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From: balaji@nexus.yorku.ca (Balaji)
Subject: Re: Bajoran language
Message-ID: <balaji.786377192@nexus.yorku.ca>
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Organization: York University
References: <3be0se$o71@mother.usf.edu> <librikD02q63.Hyx@netcom.com>
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 1994 14:06:32 GMT
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librik@netcom.com (David Librik) writes:

>>Norm.   Plur.   Neg.   Accu.   Dat.   Gen.

>*sigh*.  If you're going to invent a new language for aliens, why
>give it Indo-European (surely the most boring of all language families :->)
>properties?  The nice thing about Klingon is that Okrand based it on
>Costanoan (a Penutian language formerly spoken in the San Francisco Bay
>Area).  Surely you know enough Typology to introduce some more interesting
>features; or you could base it on Eskimoan or Iroquoian or Tupi-Guarani or one
>of the scores of nifty New Guinean language families.  _Interesting_ is what
>makes language fans (like the Klingon fans) perk up their ears.  How about
>some ejectives, voiceless vowels, prenasalized stops, or clicks?

Couldn't agree more. If it had been sufficiently remote from IE, maybe
NV wouldn't have spoken with such a strong accent? (How can you speak
gibberish with an American accent, you ask? Search me. See Fascination
if you don't believe me. It was grating.)

And that harp thing, too. Just because Bajorans are "a peace-loving
people with a rich spiritual life" doesn't mean they have to restrict
themselves to New Age muzak. On the contrary, oppression produces rich,
painful music, a complex distillation of screams in tears. Like jazz
and the blues.
-- 
Balaji

To see the beauty of Laila, requires the eyes of Majnu.
