Wednesday DE: Lángúage.

[angry_friendship_wolf]

Does your character speak any languages other than their native tongue (or the 'common' tongue in spacefaring universes)? Why and how did they learn? If they don't, are there any languages they would want to learn?

Comments

[have_no_mercy]

Tess speaks English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Mandarin Chinese. She grew up speaking English and French and learned Spanish in school. Portuguese she picked up in South America where she spent about three years in the jungle. Mandarin it's anyone's guess how she picked that up. But she speaks it in canon, so.

Kylo speaks Galactic Basic and Wookie. I'm sure he speaks more than that, but canon doesn't specify.

Creed speaks English and picked up French and German during the wars.

[configuration_birdwatcher]

Bastion's primary languages are omnicode, German, and English, but when they were built they were also programmed to understand several others that are spoken in neighboring countries or common minority languages in Germany. I kind of hedge about which languages specifically but they can definitely understand Torbjörn's Swedish in canon. They also want to learn the Binary droid language from Cassian's galaxy, through Space Duolingo or something, because it's easier for organic people to learn or translate than omnicode but compatible with their vocal processor.

Wilson speaks German and French adequately but not great, because he's from an era and social class when that would have been a standard part of his education. (I think Latin and Greek as well?) He lived abroad for a while as a student, so it's seen some practical use.

Thurlow definitely speaks French and possibly some other European languages because they lived in Paris for a bit before they relocated to Fallen London; their canon references the PC's history in Surface Europe from time to time, Paris especially, and the narration never really mentions a language barrier issue. They likely learned for the same reasons as Wilson originally. After coming to the Neath, they also figured out how to read some of the previous four fallen cities' languages and the Correspondence from carvings, although not really with the same fluency. The more they can learn of the earlier cities' languages the better since it helps them understand the history of the Neath, but it's difficult to find surviving material, and while the Fourth City has a surviving colony or two the people there don't like Londoners very much. The Correspondence is the language of stars, which are sapient in that universe, and also the language of the Masters of the Bazaar; lesser creatures trying to speak or write it are prone to lighting themselves on fire, which is an obstacle Thurlow would need to get past.

Aradia and Cirava speak Alternian; the planet and indeed the empire have one language for everybody and I'm not sure if others even exist anymore since the only troll who speaks a different language comes from an alternate timeline. There's strong indications that spoken Alternian is very similar to 21st century American English except in some areas of vocabulary, but it has a different alphabet. Maybe as many as three alphabets, since Hiveswap shows a unique one, Homestuck proper used the Daedric script from Elder Scrolls rotated 180 degrees, and there were a few times when various trolls had no difficulty reading things written in English with the Latin alphabet but that might be a Sburb player thing instead since the human protagonist of Hiveswap Friendsim has to learn written Alternian over time (but can have spoken conversations with trolls immediately).

Aradia may have learned bits and pieces of ancient, extinct or near-extinct Alternian languages from poking around in ruins; I don't think Cirava's interested in stuff like that.

[fairy_fixit]

Amascut's and Fairy Fixit's cannon isn't particularly space-faring... well kinda, the actual structure of the universe is complicated like it involves planes and realms but there are actual solar systems involved and you can theoretically reach some "planes" by traversing physical space and... teleportation being a thing before interstellar transportation sure messes with perceptions of space, I am sure. The "shape" of the universe is kind of like the shape of Yggdrasil and the Asgardian realms and the greater MCU? It's a mess.

But that wasn't the question! There does exist a Common, ooc it's purely out of convenience, since it isn't spoken just on the planet and continent where almost everything happens and the moon as well, but also in Tarddiad of all places, which is a whole separate planet in probably another solar system? Uh.. anyhow both Amascut and Fairy Fixit speak Common.

But before Common was common, Zarosian/Infernal was the lingua franca and probably even more widespread in the universe than Common. Despite it being the language of the enemy, Amascut knows it. Latin is its stand-in in-game and it is a language full of legalese and linguistic magic, so it is convenient if you want to commit people to magically binding contracts. She also knows Kharidian which is represented by a Semitic-Turkic mishmash in-game because that's just her home turf. But being a goddess, picking up new languages isn't hard to do, so I am sure she knows more besides those.

Fairy Fixit knows Common, but also old Guthixian and old Zanarian as well. Old Guthixian is represented by a something written in a FUTHARK alphabet so it would probably be represented in game by an old germanic language, but there isn't much of it in game. Common problably comes from old Guthixian, just like old English comes from older German. As for old Zanarian, not much of it is in-game either and its written form is only used in coded messages among the fairy resistance movement. She also knows a few others well enough to do job when she travels off-world.