Goreth, here.
This isn’t going to be any sort of grammar or glossary, because we don’t have that ourselves yet. But I thought all of you Patreon supporters would like to know how to pronounce a few of the words and names we’re throwing around.
I listened carefully to Ashwin’s speech the other day, and looked up the IPA, and I think I’ve got it right. So here goes.
Ktletaccete: /qʟɛ-ta-tʃɛ-tɛ/ – That first phoneme cluster is hard to do right, though.
You can just make it like the ‘cl’ in ‘clam’. Seriously. That’s OK. Like, ‘cleh-tah-cheh-teh’. Nobody on Earth is going to get angry at you or confused by you saying it slightly wrong. Even Ashwin says it’s OK to be sloppy there. The pronunciation has apparently changed a bit over the, uh, millennia, anyway.
Inmararräo: /in-ma-ɹa-ʀäo/ – Watch out for that uvular trill in the last syllable. It’s just like you hear in German, at least when spoken with human anatomy.
Ashwin, or ʔashwin: /ʔaʃ-win/ – That funky question mark is a glottal stop. It gives the first vowel a hard start to it. Like in ‘uh oh’. Makes it sound a little explosive from your throat. But it’s very subtle and you can ignore it, which is why we’ve been writing their name without the question mark thingy to represent it at the beginning. It’s just easier to capitalize their name that way, really. You tend to hear glottal stops more clearly when they’re in the middle of words, anyway, where they break up vowel sounds and keep them from blending together into diphthongs. At least, to my ears, anyway. But Ashwin says that when they write their name in nems native script, the glottal stop has a character and it’s important to include it then.
And here’s an example of what that looks like!
Looks kind of like a neo-new wave house band logo, doesn’t it? Or render that in neon, and it’d look great in a shop window. Oh, I know! I’m thinking of sportswear!
Anyway, that’s Ashwin’s name.
I’m telling nem to start a business and use that as their logo, but they’re shaking nems head at me internally.
– Goreth, the Dragon
Hi, Goreth! That’s fascinating. And I would have gotten almost all of them right – not the rolled r because this tongue can’t figure it out, and not the Ja. Language is fun. Have a good day! 😀
What kind of business would ?ashwin start? I mean, of couse they havent found their art yet, but… what do you think they’d sell? I don’t know, I’m curious. ^^
Good question!
I mean, nem doesn’t actually like the idea of selling anything, it turns out. Doing business is really alien and annoying to ʔashwin, who already spent several human lifetimes in the post-scarcity culture of the Sunspot. So they’ve repeatedly turned down the idea of using their name as a logo. In the later books, there will be some indication that maybe they’re finding nems Art, and that would typically be what a person would start as a business. But I’m going to let our books tell that story. But as a clue, if they had to make money, it wouldn’t be by selling things. It would be through providing a service.
– Goreth
(I should make my own account on this website. I’m going to need it in October.)
Phone hid your reply.
Hm thats fair… Uh… I think they would do some kind of interpersonal understanding. Whether Translation Work, therapy, or even just helping earth and sunspot understand each others cultures…
Fun! Excited to find out 🙂
Therapy is not something I had thought of yet! But, you’re right, I think I might be good at it. I would certainly provide a perspective that most Earthlings do not have, which could be a useful way of challenging assumptions. And, also, my curiosity about Earthling cultures and behavior would lead me to ask all sorts of pertinent questions.
I might have to study some human psychology and neurology to qualify for any sort of actual clinical work, of course. But that could be fun!