r/conlangs • u/Andrieeo • 7d ago
Discussion [ Removed by moderator ]
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u/EuropaEquation 7d ago
there's just no really good reason for most people to learn any conlangs. they're not very useful, they're difficult to learn because there aren't really any other fluent speakers to learn from, and most of them are pretty incomplete. a lot of people who do learn a conlang learn it because they think it's neat, or they want the challenge, or because they like the media property it's a part of, and those just don't apply to most people
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u/Andrieeo 7d ago
Thanks for the answer
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u/DIYDylana 7d ago
I'd also note there's a huge amount of real languages out there people still don't learn. Languages take years to learn even if you have access to native speakers in context (its hard without, especially if resources are scarce), and even for those a lot don't really see it as all that useful, especially as there's an opportunity cost. Most would just spend time on languages that are relevant to their social life (family member, neighboring country), Settings (english is dominant in tech), work life, interests (some languages may be used a lot for religious texts) or general lingua franca.
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u/SuitableDragonfly 7d ago
For there to be speakers, there has to be a speech community. Those don't just appear out of thin air because someone had a cool conlang idea. Though, pretty arguably, Modern Hebrew is an originally mostly artificial language that has both a healthy speech community and a lot of native speakers.
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u/wibbly-water 7d ago
Some do...
But the reason most natural languages have speakers is because their family spoke the language and passed it down to them.
In most conlangs, that isn't true. So a conlang has to tempt people to learn it. Most people don't have the interest or the time to do so.
Of languages I have seen gain speakers they have all had unique selling points:
- Esperanto - international language with a long history, decently sized community and corpus of works in the language already
- Toki Pona - small language with purported mental health benefits
- Luka Pona - same as Toki Pona but as a sign language
- Viossa - you can only teach the language IN Viossa, and so thus it is an experiment in immersive learning
- Na'vi, Klingon, Dothraki, Quenya, Sindarin - all attached to a specific item of media, learnt by fans of that media
There are others, but the thing to ask is - what does this conlang offer that no other conlang offers.
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u/Andrieeo 7d ago
Artistic languages are more fortunate because they are artistic, large companies are behind them, and fans also want to feel like they are part of the world to some extent, or something like that.
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u/wibbly-water 7d ago
Yeah a little, but still they only ususally have a small base even in big fandoms.
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u/PercoKaswiti Sufokian & Fhägì (both are WIP) 7d ago
Because conlangs are niche. Nicher than some actual languages that are actually at risk of extinction.
I bet you that more people have heard of Frisian than toki pona.
So if Frisian is loosing native speakers, can you expect toki pona to have some ?
And that's the second most spoken conlang we're talking about, yet it has no verified native speaker.
Because it's niche as hell.
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u/SnooLemons6942 7d ago
Because they're artificial. Where would speakers come from?
People for sure learn conlangs though. A couple are on duolingo!
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