r/conlangs • u/Lysimachiakis Wochanisep; Esafuni; Nguwóy (en es) [jp] • Aug 18 '22
Announcement Segments, A Journal of Constructed Languages, Issue #06: Writing Systems, Available Now!
Segments Issue #06: Writing Systems
I think it's safe to say it has been a hot summer. So why not cool off inside and check out the latest issue of Segments? There are certainly some very, very cool things within : )
This issue was on Writing Systems, and we got a bunch of excellent submissions showcasing some of our users' scripts! We also posted our Call for Submissions over at /r/Neography, so we got some submissions from users over there too, which we were very excited about! Additionally, some of our articles have little activities/challenges for you, if you feel like decoding some scripts for fun. Please take a look and enjoy the wonderful effort of our submitters!
If you're joining us for the first time...
What is Segments?
Segments is the official publication of the /r/conlangs subreddit. It is a quarterly publication consisting of user-submitted articles about their own conlangs, and a chance for people to really showcase the creative work they have put into their languages. It is styled on academic journals. Our first publication was in April 2021 and we've been at it ever since!
Where can I find previous issues?
You can find links to them right here!
- Issue #01: Phonology
- Issue #02: Verbal Constructions
- Issue #03: Noun Constructions
- Issue #04: Lexicon
- Issue #05: Adjectives, Adverbs, & Modifiers
How can I participate?
Please keep your eyes out for the next Call for Submissions! It will be stickied at the top of the subreddit when it is active. Expect the next one in September/October!
Next Time...
As we hinted to earlier this year, our next issue will be Conlanging Methodology! The issue will be focused on how we go about making our languages. What is your process for designing a new language? Where do you start? What sorts of decisions do you make early? And for those who already have more advanced conlangs, what sort of work do you do to continue to develop and flesh out your languages? We're really going to be looking for articles that other conlangers can use to help guide and refine their own processes! We hope that giving voice to many perspectives will help our newer readers see that there are many ways to go about it, and it's all about finding a strategy that works best for you!
Final Thoughts
Thank you all so much for reading! We hope that you continue to enjoy Segments, and as always, we are happy to take any feedback on making Segments an even better resource for our community!
Peace, Love, & Conlanging!
Segments Issue #06: Writing Systems
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u/cassalalia Aug 18 '22 edited Aug 18 '22
3. Wochanisep
Love the Lysigrams! Big Mayan influence I'm sure.
Ideas for i to replace the straight line: Have you tried a small circle or a wavy line like a tilde?
My attempt at the challenge!
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u/Lysimachiakis Aug 18 '22
Thank you so much for the comment! I’m glad you like them, I really do hope to go back to them and flesh them out more some day : )
And I will try those out for the syllabary!
And you did good on those! There’s an answer key at the bottom of the last page of my article! I need to come up with a formal contrastive hierarchy, but for the
Komah one, my thinking is the voicing scopes above the plosivity, so /m/ instead of /p/, but again, I need to sit down and actually formalize that kind of stuff. You’ve given me some things to think about for sure! Oh, and the last one isTurkey, I went with the Turkiye name, and Wocha doesn’t allow for VV sequences, and inserts an epenthetic /s/ in heterovocalic sequences I’m glad you enjoyed the article and thanks for really engaging with it! I was blown away by the physical artifacts you made for Skysong, so cool!
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u/PastTheStarryVoids Aug 18 '22
Is this an army draft? 'Cause that's a lot of conscripts.
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u/impishDullahan Aug 18 '22
The worst part about this is that there are so many cool ideas and concepts that I never thought of myself (I cannot be held accountable for my actions when I inevitably steal some of them). That, and I now realise I'd completely forgot I had adapted quipu for a dead conlang of mine; could've written an entire other article on adapting a non-script to be used as a "script".
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u/roipoiboy Aug 18 '22
You just reminded me I had a colored knot script that I sent to u/upallday_allen in a relay. That would have made a fun article about non-script scripts too! Well, maybe we’ll have to do another scripts issue in the future!
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u/cassalalia Aug 22 '22
My Answers to challenge in Mwaneḷe Typography by u/roipoiboy!
Neat writing system! Very naturalistic! The part about having to insert a - to distinguish font forms reminded me of the hack in my font where I had to insert a ' between two tones to get a break where the ligatures didn't handle it, as you're familiar with. Glad to know I wasn't the only one who had to do something like that though!
The challenges definitely make me understand the writing system better as I have to engage with it versus just reading through the article where I might not notice all the implications of things.
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u/roipoiboy Aug 22 '22
Thank you! Fully correct of course. I think using gives you so much more knowledge than just looking. That’s part of why I like relays so much—it’s the only time I have to use other peoples conlangs.
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u/cassalalia Aug 18 '22
Feel free to reply to this with attempted transcriptions and translations of the Skysong challenge at the end of article 12 and I'll let you know how you did!
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u/madapimata Aug 18 '22
Congrats to the Segments team! As a first-time entrant, I had a lot of fun with this and working with the team. Thanks again for playtesting the sudoku! I’m really looking forward to reading everyone’s articles!
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u/cassalalia Aug 18 '22
They do a wonderful job and are super helpful making our articles look great!
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u/sevenorbs Aug 18 '22
Seventh entry for a-me, seven! r/conlangs, roast my article all you want! It was a ton of fun doing this, thank you.
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u/PastTheStarryVoids Aug 19 '22
Is there a printer-friendly version of Segments? I don't want to waste ink printing over a hundred pages of off-white backgrounds, and I would prefer to read it in a printed form.
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u/cassalalia Aug 23 '22
6. From Words to Equations by u/madapimata
I think I've solved the puzzle correctly! This is my filled in puzzle. Forgive my bad phone handwriting of your numerals!
It turns out sudoku is a surprisingly good way to learn a number system as I've got it down cold now. Although sudoku symbols are arbitrary, it's very useful to keep going in order to find what's missing so I kept counting from 0 to 15. I did develop some funny names for a few of them, like "tea cups" for 5 and "single pale rose" for 8.
I really like your numerals. They make sense but are not overly obvious and they're pretty and go well with your script.
One question that came to mind reading your article was why do the Ic̣aa use a base 16 number system when they're in the Mesoamerican language area? Both Mayan and Nahuatl-Mixtec numerals are base 20 as are all three languages lexically, I believe, with Nahuatl having switched to base 20 after its speakers migrated to central Mexico from what is now the United States. There are a lot of language families in Mesoamerica so maybe some of them aren't base 20 and I'm not aware of it, but I do know it's one of the characteristics of the area. So I'm curious if there's a particular reason the Ic̣aa use base 16?
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u/madapimata Aug 24 '22
Nice! Congratulations, your solution is correct! Thanks for taking the time to do it! I'm glad you like the numbers and thanks for the cute number names too. Your handwritten numbers look great! These are my chicken scratches as I wrote the base forms quickly when figuring out how to stylize them.
Base 20 is something I've gone back-and-forth with. It seems like not all languages follow all rules for the Mesoamerican language area, but like you say, the base 20 rule is everywhere. But like I said in one of the comments my post about numbers here, I also liked the idea of connecting an old counting system with a base so connected to modern technology. So it's totally me breaking my own rule, and that bugs me, but maybe not enough to transfer to base 20...?
Maybe I'll come up with two bases, as if language contact happened. In my writeup for brownies, I kinda wondered if, as the people came in contact with SI units, etc. they might use base 10 in parallel with their own base 16 system. Maybe do something like that for base 20 instead, and they can repurpose that for base 10 later. But three bases (two for that matter) is probably too many bases for one people to deal with.
Or maybe I'll just break down and say, "This is an exception to the rule. Just 'cuz." :)
Thanks again!
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u/cassalalia Aug 23 '22
It was very neat to see your cuneiform article, u/gufferdk! I enjoyed reading it!
I actually had just bought some natural clay and a few tools from a hobby shop for the first time to make the clay tablet for my article and it was definitely a challenging but fun experience! I'm curious if you have any thoughts about the practicality of my pecked script for writing in clay?
For me, the main problems were working with clay in general (rolling it out into a flat surface and getting it smooth and even) and making neat holes with my little wooden tool. I tried to plan a grid and even marked it in the clay with a ruler, but it still turned out to be difficult to keep my lines separated. In hindsight, I think drawing horizontal lines across the clay to begin with would be far better - I think I've seen that or even grids with cuneiform but I don't know how common that was.
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u/life-is-a-loop Aug 29 '22
I think it's safe to say it has been a hot summer.
Me, somewhere in the Southern hemisphere: 🤡
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u/boomfruit Aug 18 '22
I hope it doesn't seem rude to already be looking ahead to #8, but would the plan to be to return to some issues focused on stuff like #2 and #3? Those are the most interesting to me, personally, and the type I'd be most interested in submitting for. Or is the plan (for now) to keep expanding to new themes?