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Culture: Grammar
One Word Language Challenge   (+2)  [vote for, against]
Pick a word, "asulazutua" or something, use inflection and pronunciation to indicate different meanings and create an entire language out of variations of it.

The slang word "dude" has many meanings depending on pronunciation and context. (link)

The Chinese language has words that have different meanings depending on the "4 tones". (link)

The proposed experiment is to create an entire language out of one word expanding on the examples of a word being given different meaning using methods shown in the links.

The word could be shortened to create variations so a sentence might look like "As asul asulaz asu asulazutua asulazut." and given different tones.

This would probably be best done with a computer given some parameters to work with, then, if somebody wanted to completely nurd out they could actually learn it and talk to other nurds. Sort of like learning Klingon.

I don't think tones and inflection would be enough to give you the necessary different meanings you'd need hence the multiple words extracted from the one base word. Asulazutua sounds exotic and very foreign in any language so I picked that. Also it's the first nonsensical word that came to mind. Kind of puts your tongue through the paces to pronounce as well which is kind of interesting.
-- doctorremulac3, Feb 13 2019

Dude https://www.youtube...watch?v=77v_Q0mhbZU
[doctorremulac3, Feb 13 2019]

Chinese tones https://www.thought...of-mandarin-2279480
[doctorremulac3, Feb 13 2019]

1984 https://en.wikipedi...ineteen_Eighty-Four
It was hoped to reduce all human speach to one word or syllable. [Voice, Feb 13 2019]

Jasper Carrott Explains Chinese https://www.google....nEUCkhP2lBqE5FpX94O
Apparently there is only one (inflected) word in the Chinese language. [8th of 7, Feb 13 2019]

Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den https://en.wikipedi...et_in_the_Stone_Den
Chinese prior art [notexactly, Feb 13 2019]

One instruction set computer https://en.wikipedi...uction_set_computer
Computer prior art [notexactly, Feb 13 2019]

Scissors Scissors_20sizzurs_20psyzzas
by [nineteenthly] [neutrinos_shadow, Feb 13 2019]

How they got the Chewbacca voice https://www.theatla...got-a-voice/375697/
[doctorremulac3, Feb 14 2019]

Of course there's this, the almighty emperor of all words... https://www.youtube...2mFs&has_verified=1
It's the word "fuck" so don't click it if you don't want to hear it about 100 times. [doctorremulac3, Feb 14 2019]

Yep, " East and Southeast Asia, the Pacific, Africa, and the Americas; as many as seventy percent of world languages may be tonal [languages]" - wikipedia.

South East Asia is 4 tones, get it right and your bandwidth is quadrupled. But my pathetic attempt to say "thanks" in Thai "kap kun kap" has (4 x 4 x 4) - 1 equals.... 63 different ways to not say "thanks" properly.
-- not_morrison_rm, Feb 13 2019


Well, you can look at "1" and "0" inflection as a variation of one empty-set- ish word.
-- Mindey, Feb 13 2019


Would this end up a bit like Fisherman's Rhyming Slang? eg:

"Fisherman's" = "Wet" (Fisherman's net)
"Fisherman's" = "Coat" (Fisherman's boat)
"Fisherman's" = "Book" (Fisherman's hook)
etc
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Feb 13 2019


In a completely round-about way, if you define the alphabet to be your single word, then it's just a matter of trivially rearranging parts of that word to mean different things. Under that definition, then English is already achieving what's set out in the idea.
-- zen_tom, Feb 13 2019


Baked. <link>
-- 8th of 7, Feb 13 2019


Groot?
-- DrBob, Feb 13 2019


Forgetaboutit.
-- pertinax, Feb 13 2019


We (sort of) already did this, 10 years ago.
<--Linky.
-- neutrinos_shadow, Feb 13 2019


Chewbacca seemed to be able to get a lot across with various growls.

(See link), and learn how to do a pretty good Chewy imitation at the end.

This could probably find practical use in science fiction making some alien species mildly more interesting.

Anyway, here's the deal, you'd need to get about 170,000 words out of one word. Not sure how many combinations of letters out of the "word" asulazutua you could get. a as, asu, asul, asula, asulaz, asulazu, asulazut, asulazut. Then there's ua, tua, utua, zutua, azutua, lazutua, ulazutua and sulazutua. Then you'd add pronunciations, syllable emphasis etc. Could you get 170,000 combinations? Sounds like a math problem so I'll pass.

The premise could be that was their god's name or something. Their supreme leader maybe.
-- doctorremulac3, Feb 14 2019


Buffalo.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Feb 14 2019


Actually, there is already a four-letter word in English that can have multiple meanings as an exclamation, a statement of disappointment, a verb and a noun. Might be best to start with that one.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Feb 14 2019


Fuck are you talking about, [MB]?
-- pertinax, Feb 14 2019


Fucked if I know.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Feb 14 2019


Over my lifetime the expression has evolved from "What the fuck are you talkin' about?" to "The fuck are you talkin' about?" to "Fuck are you talkin' about?" to its final of "Fuck you talkin' about?".

I'm sure everybody's seen it but I'll put up the Monty Python bit Max's referring to in case we've got any stragglers.
-- doctorremulac3, Feb 14 2019


I still wonder why the Germans dropped "Rindfleische tikettierungs überwachungsaufgabenübertr agungsgesetz" as their longest word, just trips off the tongue.

NB inflections only happens to the vowel sounds, so the Slovak word "Zmrzl" (frozen or congealed) stays un-toned.
-- not_morrison_rm, Feb 16 2019



random, halfbakery