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The Fictional Linguistic Dilemma - The Mad Schemes of Dr. Tectonic — LiveJournal [entries|archive|friends|userinfo]

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So, a question for y'all what read SF:




[User Picture]From: dpolicar
2007-06-17 06:10 am (UTC)
So, I checked all of these, because I can imagine/think of stories in which they all work (my favorite "other" right now is "he doesn't speak the damned language, and your challenge is to make the story interesting without ordinary conversation"... which A Martian Odyssey did brilliantly, for example. It's otherwise profoundly dated, but nevertheless well worth reading if you haven't.)

That said, they can all not work, too.

A more specific answer would depend on the general focus and tone of your story. If you're going for a realistic world where technobabble doesn't otherwise stand unexamined, don't make this the exception. Etc. etc. etc.

Put differently: don't flout laws of linguistics any more blatantly that you'll flout other physical laws.
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