Spoken Languages In The Honorverse ...

John Prigent wrote:I don't know if their system has changed since I was there many years ago, but Tanzanian friends told me that they have two official languages - English and Kiswahili - that are taught in schools, plus whichever of the tribal/local languages is learnt and used at home.
Cheers
John

It is interesting that in the Philippines, that Tagalog, an official language has an immense amount of English in it. If you know English, you can follow Tagalog at least partially and obtain context. No, not full understanding. When I was over there I was frankly a bit shocked. Then again it partly makes sense as Philippines, like India has an enormous number of languages and quite often not the warmest regards for one another historically. AH dictatorships..... Finglish is alive and well.

Then again, Jamaicans supposedly speak English, and I can honestly say, the several times I have listened to them(neighbors and their close friends that visit often) I was utterly clueless what they were saying. Yea, it is supposedly a creole language, but for all I knew it was Mandarin.

PS. I have spent quite a bit of time in Central America and speaking listening to Spanish. It is not that hard to learn more languages. But then, I also pick it up quickly. My father and brother on the other hand are hopeless. Then again they also both had problems in school listening to a teacher, but rather did just fine learning on their own. So, what is the bell curve for how we learn and retain information? Me, or my brother and father... Mother has no problems either. Sister, no problems.

Relax wrote:PS. I have spent quite a bit of time in Central America and speaking listening to Spanish. It is not that hard to learn more languages. But then, I also pick it up quickly. My father and brother on the other hand are hopeless. Then again they also both had problems in school listening to a teacher, but rather did just fine learning on their own. So, what is the bell curve for how we learn and retain information? Me, or my brother and father... Mother has no problems either. Sister, no problems.

There is no truly solid research on that, but studies suggests the vast majority of people have no problems learning 2-3 languages to a fully fluent level.

And for a comparison of what is definitely realistic, if you look at sailors from before 17th century, it was quite normal being fluent in at least 2-3 languages, and being able to speak at least another 2-4, overall, being able to get along with people in 4+ languages seem to have been the norm, with decent knowledge in 6-9 languages not rare.

I wonder how many undocumented languages there are in the Honorverse. It is hard to think that there aren't other non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species.

FYI.

I am getting married in Fuerteventura this weekend, an island in the Canaries. My parents were married there. I am part Native American and one of the Islands is home to a whistling language.

On the island of La Gomera there is a language used to communicate over the large distances across valleys called “Silbo Gomero“. My parents were very interested in this language. There is a 10 minute video link embedded part way the page.

http://everything-everywhere.com/2011/0 ... y-islands/

cthia wrote:I wonder how many undocumented languages there are in the Honorverse. It is hard to think that there aren't other non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species.

There wouldn't be many non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species, since there are only 27 intelligence species discovered in total. At least some of them probably have verbal languages.

One example, though, is the pidgin language used on Medusa, which includes both verbal and gestural components.

SWM wrote:

cthia wrote:I wonder how many undocumented languages there are in the Honorverse. It is hard to think that there aren't other non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species.

There wouldn't be many non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species, since there are only 27 intelligence species discovered in total. At least some of them probably have verbal languages.

One example, though, is the pidgin language used on Medusa, which includes both verbal and gestural components.

Don't forget our resident treecat language. What's the formal name for the treecat language - empatho, telepatho

cthia wrote:I wonder how many undocumented languages there are in the Honorverse. It is hard to think that there aren't other non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species.

Someone made a fanfic with a planet that ended up using one of the elven languages from Tolkien as their primary.

And the funny thing is, if something like that happens for real, i wouldn´t be even the slightest surprised.



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One example, though, is the pidgin language used on Medusa, which includes both verbal and gestural components.

Didn´t that include smell somehow as well? Or was that somewhere else...

cthia wrote:

SWM" quote="cthia wrote:I wonder how many undocumented languages there are in the Honorverse. It is hard to think that there aren't other non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species.

There wouldn't be many non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species, since there are only 27 intelligence species discovered in total. At least some of them probably have verbal languages.

One example, though, is the pidgin language used on Medusa, which includes both verbal and gestural components.

Don't forget our resident treecat language. What's the formal name for the treecat language - empatho, telepatho [/quote]



The treecats language is not a spoken language. They didn't have a perceivable language until Dr. Arif invented TSL.

cthia wrote:

SWM" quote="cthia wrote:I wonder how many undocumented languages there are in the Honorverse. It is hard to think that there aren't other non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species.

There wouldn't be many non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species, since there are only 27 intelligence species discovered in total. At least some of them probably have verbal languages.

One example, though, is the pidgin language used on Medusa, which includes both verbal and gestural components.

Don't forget our resident treecat language. What's the formal name for the treecat language - empatho, telepatho [/quote]

saber964 wrote:The treecats language is not a spoken language. They didn't have a perceivable language until Dr. Arif invented TSL.

My apology saber, I led the current discussion away on a tangent from the thread subject.

cthia wrote:

SWM wrote:There wouldn't be many non-verbal languages developed from non-Terran species, since there are only 27 intelligence species discovered in total. At least some of them probably have verbal languages.

One example, though, is the pidgin language used on Medusa, which includes both verbal and gestural components.

Don't forget our resident treecat language. What's the formal name for the treecat language - empatho, telepatho

I wasn't forgetting treecat sign language--I was taking it as a given, assuming that was what inspired your question.

[quote="JohnRoth"]

This is one of the myths of Arabic. People in the Islamic countries do not speak Q'ranic Arabic, they speak a local dialect that isn't the same as the one in the neighboring country, and is usually mutually incomprehensible. Tower of Babel all over again.

As far as learning classic Arabic, children are taught to sight read and pronounce it to the extent needed for the mandatory prayers and other passages they need to memorize and regurgitate. Know what it means? Heaven forfend! Their local religious authorities will tell them what it means.

Now, obviously there are scholars, educated people, and a great many etceteras who can actually read Classic Arabic and understand it, but that isn't typical for the average citizen.

John, that's not quite the case. Standard Modern Arabic is based upon Quranic Arabic - there are substantial differences, of course, but the degree of divergence is similar to that between Queen's and Australian English. SMA is the language of politics, media, international business (among Arab countries), and the upper classes, while the regional vernaculars are spoken by the masses. Everyone, or almost everyone, understands SMA and most of the urban population can at least speak it, but the language of the streets tend to be the vernacular.

Interestingly, some 'dialects' of Arabic - Yemeni, for instance - are not at all descended from Quranic Arabic but rather from sister languages thereof, but because of Quranic Arabic's historical importance and influence, the close relationship between the ancestral languages and Quranic Arabic, the impact of modern Arab nationalism and the dominance of SMA those 'dialects' are generally regarded as Arabic.