Felaryan languages

Mostly because I was kind of curious, and am rather dull about trying to think of a good reason to explain it...I felt like starting a thread that would discuss how mermaids and the like talk underwater (both to each other and land based beings that can understand them) and started thinking more about it beyond that. One of the basic things in Felarya that helps the many different people and creatures from different dimensions is the effect that they can all understand each other about 99% of the time with few exceptions. However...would predators and other Felaryan inhabitants have their own forms of language and only 'think' they hear the language they talk is the same as their own? Simple example: character A only speaks English, and hears English coming from character B. Character B however only knows Spanish and hears character A speaking Spanish back to them. This means though that the words you hear may not match up to how a person is speaking... aka, Felarya dubbing your experience . Or do they all just translate into a default 'Felarya' language both understand? I am kind of leaning towards the latter myself...though more theories are welcome.

Another thing, partly what sparked my idea to start the thread- mermaids and other sea hybrids like Chlaenas however on the other hand I've noticed in stories (besides my own I recently made, I had to look around to see if it happened before) can clearly talk under water with another, and that makes fairly great sense to communicate with each other and species they might likely come into contact with below water. It just feels like something that would make sense with Ryzelm’oire to deal with an entire city of people that had to communicate underwater. Their underwater talk however is also easily understood by other land based beings who probably can not speak underwater. So the next question is...do mermaids and the like talk with their own language (based on however they do so) that allows them speak under water and then is translated by Felarya's language effect in a similar way to how other langauges are 'translated' by whatever means? My opinion is leaning towards yes in this case again myself.

Then finally the last question. If the language thing is solved by defaulting to some base 'Felarya' language, if one speaks through this translation through enough time, would they then learn to speak Felaryan as their own language or remain with just their own basic langauges? Basically having lived so long on Felarya, remember the immortality thing can make you live a REAL long time...unless you got eaten along the way heh... could you 'forget' your old langauge and only know Felarya's itself? It was just an interesting idea that popped into my head at the time that I honestly don't have an answer to that I figured I might share.

TLDR: Does Felarya have it's own language and can you learn it? Also consider this a thread to discuss any other related language things too, these were only a few of my own questions and some partial answers to them myself.

Edit: consider myself stupid for not just bumping another language thread, I am running on about 4 hours of sleep and just remembered the search function after posting. Sorry about that.

Something in the wierd physics of Felarya likely does the translation. I wouldn't try to look at it too in-depth, since it is likely completely incomprehensible. A close example would probably be Doctor Who. I believe the Tardis (or something on him, I forget honestly) handles translations, so that when they go to alien civilizaitions and/or back in time, he and whoever he's with can talk and understand people as if they were speaking English.

It probably has something to do with perception and a whole host of other wierd dimensional things. Like, if, say Karbo for example went and talked to Crisis...he'd hear and see her speaking French. But if I were standing next to them, I would hear and see them both speaking English. Its kind of a mindfuck when you think about it, but wierder stuff has happened in Felarya. Its kind of like the speaking in tongues incident from the bible, where a huge, diverse crowd all saw the same speaker speaking their own language.

I think this just needs to be one of the "It just works like this" things...because if you try and over-think it, it gets painful. lol.

Now, I don't imagine it works on written word...so there probably IS a "Felaryan" language written and read by the locals. All the other off-world races would write/read in their own languages as well. I imagine there is an official written language of trade in places like Negav though...probably native Felaryan.

As for mermaids talking underwater...ehh, that should probably be attributed to bad writing. I always assumed they used sign-language or something. You can't really talk underwater. Maybe some kind of whale-song type form of communication? Im sure there's ways if someone is creative enough.

Vivian's a timelord.
That's how.

Felarya would have it's own written language and you would have to learn it, as the translation effect wouldn't affect written words, although it might help you understand it better.

I think it's better to have that everyone speaks their own language, you hear them speak their own language but you understand what they are saying. Of course, you would have to have a similar frame of reference.
What I'm saying is that a sufficiently alien being would not be understood (or having minimal communication) due to their frame of reference being so far removed from everybody else's.
Anyway, with this there is only one translation point, the listener's brain. This way even though they might wonder why they can understand what the stranger is saying they can still realise that they are speaking another language.
If you have people speaking different language but hearing their own, then they must also be seeing the lip moments of their own language, which means you got something odd going on with sound and light.

Anyway, as for how this (my explanation) effects stories, the answer is it doesn't really. If you were there as the events of the story were taking place would would understand what the character was saying, so that's what is written by the author.

rcs619 wrote:

As for mermaids talking underwater...ehh, that should probably be attributed to bad writing. I always assumed they used sign-language or something. You can't really talk underwater. Maybe some kind of whale-song type form of communication? Im sure there's ways if someone is creative enough.

Well, I see it like this. Underwater mermaids "sing" their messages in a special language that was meant to be sung underwater. The pitches and tones used aren't distorted by water and so they can communicate. IT would sound a bit like whale song but more modulated and possibly a higher pitch, although it would depend on the individual mermaid.
Of course, sung above water this wouldn't work and would sound different.

This also explains why mermaids are reputed to have such good singing voices, it's their method of communication.

GREGOLE wrote:

Vivian's a timelord.
That's how.

That explains so much, Vivian is her own mother.

In French_Snack stories, there are still people speak different languages (English, French, Arab). Not all people understand these languages, and need a translator XD

But many travellers comes from another world, which often have different language system (Navi langague, everyone?), yet most of they still understand each other. So I think the Felarya magic air and the mind of people have some roles here.

For example, in Felarya, if you, an English, meet a French on the street. You don't know French, don't know that person is a French and vice versa. And you say "Hello".

The Felarya magic air will affect on the speech, and somehow, when it reach the French person ear, it is automatically translated into French word "Bonjour". That guy will think that you are also a French, or have learned French. So he replied something in French, and it's automatically translated into English.

You understand what he said, and assume that he is also an English, or have learned English. Then both of you can communicate without any difficulty in Felarya. But if you two meet again in somewhere outside Felarya, you won't understand each other anymore

However, if you don't know French, and know that person is a French, your brain will think subconsciously "I'm sure that I won't understand what he say". These thought will stop the magic air acting as a translator between two people, making them communicate in their own language and... no one understand what the another want to say

Hope it not hard to understand what I have written above >.>

tkh1304 wrote:

The Felarya magic air will affect on the speech, and somehow, when it reach the French person ear, it is automatically translated into French word "Bonjour".

I think that having magic air is a bit much. We've already got magic soil and magic water.

Well, I think that magic everywhere is in the soil and in the water, so this property will somewhat affect the air too (like when water is vaporized, or dust in the air...)

tkh1304 wrote:

Well, I think that magic everywhere is in the soil and in the water, so this property will somewhat affect the air too (like when water is vaporized, or dust in the air...)

True, but the described effect is quite complicated when you think about it.

Using the most simple scenario: A conversation one on one and only one person is speaking at a time.
5 things have to happen if we use "magic air."

1. The original sounds must be neutralised
   
2. The meaning of the words that have just been spoken have to be translated to the language of the listener.
   this involves 2 sub-steps:
   1. The meaning must be extracted from the speaker's brain
      
   2. The corresponding meanings would have to be gleaned from the listener's brain, this would mean going through the memory and language centers and matiching meanings to words with appropriate grammar.
   
   
3. The translated words have to be vibrated into the air.
   

If multiple people are listening, then step 2 and 3 must be repeated for every person, along with an addition step to stop everyone just hearing a babble of all their languages combined. The sound would have to be directionalised straight to them, I don't even know if that's possible.
In a place like Negav market, where you have vendors announcing the quality of their wares and people haggling along with general chatter, the air would be practically glowing from all the magic going on.

Personally, I like seeing it as translating automatically, but I also like leaving some other languages among themselves, just to add some flavors. Like an elf speaking Elven when he doesn't want a neko to know what he's saying, or a neko speaking... well, cat speak, when she doesn't want a human to understand her. That's just me though.

Sean Okotami wrote:

Personally, I like seeing it as translating automatically, but I also like leaving some other languages among themselves, just to add some flavors. Like an elf speaking Elven when he doesn't want a neko to know what he's saying, or a neko speaking... well, cat speak, when she doesn't want a human to understand her. That's just me though.

Indeed a system which also depends on whether or not the person wants to be understood would be interesting.

Personally, I prefer to think everyone's still speaking whatever they speak, but they get subbed, and everyone ignores what they don't understand. That'd explain why predators don't ever listen to anyone: they can't read.

GREGOLE wrote:

Vivian's a timelord.
That's how.

That explains so much...it's genius!

Well anyways, good to see it started some discussion on the subject. I'll have to agree about not thinking about it too hard, as in the whole mechanics of how it works behind the scenes...I got enough questions just thinking about what it does on the surface! FrenchSnack's Lost in Felarya stories were one of the ones in particular where the exception came to mind and it works well with the stories so I'm not saying all should be auto translated heh.

As for other theories though, the state of mind does seem like a good one. Basically what I get from that is you can make a language untranslated if you make a conscious (or subconscious) choice about it, so a speaker who wants to speak in tongues (Elven example by Sean) puts more thought into it to override the 'spell'. Vice versa people convinced they can't understand someone they know speaks something different (FrenchSnack stories) won't understand what they hear the other saying. A case of mind over matter, or magic.

But yes, this is a fun little thing to discuss, as long as you don't get too bogged down in it.

What we know:
- People from different worlds, and likely different universes or galaxies, can talk to and understand other people when they come to Felarya.
- This does not work on written languages, or more alien forms of communication like Mermaid-song and such.

As for how it works, there's a dozen different potential ideas, but they don't account for every eventuality. As much as I dislike handwaes, this seems to be another thing that needs to be filed under the "It just works like this" bin. lol

I say there should be a rule to the spell (I read the wiki) where the people affected can willfully decide to resist it as to talk their native language when they want some privacy or discuss things with members of their race only. I think it would add some flavor and depth to the language in Felarya as well as open a few more possibilities. Like a very solitary person can keep the spell willfully suppress as he doesn't want others to understand what he says.

One of the things I always found interesting about Felarya is that - seemingly - there's no "speak in different language" privacy. You couldn't secretly pass the message "Kill them" to your guards in one language whilst telling the people that they're about to guide you to your new quarters, the guards told in a different language because "They don't speak English / Dutch / Negavian / whatever". The one way I thought to get around this, sort of form a private language (as written text, like rcs stated, is seemingly untranslated), is to make references within your dialogue to distinct people, places, or events that have secret meanings.

For example, "Deryll, the rose blossoms in Cypress' grove!" This is multiple levels of security, as: 1) It relies on people understanding you are speaking something other than gibberish. 2) It could be made context sensitive. "in Cypress' grove late summer eve!" could mean something completely different than "in Cypress' grove in the dawning light!" 3) Someone not familiar with Cypress, a Rose, and so on would have no clue what the hell was just said.

Of course, the above was just gibberish, but its point stands: Private languages that could either be on a large scale (to differentiate the new fish from the old fish, for instance dividing who has or hasn't actually passed by the Giant Tree) or a small one (related to intra-group events, such as "Remember Walter's fishing trip?" being a way to alert a party that they're about to be ambushed without letting the ambushers know the jig is up). These wouldn't be fixed through magical language comprehension (You are understanding the language, it's just coming out like gibberish), would be difficult to infiltrate from an outsider, and so on.

Heh, I don't know. It sounds too military-ish or cult-ish to me. I still prefer the idea that someone can willfully speak their native or other tongues if they desire strongly, but when they don't, it's automatically translated. Although, something just hit me. If you are bilingual, does it get translated in both languages?

That's actually a boggling question. Whatever translates people's languages would have a hard time with someone who's bilingual or even trilingual.

I often thought before the whole "felarya wide translation spell" that there was a spell that a mage or councilor or someone could use with you to help you learn the native language in felarya easily. People who move to different countries can get the hang of a language in a few short months if they've been emersing themself into the whole culture. With a spell it could possibly take days. Instead of having an "auto" spell, couldn't it just be more of a "manual" kind of thing?

Pendragon wrote:

That's actually a boggling question. Whatever translates people's languages would have a hard time with someone who's bilingual or even trilingual.

I don't see a problem when using the method I proposed. In any case where exactly are you seeing difficulties?

There's something else we need to adress. In stories and comics, creatures with massive gaps in size can casually chatter without the giant one shattering the tiny one's ear drums. Hell, tinies can talk to humans from a fair distance and they'll hear them clearly despite their small stature.

Sean Okotami wrote:

There's something else we need to adress. In stories and comics, creatures with massive gaps in size can casually chatter without the giant one shattering the tiny one's ear drums. Hell, tinies can talk to humans from a fair distance and they'll hear them clearly despite their small stature.

This is one of the very few areas which I am willing to handwave as I don't think that's something which can be solved. I believe that there was an attempt to address it in a old thread and the consensus was the same.

Or it could be part of the translation spell where it also adjust the volume to accomodate to the ears.

Sean Okotami wrote:

Or it could be part of the translation spell where it also adjust the volume to accomodate to the ears.

Yeah that could work to... Although it'd still be a handwave.

*shrug* Some things can't be explained with science.

Sean Okotami wrote:

*shrug* Some things can't be explained with science.

You take that back! You take that back right now!



Heh, but more seriously I'm not so sure that people would have any problems hearing tinies, at least in quiet situations. We've got pretty good hearing (for example, rub your fingertips together and you should be able to hear that sound up to several inches from your ear. That's a pretty quiet sound; I don't think that a tiny person's voice would be anywhere near that quiet.