[conlang_learners] Thoughts

[Wayne S. Rossi]

--- On Sat, 6/13/09, Eugene Oh <un.doing at gmail.com> wrote:

> We probably shouldn't use such
> subjective criteria in judging the conlangs we have here.
> "Ugly" and "well-made" differ from
> person to person, and are potentially insulting.
> Eugene

I don't entirely agree.  I think that a lot of what will be needed in the project of actually learning a language is going to be having a subjective attraction to it.  Unless it's attractive in itself as an "idea language" like Lojban or Esperanto in their own ways, we've got to have a certain spark of enthusiasm for the language ourselves.  Something that is just plain unappealing isn't going to have the force to keep them to a project of actually learning it.

That said, I think that we really ought to target ourselves for some system that will actually select two languages, in such a way that everybody in the group will want to learn one or the other (or both) and we can divide the resulting study group in two along those lines.  Given the size, I think allowing some room for taste is the only way to go.

 - Wayne