you could use an abjad
Vincent Pistelli
wouldn't use very many vowels. Sorry if I am misunderstanding you, but
the idea I had was to use an abjad instead of an alphabet. In case you
do not know what an abjad is, it is where each grapheme represents a
syllable, so maybe the name of the language could sound something like
this: qu-wah-wah '(glottal stop) xo-ze-xo
Vincent Pistelli
am tired.
Alex Fink
>
> > I was thinking about your language and from just the name I figured it
> > wouldn't use very many vowels. Sorry if I am misunderstanding you, but
Hm, so 26 syllables in all? A rather limiting set, that is, and ... I
dunno, I just don't like the potential sound of each consonant being
bounden to precede the same vowel all the time, as you seem to
propose, the consonants still mostly having their normal values. It
would probably sound too artificial for me.
I may as well proclaim here my staunch support of not attempting to
seek sound values of qww'xzx letters that necessarily have precedent
among Roman scripts we know.
And I may as well put forth a thought of my own for a basic body type
for the sound-symbol correspondence, which is that each letter have
one consonantal and one vocalic value. Perhaps related (to the extent
they can be), perhaps not; perhaps allophonic (so that a letter could
read as C or V depending on the surrounds), perhaps not (so that each
stem would have fixed choices of C or V for each letter).
Alex-l
Brett Williams
Welcome, Vincent!
While I do agree with Alex that a syllabary would be too small & slow
for casual conversation with just 26 syllables, I think it might be
useful anyway. (Relatedly, I did think up one possible version of the
letters: You could say Alpha Bravo Charlie etc. That would be even
slower and more accurate.)
Would you like to invent a syllabary for us, Vincent, so we can test
it out? If you even just invented syllables for L, K and J that would
be enough to keep us for a while, and we could see how much use it was
getting by that point and decide whether to continue it.
<3,
mungojelly-l
Brett Williams
>
> I am sorry I meant a syllabary not an abjad.
Oh no problem. I didn't know the word "abjad" so I learned something. :)
> It is kind of late and I am tired.
What time zone are you in, Vincent? (How about you, Alex?) I'm in
EST, Vermont.
<3,
mungojelly-l
Brett Williams
>
> And I may as well put forth a thought of my own for a basic body type
> for the sound-symbol correspondence, which is that each letter have
> one consonantal and one vocalic value. Perhaps related (to the extent
> they can be), perhaps not; perhaps allophonic (so that a letter could
> read as C or V depending on the surrounds), perhaps not (so that each
> stem would have fixed choices of C or V for each letter).
I like the idea of there being allophonic choices. Allophony
fascinates me. And any time there's choices, I think that language
has a natural ability to flow into that space and beautify it.
Perhaps you could read a word xx'xxxx as either cv'cvcv or vc'vcvc or
even vc'vccv, etc.? If there were a lot of different ways to render a
word into sounds, then we'd gradually habituate ourselves to the most
beautiful ones. It's a lot easier to let a language clean itself up
like that, then to try to make it perfectly formed from the start. :)
<3,
mungojelly-l
Alex Fink
>
> I like the idea of there being allophonic choices. Allophony
> fascinates me. And any time there's choices, I think that language
> has a natural ability to flow into that space and beautify it.
It occurs to me that if each letter has a C and a V reading then
there's really quite a natural way to make a syllabary out of it, just
by catenating the C and V values of the letter. So perhaps qww'xzx
might have both this allophonic C-or-V form and a syllabary. I think
a syllabary is quite a useful thing to have around -- it would be good
for noisy channels where single phone pronunciations would get garbled
and misheard more easily.
> (How about you, Alex?)
I'm on Pacific time, but visiting the Central time zone till tomorrow
eve.
Alex
Vincent Pistelli
Vincent Pistelli
Vincent Pistelli
Brett Williams
> Sorry I didn't put all of my comments together, but on the subject of me
> making a syllabary, I will try if I have time. I am in eighth grade and I
> am loaded up with homework right now because state testing is in a few weeks
> and loads o tests are coming up, but I will still try when I have some free
> time.
There's no hurry;; This project isn't on any kind of timeline; just
sort of going along throwing things up and seeing what sticks;; Keep
your mind open; & maybe something will happen to occur to you that
might be useful to the progress of qww'xzx;; Even very simple ideas
could make a big difference in how we end up using the language;;
> Where should I post the syllabary if/when I finish it?
Here is fine;; There's a place to upload files I think if you have a
format other than text;; This group is going to stay here
indefinitely; as far as I know; though I don't know how we might end
up using it differently once we start some level-specific forums;;
I have a vision; that I'll share more as we go along; of a sort of
spreading network of internet ruins strewn along the highway (or
mountainous dirt path, or whatever it ends up) of the qww'xzx level
ladder;;; but this group is where we're having this historical
foundational conversation; so it will always be important to qww'xzx;;
Either qww'xzx will fall; as brave languages before it have; and this
group will be its whole record;;; or this seed will branch & grow &
this place will become a root; a place of history feeding that tree;;;
either way, it will be here;;
lll;;
<3,
mungojelly-l