Creative Linguistics

Creating languages for several purposes

By Marcos Franco

Welcome to Creative Linguistics, a web page about constructed and controlled languages where I gather projects and ideas I've worked on in this field. To start with, a few words about what these languages are may be useful to put the casual visitor into context:

Controlled languages are human languages where some restrictions have been applied in order to meet the requirements of a machine translation system (and hence deliver a high quality output), or in order to ensure a correct comprehension and  interpretation from (usually foreign) readers.

On the other hand, constructed international auxiliary languages (like Esperanto, Ido, Novial, Interlingua, Occidental...) are usually meant for serving as a neutral and easy-to-learn second language for everybody. Unfortunately, none of these languages have reached such a status so far, but I find them interesting because they are a mixture of science and art that involves linguistic knowledge, intuition, creativity and taste.

UTL :  This is probably my most serious project so far. The Universal Translation Language (UTL) is an artificial controlled language which, departing from Esperanto, is envisaged as a tool to write accurately in languages you don't speak (through machine translation). By using UTL, translating any document into multiple languages should be faster and cheaper than with any currently available method or system.

ESPAÑOL FACIL : Mainly intended for Spanish speakers addressing a foreign audience. It is a controlled language quite easy to understand for any person with no more than a basic knowledge of Spanish. Its careful selection of Spanish words makes it similar to eurocentric auxiliary languages like Interlingua. However, Español Facil has no artificial elements. The page itself is written in Español Facil.

INTAL : A page about a language which has certain similarities with Jespersen's Novial. Its name is Intal (after INTernational Auxiliary Language), and it was developed by Erich Weferling in the 1950's.

 

(c) 1998-2003. Contents and embedded music "Scherzo para piano" by Marcos Franco.

If you want a conventional machine-made translation of this or any other webpage, try Altavista's babelfish. For good quality, handmade translations, try Alfil Traducciones.