Láadan

Láadan () is a gynocentric constructed language created by Suzette Haden Elgin in 1982 to test the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis, specifically to determine if development of a language aimed at expressing the views of women would shape a culture; a subsidiary hypothesis was that Western natural languages may be better suited for expressing the views of men than women. The language was included in her science fiction Native Tongue series.

Láadan contains a number of words that are used to make unambiguous statements that include how one feels about what one is saying. According to Elgin, this is designed to counter male-centered language's limitations on women, who are forced to respond "I know I said that, but I meant this".

Motivation, development and publication history

Elgin was a writer of both fiction and nonfiction book series. Láadan and the ideas underpinning its creation were described in several series:

It was included as a language portrayed diegetically within the speculative fiction novel trilogy Native Tongue (1984), The Judas Rose (1987), and Earthsong (1993). The role of the language in the plot of the overall story is as a transformative project, whose development changes the social roles of an extended family of linguist characters.

After the publication of the second novel, A First Dictionary & Grammar of Láadan (1988) was published in the hopes that a community of speakers could form, and the validity of the project from the novels might be tested in real life. The grammar book was advertised in literary and feminist magazines, and feedback led to a second edition and posthumously a third edition.

Before conceiving of Láadan, Elgin had published a self-help book The Gentle Art of Verbal Self Defense (1980) which was developed into a series of books focusing on the workplace, romantic relationships, and so on. It postulated that at least in English, phrasing often allowed for an ambiguous hostility which could be used as a sort of verbal abuse especially in competitive environments, and discussed which defenses might be effective and which not; see Template:Section link. To allow for the means to express nuanced emotion and other distinctions, features combine to create and modify meanings.

Phonology

Tones

Láadan is a tonal language. It utilises two distinct tonesTemplate:Efn:

• Template:Spaced ndash or , a short, medium or low tone, represented by a single unmarked vowel
• Template:Spaced ndash, a short, high tone, represented by a single marked vowel

The word "Láadan" has three syllables: "lá-" with the short vowel /a/ plus high tone; "-a" with the short vowel /a/ and no tone; and "-dan".

Láadan does not allow any double (i.e. long) phonemes. Whenever two identical short vowels would occur side by side in a single morpheme, one of them has to be marked for high tone. When adding an affix would result in two identical vowels side by side, an epenthetic /h/ is inserted to prevent the forbidden sequence. The language will allow either or , but not *maa. These combinations can be described as:

• Template:Spaced ndash, a long, low-rising tone, represented by a double vowel, the second of which is marked
• Template:Spaced ndash, a long, high-falling tone, represented by a double vowel, the first of which is marked

Vowels

Láadan has five vowels:

• aTemplate:Spaced ndash, an open back unrounded vowel (as English calm),
• eTemplate:Spaced ndash, an open-mid front unrounded vowel (as English bell),
• iTemplate:Spaced ndash, a near-close near-front unrounded vowel (as English bit),
• oTemplate:Spaced ndash, a close-mid back rounded vowel (as English home),
• uTemplate:Spaced ndash, a close back rounded vowel (as English boon).

Consonants

		Labial	Dental / Alveolar		Postalveolar / Palatal	Glottal
			median	lateral
Nasal		m Template:IPAslink	n Template:IPAslink
Plosive		b Template:IPAslink	d Template:IPAslink
Fricative	voiceless		th Template:IPAslink	lh Template:IPAslink	sh Template:IPAslink	h Template:IPAslink
	voiced				zh Template:IPAslink
Approximant		w Template:IPAslink	r Template:IPAslink	l Template:IPAslink	y Template:IPAslink

Láadan lacks the consonants . It uses b, d, sh (), m, n, l, r, w, y (), h with the same phonetic value as English. Three digraphs require further explanation:

• thTemplate:Spaced ndash, a voiceless dental fricative (always as in English think, never as then),
• zhTemplate:Spaced ndash, a voiced postalveolar fricative (as English pleasure),
• lhTemplate:Spaced ndash, a voiceless alveolar lateral fricative (as Welsh ).

Grammar

Mandatory parts of speech

Most Láadan sentences, and all formal sentences in the language, contain three particles:

• The speech-act particleTemplate:Spaced ndashthis occurs at the beginning of the sentence and marks it as either a statement (), a question (), et cetera; in connected speech or writing, this particle is often omitted. They are:

  Indicates a declarative sentence (usually optional)

  Indicates a question

  Indicates a command; very rare, except to small children

  Indicates a request; this is the usual imperative/"command" form

  Indicates a promise

  Indicates a warning

• The grammatical tense particleTemplate:Spaced ndashthis occurs second in the sentence and marks it as either present tense (), past tense (), future tense () or hypothetical (); without the tense particle, the sentence is assumed to have the same tense as the previous sentence.
• The evidence particleTemplate:Spaced ndashthis occurs at the end of statements and indicates the trustworthiness of the statement.Template:Efn They are:

  Known to speaker because perceived by speaker, externally or internally

  Known to speaker because self-evident

  Perceived by speaker in a dream

  Assumed true by speaker because speaker trusts source

  Assumed false by speaker because speaker distrusts source; if evil intent by the source is also assumed, the form is

  Imagined or invented by speaker, hypothetical

  Used to indicate that the speaker states a total lack of knowledge as to the validity of the matter

Word order

Láadan has two syntactic orderings. In active voice, it is a verb–subject–object (VSO) language; the English example sentence in the following table would read in Template:Langx. In passive voice, it is an object–verb–subject (OVS) language; the sentence would read in Template:Langx. In either case, it uses a minority word order type among languages of the world.

Verbs and adjectives are interchangeable. There are no articles, and the object is marked by the or suffix. The plural number is shown only by the prefix to the verb. The particle following a verb makes it negative. Separate clauses are joined by the particle .

OBJ:object REQ:request ST

Some basic sentences in Láadan

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Morphology

Láadan has an agglutinative morphology, and uses a number of affixes to indicate various feelings and moods that many natural languages can only indicate by tone of voice, body language or circumlocution.

Affix	meaning	example
	disgust or dislike	: "pleasantly bewildered"; : "unpleasantly bewildered"
	to try to	: "I tried to come"
	to try in vain to	: "I tried in vain to come"
	progressive aspect	: "I was trying in vain to come"
	natural possessor	: "her mother's milk"
	customary or legal possessor	: "my husband"
	possessor by chance	: "your money (gambling winnings)"
	possessor by unknown provenance	: "the cats' food"
	denotes male (otherwise female or gender neutral)	: "mother/parent"; : "father"

The speech-act particle, at the beginning of a sentence, can also carry several suffixes, which expand on the overall state of the sentence. For example, begins a statement, but begins a statement that is part of a narrative; begins a request made in pain; begins a question that is meant in jest.

Pronouns

Pronouns in Láadan are built up from a number of constituent parts. The consonant l marks the first person, n the second person and b the third person. Usually, these are followed by the vowel e. The vowel a is used to designate someone who is loved ( is prefixed to describe someone who is despised). The suffix is used to mark a plural pronoun for numbers up to four, and for numbers beyond that. Therefore, means "we, several beloved", and means "they, many despised".

Reception

Anthony Burgess mentioned Láadan in a 1985 review of A Feminist Dictionary in The Observer, calling it "ingenious" and stating he was "highly sympathetic" of its aims, but asserting that "it's not going to work" because "[n]ot enough women care sufficiently".

See also

• Language and gender
• Muted group theory

Further reading

• Elgin, Suzette Haden, & Diane Martin. A First Dictionary and Grammar of Láadan. Madison: Society for the Furtherance and Study of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 1988.
• Jones, Mari C. and Ishtla Singh, Exploring Language Change: Routledge, 2005; pp. 169–182.

External links

• Elgin's Láadan introduction

  Lesson One of Láadan Made Easier

  A Láadan Sampler

• Elgin’s critique of others’ analysis of Láadan:
  • Myths About Láadan
  • Just One More Láadan Myth
• Láadan lessons (moderately paced lessons in Láadan by A.M.J. "Amberwind" Barnhart; archived from prior URL)
• Some Láadan (PDF) (The text says that "wo-" is a plural marker. This is an error; the plural marker is "me-", while "wo-" is a relativizer.)
• Láadan Working Group
• How to count in Láadan
• Template:Trim Template:Replace on YouTube: a critical video review of the basics of Láadan as an artlang
• Essays and guides about Láadan, a group blog