Trokh
This language is primarily used by the Aslan race
- It is a supercentral language.
Description (Specifications)
The Aslan language is known as Trokh and is spoken by nearly all Aslan.
- Although the Trokh language is spoken by nearly all Aslan, few non-Aslan can claim to have mastered it. Difficult to pronounce, split into gender-specific dialects, and weighty with formalisms, it causes foreign speakers to open themselves to embarrassing blunders in conversation.
- Trokh is three languages at once: a base language of shared, neutral gender terms, along with two separate languages for males and females, each having different emphases of vocabulary. While a typical male will understand many words of the female dialect, it would be a grave dishonor for him to utter one, and vice versa.
Structure
The language is:
- highly agglutinative
- word stem (strong affixture)
- prefixture
- infixture
- suffixture
- Particle use
- case marking
The extant example from Alien Module 1 is:
Example #1
Hlyueawifiy Ahroay'ifiy Wahtoi Layeauiwahfeakteli hlalikhtyeiteyahahtateisiyu
Unmarried first son of the third son of the grandfather of the head of the pride which holds the valley in the fork of the Iwahfea River part of clan Wahtoi which is a vassal of clan Aroaye'i itself a vassal of clan Hlyueawi.
Pulling out patterns, this format emerges:
Hlyueawi-fiy + Ahroay'i-fiy + Wahtoi + Lay-eau-iwahfea-kteli + hlali-khtyei-teya-hahta-teisi-yu
[clan] Hlyueawi-over + [clan] Aroaye'i-over + [clan] Wahtoi + [pride] fork-river-Iwahfea-valley + head-grandfather-third son-first son-unmarried
Morphology
Morphology is the study of the internal structure of words.
- morpheme, inflection, paradigm, declension, derivation, compound, etc.
affixally polysynthetic language ergative language both in nominal and verbal morphology. It has obligatory polyagreement on all verbs with subject and object but not with the theme of a ditransitive verb. nonconcatenative morphology triliteral roots
Phonology
Phonology, the study of the sound systems of a language.
- phoneme, allophone, segment, mora, syllable, foot, stress, tone, etc.
Descriptors:
- Distinct phonotactics
- Pseudo-mora-timed language
- Limited dialecture
The complexities of Trokh pronunciation hamper foreign speakers. One human "expert" wrote: "The tongue spoken by the Aslan is both attractive and repellent to the Anglic ear, combining sonorous and melodic vowel sounds with throaty snarls and animal growls, all accompanied by a fair amount of spitting when spoken at any volume."
- Proper pronunciation of vowels has often proved the most difficult aspect of the language for humans, as some are pronounced while inhaling rather than exhaling. A Trokh speaker can talk faster than a human. He doesn't need to pause for breath in the midst of his speech. Instead, the language itself paces the speaker's breathing, necessitating rapid movement of the diaphragm to change the direction of breath. Indeed, the word trokh means "belly," referring to the motion of the Aslan stomach when speaking.
Grammar
Grammar is the structure of a language.
- tense, aspect, mood and modality, grammatical number, grammatical gender, case, etc.
Extensive aspect particle usage Many cases Extreme verb perfective and imperfective distinction "person"-enclitics
Syntax
Syntax is the study of how words combine to form grammatical sentences.
- phrase, clause, grammatical function, grammatical voice, etc.
variable syntax absorbed over historical forms
Meaning
No information yet available.
Lexicology
A lexicon is the word supply of a language.
- word, lexeme, lemma, lexicon, vocabulary, terminology, etc.
Semantics
Semantics is the study of the meaning of words (lexical semantics), and how these combine to form the meanings of sentences.
- meaning, sense, entailment, truth condition, compositionality, etc.
- Perhaps easier to grasp than spoken Trokh are its written forms. Many humans have come into contact with yoyeaokhtef –the ornamental designs along the edges of Aslan ships, buildings, and devices. To the Aslan eye, these are not random abstracts, but a combination of poetry, drama, and calligraphy, exciting the mind, the eye, and the ear. Yoyeaokhtef patterns are composed of multiple, blended tao-Trokh ideographs. To Aslan, the result is akin to grand opera in its combination of visual, aural, and dramatic elements.
- For more basic purposes, textbooks or shopping lists, for instance, Aslan use the tleftuawaoirlouheei, or "female script," which denotes individual sounds with discrete symbols. A typical Aslan tank will have its control panel labeled with ornate, male-oriented yoyeaokhtef. The tank computer's software, however, will have been entered by a female technician with a keyboard configured for the female tleftuawaoirlouheei.
Pragmatics
Pragmatics is the study of how language is used by its speakers.
- presupposition, implicature, deixis
- Trokh is a formal language, with highly regulated rules of expression. Novice speakers lack the option of putting together words to create more complex statements. There are so many formalisms in Trokh that the student must simply learn them all by rote, if he expects to be understood without being challenged.
History & Background (Historical Linguistics)
The Trokh language can be traced back to Kusyu (Dark Nebula 1226), where it developed into its present form about 4,000 years ago. Since then, Trokh has changed little. In fact, some scholars insist it has decreased in the number of words it contains and is more formalized.
- Whatever the case, Trokh remains almost entirely free of offshoots, local dialects, or corruptions.
Worlds & Sectors (Astrography)
This language is primarily in used in the following areas:
References & Contributors (Sources)
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