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Re:Linguistics and Programming Languages by throwaway7645 on Monday July 17, 2017 @01:33PM (#14790652)
Anytime Lojban comes up I recommend taking a look at linguist Arika Okrent's book "Into the Land of Invented Languages". She learns several conlangs (constructed languages) during the book and has several chapters devoted to the history and her learning of Lojban and some of its pitfalls (some things take a lot of words to say). There's a reason why natural languages have so much ambiguity, so you don't have to write a novel to have a basic conversation. If you go to wikitongues on YouTube you'll see a prominent community member who can only read it and can't speak it...it isn't easy.

Edit: Lojban is ambiguous with how something is said, so when a speaker says something you should never misinterpret the words, but the meaning could be misinterpreted as I understand it. I'm no expert, but would love to see something like this take off.

Re:Linguistics and Programming Languages by zephyrfalcon on Monday July 17, 2017 @03:43PM (#14791729)
"""I recommend taking a look at linguist Arika Okrent's book "Into the Land of Invented Languages"""

I used to have that book... I didn't think it was very good. I wanted to learn more about the various conlangs, but instead the author mostly focused on their creators, and then especially their idiosyncrasies and quirks.

For those who want to know more about conlangs, I would recommend "The Language Construction Kit" by Mark Rosenfelder.

Re:Linguistics and Programming Languages by throwaway7645 on Monday July 17, 2017 @05:29PM (#14792422)
The Language Construction Kit is great from everything I've read. Yes her book is more on the history & pro/cons of various conlangs mixed with examples...etc. It's not supposed to teach you Klingon, Lojban, Esperanto, and several others all in one book.
Re:Linguistics and Programming Languages by anthonybullard on Monday July 17, 2017 @03:57PM (#14791839)
The Language Construction Kit is phenomenal and played a huge part in developing my love of conlangs as well as linguistics in general.
Re:Linguistics and Programming Languages by sriku on Monday July 17, 2017 @05:59PM (#14792616)
An aside - the brilliant Star Trek episode Darmok [1] shows the importance of the shared cultural context in which communication happens. [2] is a snippet of the episode where the crew is perplexed by the "language" of the "Tamarians".

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darmok [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-wzr74d7TI

Re:Linguistics and Programming Languages by rumcajz on Monday July 17, 2017 @03:16PM (#14791503)
When it comes to book recommendations I would recommend Umberto Eco's The Search for the Perfect Language.
Re:Linguistics and Programming Languages by throwaway7645 on Monday July 17, 2017 @05:25PM (#14792394)
Speaking of Larry Wall (creator of Perl) above, "the search for the perfect language" is his favorite book I believe.