tweets provide us with a completely new perspective on contemporary slang. Based on inside information from real live slang users as well as the best scholarly sources, this book is guaranteed to teach you some new words that you shouldn't use in polite company. Teachers, politicians, broadcasters, and parents characterize the language of teenagers as sloppy, repetitive, and unintelligent, but these complaints are nothing new. In 1906, an Australian journalist overheard some youths on a street-corner: Things will be bally slow till next pay-day. I've done in nearly all my spond. Here, now; cheese it, or I'll lob one in your lug. Lend us a cigarette. Lend it; oh, no, I don't part. Look out, here's a bobby going to tell us to shove along. What, he wondered, was the world coming to. For the 411, read on ...

Download or read book From Elvish to Klingon written by Michael Adams and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-10-27 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How are languages invented? Why are they invented? Who uses them? What are the cultural effects of invented languages? This fascinating book looks at all manner of invented languages and explores the origins, purpose, and usage of these curious artefacts of culture. Written by experts in the field, chapters discuss languages from Esperanto to Klingon and uncover the motives behind their creation, and the outcomes of their existence. Introduction by Michael Adams Linking all invented languages, Michael Adams explains how creating a language is intimidating work; no one would attempt to invent one unless driven by a serious purpose or aspiration. He explains how the origin and development of each invented language illustrates inventors' and users' dissatisfaction with the language(s) already available to them, and how each invented language expresses one or more of a wide range of purposes and aspirations: political, social, aesthetic, intellectual, and technological. Chapter 1: International Auxiliary Languages by Arden Smith From the mythical Language of Adam to Esperanto and Solrésol, this chapter looks at the history, linguistics, and significance of international or universal languages (including sign languages). Chapter 2: Invented Vocabularies: Newspeak and Nadsat by Howard Jackson Looking at the invented vocabularies of science fiction, for example 1984's 'Newspeak' and Clockwork Orange's 'Nadsat', this chapter discusses the feasibility of such vocabularies, the plausibility of such lexical change, and the validity of the Sapir-Whorfian echoes heard in such literary experiments. Chapter 3: 'Oirish' Inventions: James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, Paul Muldoon by Stephen Watt This chapter looks at literary inventions of another kind, nonsense and semi-nonsense languages, including those used in the works of James Joyce and Samuel Beckett. Chapter 4: Tolkien's Invented Languages by Edmund Weiner Focussing on the work of the accomplished philologist J.R.R. Tolkien, the fifteen languages he created are considered in the context of invented languages of other kinds. Chapter 5: Klingon and other Science Fiction Languages by Marc Okrand, Judith Hendriks-Hermans, and Sjaak Kroon Klingon is the most fully developed of fictional languages (besides Tolkien's). Used by many, this chapter explores the speech community of 'Trekkies', alongside other science fiction vocabularies. Chapter 6: Logical Languages by Michael Adams This chapter introduces conlangs, 'constructed languages'. For example, Láaden, created to express feminine experience better than 'patriarchal' languages. Chapter 7: Gaming Languages and Language Games by James Portnow Languages and games are both fundamentally interactive, based on the adoption of arbitrary sign systems, and come with a set of formal rules which can be manipulated to express different outcomes. This being one of the drivers for the popularity of invented languages within the gaming community, James Portnow looks at several gaming languages and language games, such as Gargish, D'ni, Simlish, and Logos. Chapter 8: Revitalized Languages as Invented Languages by Suzanne Romaine The final chapter looks at language continuation, renewal, revival, and resurrection - in the cases of Gaelic, Welsh, Cornish, and Breton - as well as language regulation.

Download or read book How We Talk written by N. J. Enfield and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2017-11-14 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An expert guide to how conversation works, from how we know when to speak to why huh is a universal word We all had teachers who scolded us over the use of um, uh-huh, oh, like, and mm-hmm. But as linguist N. J. Enfield reveals in How We Talk, these "bad words" are fundamental to language.Whether we are speaking with the clerk at the store, our boss, or our spouse, language is dependent on things as commonplace as a rising tone of voice, an apparently meaningless word, or a glance -- signals so small that we hardly pay them any conscious attention. Nevertheless, they are the essence of how we speak. From the traffic signals of speech to the importance of um, How We Talk revolutionizes our understanding of conversation. In the process, Enfield reveals what makes language universally -- and uniquely -- human.