Talk:International auxiliary language

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Hallmarks of a good auxlang

I added the following info. User DenisMoskowitz deleted it.

1. Are the words easy to pronounce? Are there any consonant clusters?
2. Is it easy to understand fast speech? Are the boundaries between the words obvious even if you do not know the words?
3. Is it easy to make compound words? How long are these compound words?
4. If you do not know a word and do not know its morphemes, can you tell if it is an adjective, a noun, or a verb? Can you tell if it is a compound word?
5. Are there any mnemonic links between the morphemes that make it easier to memorize the morphemes? Are there any rules that minimize the burden of memorizing the morphemes?
6. Is it possible to make arbitrarily long and arbitrarily complex sentences that have clear, unambiguous meaning?
7. Is the auxlang culturally neutral, or does it sound like a relic of colonialism?
8. Is it terse?

____________

This Wikipedia article pertains almost exclusively to constructed auxlangs. Learning a new language is a great effort, so it is only natural to try to find out which constructed auxlang is the best before learning it. The Wikipedia article, in its old form, gives no clue how to find the best constructed auxlangs. It gives the impression that the auxlangs are chosen the same way as religions. If you do not like my yardsticks, change them, or make your own, but do not delete the entire chapter.Quinacrine 20:36, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

This addition consists entirely of opinions about what makes a "good" auxlang. Good for what purpose? According to who? I'm sure that many auxlangers would disagree about many of these points, which is why we don't put opinions and original research into wikipedia articles. If you have a citable statement to add, such as "According to the Foobar University Auxlang Study Group's 1978 experiments (link), lack of consonant clusters ease learning of auxiliary languages" then please add it. Wikipedia's function is not to tell people how to find the "best" constructed auxlangs, and it's not the place to put anyone's personal yardsticks, yours or mine. DenisMoskowitz 21:15, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

It would not be bad to have a section on "Design criteria", but it needs to be written neutrally and sources to particular writings by particular people who argue for specific design criteria. I think we could easily find cites from LL Zamenhof, Otto Jesperson, Edward Sapir, Alexander Gode, Rick Harrison, and some others; would those sources be sufficient to make such a section broadly-based and neutral enough? --Jim Henry (talk) 19:50, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

History

I've just realized how bad the history section is. I've made some local tweaks for better wording, but it needs to be totally rewritten. The opening section with the two quotes just doesn't go anywhere or say anything substantial, as it is. The table could stay, but the most important parts of it (re: Solresol, Volapuk, Esperanto, Ido and Interlingua) need to be expanded into substantial, sourced and cited narrative text, and new material on the recent explosion of non-Euroclone "worldlangs" on the Internet needs to be written (e.g. Vorlin, Ceqli, Ilomi, etc.; this recent stuff probably can't be sourced to as venerable sources as the earlier stuff, mainly to postings on the AUXLANG mailing list, which should also be mentioned in this history). I'm planning to re-read Eco's Search for the Perfect Language at some point, and could revisit this then; meanwhile I hope someone who owns some other relevant books, or whose library has them, will do something to this disgraceful mess. --Jim Henry (talk) 00:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Criticism section

I've expanded the criticism section. However, I'm not sure some of what I added there shouldn't go in the Classication section instead. Thoughts? --Jim Henry (talk) 17:40, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

"One criticism already prevalent in the late 19th century, and still sometimes heard today, is that an international language might hasten the extinction of minority languages." -Not sure I agree with this. Citation needed.

Do you mean that you don't agree with the criticism or you don't agree that it dates back to the 19th century and that people still make this criticism today? I have cites for both facts, already in the article; see below.

One response has been that, even if this happens, the benefits would outweigh the costs;[17][19]

-these citations are not in english, so I dont know how to verify them

another, that proponents of auxlangs, particularly in the Esperanto movement, are generally also proponents of measures to conserve and promote minority languages and cultures.

-doesnt make much sense in context. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.230.107.183 (talk) 05:49, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia would be an impoverished encyclopedia if the only facts considered verifiable were the ones published in English.

As for the response "proponents of auxlangs, particularly in the Esperanto movement, are generally also proponents of measures to conserve and promote minority languages and cultures" -- I somewhat agree that it isn't a perfectly cogent response to the objection; Vinko Ošlak, whose long article I cited there, argues against it, saying that even if most Esperanto speakers are nice people and don't intend any harm, that doesn't prove that Esperanto wouldn't have the same harmful effects as English, French, Spanish etc. in suppressing minority languages if it were spoken as widely or even more so. But it is a response to that objection that some Esperanto speakers make, and Wikipedia shouldn't go so meta, in my opinion, as to criticise in its own voice the responses to the criticism. It should only cite the criticisms and the responses that are made to the criticisms. I'll try to dig up my copy of Ošlak's article and see what sources he cites for the people who fear an auxlang would hasten extinction of minority languages and those who argue against it; but in any case I think his article alone is citation enough for both the criticism and the response, though more cites would be nice to have. Zamenhof (1903) also discusses the same criticism, which is evidence for its dating from the 19th century. --Jim Henry (talk) 19:41, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Latin as an international language

Wasn't Latin used as a sort of international language at one point? It is not a constructed language, so it would be an oddball in this article, but I believe that at one point, when scholars published works that they believed would be of international significance, they would often publish them in Latin. Take for example "Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica" by Isaac newton. He was an English scholar, but he published the book in Latin (Don't know Latin, and never read the book, but I'm pretty sure it was in Latin!) I also believe that at one point Latin was a very common (or even standard) part of western education. I think that it is reasonable to assume that part of the reason for this was to facilitate international communication. Sure, it was a language for scholars mostly, but it was international, and auxiliary, so it may have a place in this article beyond just being the basis for many other languages. --SCooley138 (talk) 08:49, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I think what you're looking for can be found under lingua franca, which is to say natural languages that are used cross-culturally for trade or scholarship. --199.185.132.4 (talk) 17:37, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, that is what I was looking for. However, it makes me wonder about the title of the article. Perhaps it should be 'Constructed international auxiliary language' as lingua franca and and International auxiliary language are functionally equivalent. The main difference being that one is natural, and the other is not. This is especially true of the modern use of Latin, as it is a dead language, and no one speaks it as a mother tongue. SCooley138 (talk) 09:05, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Sorry. What's the Point?

I came here to understand the point. Specifically, to understand why anyone should learn an IAL. To be honest, I still don't understand. Maybe this is a failure on my part to agree with the need for IAL's; maybe it is a failure of the article to clearly explain the reason behind them; maybe it is a failure of the IAL's in general. I speak Spanish and Portuguese. If I was going to "pick-up" another language, German or French would be more helpful. It seems that by far, the most common auxiliary language (perhaps it is approaching internationalism) is English. It seems to be the most widely accepted and preferred auxiliary language in South America, Europe, Africa and to a lesser extent the Middle East (I haven't been to the far east). This discussion section isn't intended to be a criticism. I'm just highlighting my unanswered questions. --Lacarids (talk) 13:25, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Adjuvilo

The language "Adjuvilo" was created in the year 1910 and not like in the article stated 1908 by Claudius Colas. The book of Colas on Adjuvilo was published 1910. It was designed as "reformed and simplified Ido". The theory that it was invented to confuse Idists has no sufficient proof. Valodnieks (talk) 23:09, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Objective criteria to admit an auxlang at the list of the most notable in history

I suggest the following levels of importance:

1. Top level: those having an own Wikipedia (Volapük, Esperanto, Ido, Interlingue, Novial, Interlingua, Lojban).
2. Those having an official language code by ISO [1]
3. Those having at least their own article at Wikipedia.
4. Insuficient level: those having not an own Wikipedia, not a language code by ISO, not an own article at Wikipedia. These, in my opinion, should be out of the list.

Any further criteria will be welcome. --Xabadiar (talk) 09:51, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

What's the different between the last two levels if anyone can create an auxlang or edit Wikipedia? I think that my particular keyboard setup is the best, but writing an article (on wikipedia or elsewhere) does not make it noteworthy enough. Real objective measurements include statistics on the well-knownness/compleness/active use of a particular auxlang. 220.253.57.75 (talk) 13:52, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

"Having their own Wikipedia" and "having an article at Wikipedia" are kind of self-referencing, which is against policies. I'm not so very sure about the ISO code either - it's a pretty weird collection over there: some were added just because someone mentioned them on a mailing list, others were added because someone took the effort to apply for one officially. I'm afraid there are only two things that really can make a difference: that's a) number of users (both now and in the past), and b) coverage in books, the media, scientific press etc. —IJzeren Jan _Uszkiełtu? 21:53, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I would suggest that a "most notable" project ought to be at least ten years old — long enough for the buzz of novelty to fade. —Tamfang (talk) 04:01, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Another criterion (easy to meet): is it on Mark Rosenfelder's list? —Tamfang (talk) 04:18, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Constructed languages. Presence on the Web

Google searches. 12/30/2012

Language - {ISO code} - # results - remarks

• Ido - {IO} - 179,000,000 - but many acronyms
• Esperanto - {EO} - 164,000,000 -
• Toki Pona - {not ISO} - 26,600,000 -
• Klingon - {TLH} - 15,700,000 -
• Interlingua - {IA} - 14,100,000 - polysemic word
• Volapük - {VO} - 12,500,000 -
• Interlingue - {IE} - 8,240,000 -
• Quenya - {QYA} - 5,580,000 -
• Sindarin - {SJN} - 5,560,000 -
• Novial - {NOV} - 4,250,000 - polysemic word
• Lojban - {JBO} - 4,010,000 -
• Kotava - {AVK} - 535,000 -
• Lingwa de Planeta - {not ISO} - 433,000 -
• Na'vi - {not ISO} - 377,000 -
• Slovio - {not ISO} - 323,000 -
• Lingua Franca Nova - {LFN} - 258,000 -
• Brithenig - {BZT} - 137,000 -
• Láadan - {LDN} - 117,000 -
• Mondlango - {not ISO} - 72,100 -
• Interglossa - {IGS} - 65,000 -
• Europanto - {EUR, no more ISO} - 42,600 -
• Uropi - {not ISO} - 27,400 -
• Sambahsa - {not ISO} - 19,000 -

YuraniA (talk) 17:59, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Diff. between auxlangs, lingua francas, and pidgins

I read the first paragraph of this article and thought it could also be the explanation of a lingua franca or a pidgin. Maybe that means I wasn't patient enough to keep reading the subsequent paragraphs, or maybe that means these concepts can overlap in a Venn diagram, but I do expect some more precision in the first paragraph. I imagine tacking on something like "it is usually constructed" could help with this problem while keeping the paragraph succinct. 98.201.105.80 (talk) 10:55, 3 June 2013 (UTC)