![]() ![]() During Torfan’s creation for Marvel, Rhyne focused on the creation of words while Hearn focused on grammar. Now it’s time to build words and sentences. ![]() ![]() We must acknowledge their distinct cultures! There are even fan pages dedicated to over 400 different species of Marvel aliens. No two alien species are created equally, and neither are their respective languages. The sound has to be consistent and reflect the culture of the specific group, otherwise, it simply doesn’t work.Īre said aliens/life forms docile, heroic, merciless, primitive? This will affect how melodic (or not) their language will sound. When creating a fictitious language for Hollywood, conlangers have to work closely with the director to understand their vision for the film. Create a Phonology that Represents the Culture The first step to creating an alien language? Add non-earthly sounds. These popping sounds were also used in the Na’vi language of the Avatars, annotated as kx, tx, and px. To create an alien language means creating exotic sounds that are unfamiliar to our common human phonemes, like ejective sounds, for example.Įjective sounds are consonants that are emphasized emphatically and are hardly ever used by humans. Step 1: Decide Whether it Will Be a Human or an Alien LanguageĬonlanguages come in all shapes, sizes, and now, species.Ĭreators of languages have to decide whether the language will be adapted from a human language or if it has a completely unrelated alien origin.īecause on our little Earth, every human child is physically capable of making around 7,000 different phones (the technical term for an individual sound segment), but many of the world’s most common languages have under 100 phonemes. We’re going to break down some of the main steps conlangers take in order to create languages from scratch, like Torfan from the Captain Marvel movie. How To Create an Alien Language Like Torfan for Hollywood Directors don’t want to risk losing viewers during heart-wrenching moments because they got lost in the translation of a fictitious language.īut when directors DO choose to employ conlanguages, what steps do the creators take to come up with these masterpieces? One of the main reasons for the lack of linguistic diversity is that emotional moments hit harder with viewers in their own language. However, the reality is that most conlanguages only make small appearances in Hollywood, with English (primarily British) acting as the principal language among alien species. The Cornell students who created the Torfan alien language from scratch were new to “conlanging” when they were first approached by Marvel, although they were well aware of its existence.Ĭonlang dominates the sci-fi/fantasy market and features in epic fan favorites such as Avatar, Lord of the Rings, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, and Game of Thrones. A “conlanger” is someone who invents a new language. So how do a couple of comic book-loving linguistics enthusiasts go about creating an alien language anyway, and what can they teach avid language-learning earthlings about our mother tongues?Ĭonlanger is the name, language creation is the game.Ĭonlanging is the creation of “constructed” or intentionally created (as opposed to naturally developing) languages such as Esperanto, Klingon or Dothraki. Two linguistics students from Cornell, Ryan Hearn, and Joseph Ryne hit the jackpot when Hollywood reached out to the university looking for young talent to create Torfan, a never-before-heard alien language, for America’s sweetheart Captain Marvel movie. Linguistics students spend their time studying phonetics, dissecting sentence structures, and … creating alien languages? That’s right. ![]()
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