Conlanging cliche
From KneeQuickie
Contents |
Introduction
Conlanging, like any artform, is far from free of clichés, tropes, and tried and true approaches. This article is not here to point fingers or accuse people of plagiarism, but to inform on some common and possibly overused features in constructed languages.
Phonological
Orthographical
Korean block
The Korean block script arranges the parts of a syllable, each based on hanzi strokes, into a square, resulting in something that looks like a Chinese character but is more accurately termed an alphabet with a somewhat nonlinear arrangement internally. This ingenious idea was invented by Korean linguists in the script known as hangeul.
Hangeul doesn't just arrange characters into block formations, however. It also bases the forms of the characters on phonology, making it a featural script where the features of each sound are actually shown in the script, so fricatives, stops, etc. are indicated. This is something most imitators don't seem to bother with, though.
Mongolian vine
For some reason, all (or at least most) vertical conscripts seem to be cursive. This is apparently because they are based on the Mongolian script. Of course, there is no requirement for a vertical script to be cursive (the Chinese script is traditionally vertical, for example), but cursiveness is popular, nonetheless.
