#lcc10 Dominique Stephan Bobeck - The Semitic Influence on Conlangs

details & slides: https://conlang.org/lcc10/#bobeck
speaker: Twitter @DomBobeck, dom.bobeck@gmail.com

The fact that natural languages inspire conlangers and even influence their work is nothing new. Prominent a priori examples are Sindarin resembling Welsh and Quenya with Finnish, Latin and Greek influences.

There were several attempts to attest natlang influence on conlangs by various studies (e.g. Cotugno 2022, Tikka 2007, Zielenbach 2021). But a consistent methodology is still a desideratum. The usual way is to select properties of a conlang that can be found in a certain natlang and compare them. This way of detecting natlang impact on conlangs has the severe disadvantage of determining random features and being prone to a selection bias.

In my master’s thesis about the Semitic influence on conlangs (funded by the LCS President’s Scholarship), I chose a different way of determining natlang influence on conlangs. I selected a random sample of 16 “popular” conlangs with the addition of two conlangs being not as popular but which I have chosen on purpose. These 18 conlangs are: Adûnaic, Khuzdul, Quenya, Sindarin, Atlantean, Klingon, Na’vi, Dothraki, Fremen, Lishephus, Sardaukar, Sondiv, High Valyrian, Verbis Diablo, Méníshè, Sangheili, Xanz and Eḥeiθymme. To these conlangs I applied seven phonological and morphological features which should be (a) hallmarks of Semitic languages and (b) infrequent in the world’s languages.

The presentation will address the subsequent questions: (i) Which Semitic features should be considered? (ii) How frequent and in which natlangs do these features occur? (iii) Finally, which conlangs show the most striking similarities to Semitic languages so that we can speak of influence?

References

Cotugno, Francesca (2022) L’impatto della tradizione linguistica classica sull’opera di Tolkien, presentation at the International Conference on Constructed Languages, 14–15.07.2022, University of Turin.
Tikka, Petri (2007) The Finnicization of Quenya, in: Arda Philology 1. Proceedings of the First International Conference on J.R.R. Tolkien’s Invented Languages, Omentielva Minya, Stockholm, 2005, 1–13.
Zielenbach, Maria (2021) The Semitic connection. Near Eastern Influences on Tolkien’s Invented Languages, (presentation).

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