Kristen Stieffel

Unventing Language Kristen Stieffel

Constructed Languages like Elvish and Klingon are a vital part of many speculative stories. But you needn't be a linguist like Tolkein or Okrand to incorporate distinct languages into your storyworld. Inventing complete vocabularies and grammar for a ConLang is beyond the scope of this paper. What this publication covers is how to unvent a language by mixing and matching elements of real languages to give the impression of a language that's foreign to your viewpoint character. Learn how culture shapes language and vocabulary, what to avoid when representing foreign languages in your manuscript, and how to represent multiple languages in a manuscript written entirely in a single language. This paper was originally designed for writers of science fiction and fantasy, but it may also be useful to writers with international real-world settings.