Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

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LinguistCat
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by LinguistCat »

Currently mine is related to and based on Japanese so aside from some details, it's pronounced similar to Japanese. I might change some things about the phonology and such so that might change but probably still pronounceable.
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lsd
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by lsd »

...and do you try and speak or pronouce it
LinguistCat wrote: 08 Jun 2020 18:32 Currently mine is related to and based on Japanese so aside from some details, it's pronounced similar to Japanese. I might change some things about the phonology and such so that might change but probably still pronounceable.
and do you try to speak or pronounce it or is it all on paper...
Ælfwine
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Ælfwine »

Gothish is all on paper. I suppose if you can speak Dutch or Low German the conlang wouldnt be too hard to pronounce as it shares most of the same sounds (except for /T/). I cant speak either but i wonder if it would be mutually intelligible if i could.
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Chagen
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Chagen »

Yes, but I absolutely cannot distinguish /ʂ ʐ ʈʂ ɖʐ/ from /ɕ ʑ tɕ dʑ/ so it sounds pretty bad (they all just kinda become /ʃ ʒ tʃ dʒ/).
Nūdenku waga honji ma naku honyasi ne ika-ika ichamase!
female-appearance=despite boy-voice=PAT hold boy-youth=TOP very be.cute-3PL
Honyasi zō honyasi ma naidasu.
boy-youth=AGT boy-youth=PAT love.romantically-3S
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Parlox
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Parlox »

I can pronounce my main conlang, Gondolan, with little to no difficulty. It doesn't have a particularly hard phoneme inventory or phonotactics, the strangest thing there is /ʀ/ which is pretty easy for me to pronounce. Probably cuz I'm in love with it.

Although Celos can be kinda hard because of the voiceless nasals.
:con: Gândölansch (Gondolan)Feongkrwe (Feongrkean)Tamhanddön (Tamanthon)Θανηλοξαμαψⱶ (Thanelotic)Yônjcerth (Yaponese)Ba̧supan (Basupan)Mùthoķán (Mothaucian) :con:
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Nachtuil »

I do try to pronounce things yeah. Not necessarily to learn the languages of course. While I am mindful my own sense of what is cumbersome to say is based on the combined phonotactics of the languages I have experience with, I think it is helpful to give clues to what kind of restrictions or allophony may make sense. Also it can be fun. haha
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Alessio »

I try to pronounce my conlangs as much as possible, but I realize that I'm pretty limted in the number of phonemes that I can actually pronounce consistently. I especially have problems with palatalized/velarized/labialized/aspirated consonants and with most vowels that aren't present in my mother tongue (Italian). I've been trying to get started on Hycromin, a language with a pretty wide phoneme inventory, for quite a few months, but not being able to pronounce the words makes me give up after I've written only a few sentences. It's definitely a limitation I should try to overcome.
:ita: :eng: [:D] | :fra: :esp: :rus: [:)] | :con: Hecathver, Hajás, Hedetsūrk, Darezh...

Tin't inameint ca tót a sàm stê żōv'n e un po' cajoun, mo s't'armâgn cajoun an vōl ménga dîr t'armâgn anc żōven...
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LinguistCat
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by LinguistCat »

lsd wrote: 08 Jun 2020 18:41 ...and do you try and speak or pronouce it
LinguistCat wrote: 08 Jun 2020 18:32 Currently mine is related to and based on Japanese so aside from some details, it's pronounced similar to Japanese. I might change some things about the phonology and such so that might change but probably still pronounceable.
and do you try to speak or pronounce it or is it all on paper...
We are in a thread about whether we speak/pronounce our conlangs and I said mine is very pronounceable, as in I am able to correctly pronounce most of it. Which implies that yes, I do speak/pronounce it at least on occasion to check that it has the right feel and sound that I want. I'm sorry context and what I wrote was not enough for you to understand my meaning, lsd.

The only phoneme in its current form that I have trouble with is /r/ or /r:/ because I never learned to consistently roll r's, and the syllable structure is very simple so there are few if any clusters that would cause problems. But /r/ in short form ranges from /r~ɾ~ɺ/ so then only a proper /r:/ is hard for me.

But I am thinking of reworking things with a slightly different idea about segments. This might end up less pronounceable (by me) and therefor less likely to be spoken.
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Lambuzhao
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Lambuzhao »

KaiTheHomoSapien wrote: 27 Mar 2020 17:09 I mean "on paper" metaphorically, so that can include computer screens. [:)]

I'm just asking if anyone else ever tries to say the words and sentences they create? I don't mean that you necessarily have real-life conversations in your conlang, but whether you ever say anything you've created out loud at all, just to yourself, just to hear it. I like to hear the sound of my language, not just look at morphological tables (as much as I love those), so I often do try and pronounce words and sentences or recite declension tables to myself just for fun. Some day I'd like to write a song in my conlang.

One thing I've always been interested in would be to hear some recordings of people speaking their languages. [:O]
I read aloud things that I have translated into my conlangs. In a box in corner of storage Unit in the southron part of the city wherein I reside, ther are some auncientmost cassette tapes on which I have some recordings, some good, some not so good.

Regarding short poems, or song translations, as Kiwikami has said, I likewise do those exercises with the specific idea of reciting/singing them aloud.

As another avenue to push into the spoken/listening domains of :con: L2 acquisition, I have typed and played back conlang utterances of varying length in online TTS platforms. The trick is finding the natlang(s) that come closest to your con lang in question. But, once you've found it/them, you can experiment with different speaker voices (male/female, old/young) and challenge your listening comprehension via playback at different speeds.


As a High School language teacher, I got put through the paces during the recent COVID-19 Quarantine. But, one of the good things to come out of it (besides a consistent paycheck) was that I learned about some sweet new online tools. I hope to delve more into actually recording dialogues using TTS voices or my own (I enjoy doing various voices/impressions)… something which I have said I'd do every summer since… ooooh, 2012 (¡!¡)

PS:

I have in the past "spoken" (i.e. responded in written form) in other people's conlangs on CBB and ZBB in small tidbits (usually on the respective Conversation/Practice threads). That experiment was a very challenging and interesting, to say the least.
[:D]
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Khunjund »

I always make sure I can pronounce everything in my conlangs. I use it as a kind of rule on what I’m “allowed” to have or not, and it helps me both shape the phonotactics of the language and practice my IPA pronunciation.

Also, I’ve seen a couple conlangs here and there for which the phonemic/phonetic transcriptions looked like an alphabet soup of secondary articulations and stuff, and I can’t help but think that they would benefit from going through this kind of filter. Then again, if that’s how their creators want them to be, who am I to judge.
Fluent: :ca-qc: :eng: | Learning: :jpn: | Interested: :ara: :chn: :rus: :hkg: :ind: :por: :deu: :tha: :tur: :vie: :kor: :swe: :pol: :rou: :fin: :esp: :isr: :nga: :irl: :ita: :tib: :ell: :eth: etc.
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by silvercat »

Mine are mostly on paper, but I've recorded a few Nyjichun words for the lexicon. I should pronounce all my conlangs more because I always forget the vowels.
my pronouns: they/them or e/em/eirs/emself
Main conlang: Ŋyjichɯn. Other conlangs: Tsɑkø (naming language), Ie, Tynthna, Maanxmuʃt, Ylialis
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Porphyrogenitos
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Porphyrogenitos »

I've never fleshed out a conlang enough to compose more than a tentative two-word sentence, but when thinking about conlang ideas, I do usually limit myself to things I feel confident pronouncing - because I do like to be able to say things in my conlangs out loud.
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by prettydragoon »

Sure I do. Of course, Rireinutire has fairly simple phonotactics, so even I can pronounce it.
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eldin raigmore
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by eldin raigmore »

None of my conlangs have much vocabulary yet.
The words they do have are all easy for me to pronounce understandably,
but not necessarily easy for me to pronounce correctly.
Of course I’m the only one who knows I’m saying them wrong!
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Larryrl »

I pronounce the words to my Shu language as often as I can, either out loud or to myself in my head. The goal it to become fluent, and of course to finish the conlang. Shu is also on paper, which I printed from either word or excel, sometimes both. My Shu grammar can be downloaded here.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ubfktu5u5ho9g ... r.pdf?dl=0
Bu mac zoom pana shem.
Me too sexy for shirt.
Bu mac zoom pana shem.
Me too sexy for shirt.
Kle mac bu run
So sexyI hurt


Beef steak is good
wos pis ho tu
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eldin raigmore
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by eldin raigmore »

I always work on pronouncing individual phonemes.
My diligence pretty much ends there.
I try to pronounce individual words, but that’s more aspirational than actual. Names get the most attention.
Full sentences are rather hit-or-miss.
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Flavia »

I only have conlangs with phonemes I can pronounce. I've created many sketches with implosives/epiglottals/anything I can't pronounce, but it seems I scrap such langs more early than others.
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Yagia1 »

I can pronounce my conlang, even speak some simple sentences without having the text written down first. When I hear my own words, they sound like a mixture of Italian and new Greek, but yet without any acquaintance. Someone else wouldn't understand one syllable. Feels nice [;)]
conlang: Vayardyio.
Affacite iago Vayardyio fidigou dicronésara !

native: :nld: fluent: :eng: :fra: :deu: can read: :ita: :esp:
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by Lorik »

Yup, I really like hearing the sound of my conlangs. In fact, I often speak to my horse (yes, the one on my profile picture) in Lohdan (not when other people are around, of course).
Native: :bra: | Fluent: :eng: :fra: | Intermediate: :rus:
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Re: Does anyone else try and actually speak or pronounce their conlang or is it all on paper?

Post by aliencadaver »

I can't fully pronounce the Flowering Speech, but I give it my best! I don't have much to the language so far besides an inventory of syllables and a script that I'm continually in the process of refining and remaking, so I can't do any real speaking in the language aside from listing names - that said, I do go through the syllable inventory and try to pronounce all of them as best I can. It helps me make sure that each syllable sounds like it 'belongs' in the language, and also helps me cut out combinations of vowels that would be impractical or impossible to pronounce within one syllable.

I'm able to pronounce most vowel combinations well enough, or at least I can get close enough that it lets me vividly picture how a syllable might sound coming from someone who's actually fluent in the Flowering Speech! What's really keeping me from getting it right on my own is that I cannot for the life of me produce a trilled R, and the letter 'R' in my romanization system always indicates a voiced alveolar trill.
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