Are Elvish, Klingon, Dothraki and Na'vi real languages? - John McWhorter

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What do Game of Thrones' Dothraki, Avatar's Na'vi, Star Trek's Klingon and LOTR's Elvish have in common? They are all fantasy constructed languages, or conlangs. Conlangs have all the delicious complexities of real languages: a high volume of words, grammar rules, and room for messiness and evolution. John McWhorter explains why these invented languages captivate fans long past the rolling credits.

Lesson by John McWhorter, animation by Enjoyanimation.

To many, one of the coolest things
about "Game of Thrones"

is that the inhabitants
of the Dothraki Sea

have their own real language.

And Dothraki came hot on the heels

of the real language
that the Na'vi speak in "Avatar,"

which, surely, the Na'vi needed

when the Klingons in "Star Trek" have had
their own whole language since 1979.

And let's not forget the Elvish languages

in J.R.R. Tolkien's
"Lord of the Rings" trilogy,

especially since that was
the official grandfather

of the fantasy conlangs.

"Conlang" is short for
"constructed language."

They're more than codes like Pig Latin,

and they're not just collections
of fabricated slang like the Nadsat lingo

that the teen hoodlums
in "A Clockwork Orange" speak,

where "droog" from Russian
happens to mean "friend."

What makes conlangs real languages
isn't the number of words they have.

It helps, of course,
to have a lot of words.

Dothraki has thousands of words.

Na'vi started with 1,500 words.

Fans on websites
have steadily created more.

But we can see the difference
between vocabulary alone

and what makes a real language

from a look at how Tolkien
put together grand old Elvish,

a conlang with several thousands words.

After all, you could memorize
5,000 words of Russian

and still be barely able
to construct a sentence.

A four-year-old would talk
rings around you.

That's because you have to know
how to put the words together.

That is, a real language has grammar.

Elvish does.

In English, to make a verb past,
you add an "-ed."

Wash, washed.

In Elvish, "wash" is "allu"

and "washed" is "allune."

Real languages also change over time.

There's no such thing as a language

that's the same today
as it was a thousand years ago.

As people speak, they drift
into new habits,

shed old ones,

make mistakes, and get creative.

Today, one says,

"Give us today our daily bread."

In Old English, they said,

"Urne gedaeghwamlican
hlaf syle us todaeg."

Things change in conlangs, too.

Tolkien charted out ancient
and newer versions of Elvish.

When the first Elves awoke at Cuiviénen,

in their new language,

the word for "people" was "kwendi,"

but in the language of one of the groups
that moved away, Teleri,

over time, "kwendi" became "pendi,"

with the "k" turning into a "p."

And just like real languages,
conlangs like Elvish split off into many.

When the Romans transplanted
Latin across Europe,

French, Spanish, and Italian were born.

When groups move to different places,

over time, their ways
of speaking grow apart,

just like everything else about them.

Thus, Latin's word for hand was "manus,"

but in French, it became "main,"

while in Spain it became "mano."

Tolkien made sure Elvish
did the same kind of thing.

While that original word
"kwendi" became "pendi"

among the Teleri,

among the Avari, who spread
throughout Middle Earth,

it became "kindi"
when the "w" dropped out.

The Elvish varieties Tolkien
fleshed out the most

are Quenya and Sindarin,

and their words are different
in the same way French and Spanish are.

Quenya has "suc" for "drink,"

Sindarin has "sog."

And as you know, real languages are messy.

That's because they change,

and change has a way
of working against order,

just like in a living room
or on a bookshelf.

Real languages are never
perfectly logical.

That's why Tolkien made sure
that Elvish had plenty of exceptions.

Lots of verbs are conjugated
in ways you just have to know.

Take even the word "know."

In the past, it's "knew,"

which isn't explained
by any of the rules in English.

Oh well.

In Elvish, "know" is "ista,"

but "knew" is "sinte."

Oh well.

The truth is, though, that Elvish
is more a sketch for a real language

than a whole one.

For Tolkien, Elvish was a hobby

rather than an attempt to create something
people could actually speak.

Much of the Elvish the characters
in the "Lord of the Rings" movies speak

has been made up since Tolkien
by dedicated fans of Elvish

based on guesses as to what Tolkien
would have constructed.

That's the best we can do for Elvish
because there are no actual Elves around

to speak it for us.

But the modern conlangs go further.

Dothraki, Na'vi, and Klingon
are developed enough

that you can actually speak them.

Here's a translation
of "Hamlet" into Klingon,

although performing it
would mean getting used

to pronouncing "k" with your uvula,

that weird, cartoony thing hanging
in the back of your throat.

Believe it or not, you actually do that
in plenty of languages around the world,

like Eskimo ones.

Pronouncing Elvish is much easier, though.

So, let's take our leave for now

from this introduction
to conlangs in Elvish

and the other three conlangs discussed

with a heartfelt
quad-conlangual valedictory:

"A Na Marie!"

"Hajas!"

Na'vi's "Kiyevame!"

"Qapla!"

and "Goodbye!"