When making an “alien” conlang (however you define that), it’s easy to take the phonology half, make it outrageous, and call it a day. But that’s only half the battle. There’s more to a language than its sounds, and if you’re designing a conlang for anything more than naming, you still need to look at the grammar, too.
So how can we make the grammar of a language “feel” otherworldly? As with the sounds, the easiest way is to violate the traditional expectations that we, as speakers of human languages, have developed. To do this, however, we need to know our preconceptions, and we also need to take a look at how grammar really works.
The foundation of grammar
I can’t claim to understand the mental underpinnings of language. I bought a book about the subject years ago, but I’ve never had the chance to read it. What follows comes from articles, other conlangers, and a healthy dose of critical thinking.
Language is a means of communication, but it’s also inextricably linked to cognition, to memory. The human brain is a wonderful memory device (if you discount those pesky problems of fuzzy recollection, dementia, etc.) that works in a fascinating way. At its core, it seems to be primarily an associative memory. In other words, we remember things by their association with what we already know. Our language reflects that. Nouns are things, verbs are actions, adjectives are states or conditions; not for nothing are they all taught by means of pictures and examples. Those build the associations we use to remember them.
Is it possible that an alien intelligence doesn’t work this way? Sure, but that would be so “out there” that I can’t begin to contemplate it. If you want to try, go ahead, but it won’t be easy. On the other hand, that’s one way to get something totally different from what we know. I just wouldn’t want to try and describe it, much less use it.
Moving on to “actual” linguistics, we’re used to the traditional parts of speech, the trinity of noun, verb, and adjective. On top of them, we often toss in adverbs, articles, prepositions, and the like, but those aren’t quite as “core” as the big three. Indeed, many languages get by just fine without articles, including Latin and Japanese. Adverbs are so nebulously defined that you can find words in any language that fit their category, but there are plenty of examples of languages using adjectives in their place. Prepositions (more generally, adpositions) aren’t entirely necessary, either; most of their function can be replaced by a large set of case markers.
But it seems awfully hard to ditch any of the big three. How would you make a language without verbs, for instance? Like the “pure functional” approach to computer programming, it would appear that nothing could be accomplished, since there’s no way to cause changes. Similarly, a “nounless” conlang couldn’t name anything. For adjectives, it’s not so bad, as state verbs can already take their place in a few natural languages, but it’s difficult to imagine a total lack of them.
That hasn’t stopped industrious conlangers from trying. Languages without verbs/nouns/adjectives are a perennial favorite in any circle. I can’t say I’ve attempted one myself, but I can see how they might work, and any of the three looks very alien to me.
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Getting rid of adjectives is the easiest. As above, most can be replaced by state verbs. A phrase like “the red door”, for instance, might come out as something like “the door that is red” or “the door it is red”. The difference is that adjectives are often (but not always) marked as if they were nouns, while a state verb like this would instead be conjugated like any other verb in the language.
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Dropping verbs is much harder. You can look into languages that lack copular verbs for examples here, though the same idea can be extended to most of the “predicating” verbs, like English “to have”, “to become”, etc. Pronouns, case markers, and liberal use of adjectives can take care of most of it, but it’ll definitely feel weird.
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Throwing out nouns is next to impossible, in my opinion. Not to say you should give up your ambitions, but…I’m not sure I can help you here. A language without nouns may truly be beyond our comprehension. Perhaps it’s the language of some mystical or super-advanced race, or that of a hive mind which has no need for names. I honestly don’t know.
Alternate universal
Much simpler than tossing entire categories of words is just finding new ways to use them. Most (I emphasize this for a reason) languages of the world follow a set of linguistic universals, as laid out by linguist Joseph Greenberg. They don’t follow all of them, mind you, but it’s better than even odds. Some of the more interesting ones include:
- #3: VSO languages are prepositional. This comes from their “head-first” word order, but it’s easy to invert.
- #14: In conditional clauses, the conclusion (“then” part) normally follows the condition (“if” part). Even in English, it’s not hard to find counterexamples, if you know where to look. (See what I did there?) But it’s not the usual form. In an alien conlang, it could be.
- #34: Languages with a dual number must also have a plural; those with a trial (three of something) have a dual and a plural. No real reason this has to be so, not for aliens. I’d like to know how you justify it, though.
- #38: Any language with case can only have a zero marker for the case representing an intransitive subject—nominative, absolutive, etc. If you’ve got a different way of distinguishing cases, then there’s no reason you have to follow this rule, right?
- #42: All languages have at least three person and two number distinctions for pronouns. Another one where it’s not too hard to see the “alien” point of view.
Conclusion
Grammar is a huge field, and we’ve barely taken the first step into it. Even if you don’t make something completely outlandish as in the above examples, you can still create an alien grammar out of more mundane building blocks. There are thousands of languages in the world, and many have rare or unique features that could find a home in your alien conlang. A number for “a few”? Sure, it works for the Motuna language of Papua New Guinea. Want a case for things you’re afraid of? A few of the Aboriginal languages of Australia can help you there…if there are any native speakers left alive when you start. The list goes on for just about anything you could think of. All you have to do is look, because, linguistically, aliens are among us.