What is you're opinion of Conlangs? For anyone unfamiliar with the term, Conlang stands for constructed language. Constructed languages are intentionally developed with a specific purpose in mind, where natural languages develop and are influenced over time and are usually an official language in some way. A constructed language can be written or spoken and built from the ground up or just a variation or simplification of an existing language. Reasons for constructing a language can range anywhere from use in media, like books, movies and TV series, such as languages like Klingon, which the Star Trek fandom has actually further developed over the years, and Ayliedoon, which originates from the Elder Scrolls series of videogames, to languages meant to help break through the language barrier between different cultures and nationalities by taking elements from multiple existing natural languages, like Esperanto and lojban, and even just silly, made up code that you and a friend pass back and forth. Some people consider these to be "fake" languages with no practical use outside of entertainment, but Esperanto was actually relatively successful as a Conlang in it's day. It was intended to be an easy to learn, universal second language to help people from all over the world who have a lot of difficulty learning each other's native language. What do you think?

I personally don't have a problem with these types of languages. Let people do what they want lmao. It is very interesting and shows you how creative (or dumb?) people can be just by creating a language. Kinda like Simlish. If I'm correct it's a combination of like 9 languages which is why it sounds so silly.

So, you mean like code language? Like what I would make during middle school and high school to talk to my friends to pass in class so the teacher couldn't decipher it? I love them! I mean, I don't think they have much practical use outside of what they were made for, and I would never learn Klingon or Ayliedoon because it has no use for me. But, I think they are fun and have their purposes. 

Personally I have a bias towards videogame languages, but any other thing like that like lojban or esperanto seems really hipsterish and useless.

I mean, it's basically almost english, and basically almost no one knows it or uses it in professional discussions, so what's the point? It's inane and boring.

Lexatom : Right. I had actually forgotten about Simlish. Since it was created to sound silly, I'd say it did it's job pretty well.

thing1 : That's the cool thing about it. It can be anything from universal communication to encryption. I don't have anything really worked out, but I have a couple ideas for writing systems. Just very rough concepts.

yoshirulez! : "Hipsterish" isn't really a great way to describe it. If something is outdated or obscure, that doesn't absolutely make it hipsterish. The same argument could be made about retro videogames. lojban is more of a thought experiment than anything else, but Esperanto, while a very pie-in-the-sky idea, was a project to develop a very simple, straightforward language to unite people who otherwise couldn't communicate with each other. With their current level of popularity, they are indeed rather useless. But if more people learned to speak an inorganic second language, it would make for an excellent business language because it's international. Also, a less important nitpick, but neither of them are all that close to English. lojban is almost like a spoken, written programming language and Esperanto is like taking parts of a dozen European languages and putting them in a blender.

I don't think they're silly, but I don't think it makes sense beyond an entertainment level to learn them, because no language will ever be useful unless it's widely adopted, and people as a whole are lazy (or busy in some cases) and as such won't be bothered to learn a new language that they don't have to. So until a conlang becomes national language in at least one country and/or makes it's way into school literature, the idea of it will never catch on enough to make it likely that you'll ever meet someone outside of their fan sites that speaks it.

So...yeah I mean if the learner goes into it with their eyes open to the fact that this is just for fun, there's no point in them learning it. And if you want to be able to communicate without your boss or teacher knowing what you're saying (and you live in the US) then learn something besides English or Spanish and you're probably golden. And as an added bonus, you'll know a new language that could potentially prove very useful in a career or some other way.


There is one thing I'd like to do with a conlang though: I would love to make one for an in-game language one day. Of course I hate when a game uses a conlang exclusively, but to have, say, a certain race (like wizards or something) that use a language between themselves, or as an ancient tongue that the elites of them know or something, that would be cool. It would also require only a very small vocabulary be made.

I have nothing against conlangs. Thinks is pretty awesome that people make up there own languages for movies and games since it gives the game and movie character. Gives it a special touch in my eyes!