Engineered languages (often abbreviated to engelangs, or, less commonly, engilangs) are

constructed languages A constructed language (sometimes called a conlang) is a language whose phonology, grammar, and vocabulary, instead of having developed naturally, are consciously devised for some purpose, which may include being devised for a work of fiction. ...

devised to test or prove some hypotheses about how languages work or might work. There are at least three subcategories, philosophical languages (or ideal languages), logical languages (sometimes abbreviated as ''loglangs''), and experimental languages. Raymond Brown describes engineered languages as "languages that are designed to specified ''objective'' criteria, and modeled to meet those criteria". Some engineered languages have been considered candidate global auxiliary languages, and some languages intended as international auxiliary languages have certain "engineered" aspects (in which they are more regular and systematic than their natural language sources).

Logical languages

Logical languages are meant to allow (or enforce) unambiguous statements. They are typically based on

predicate logic First-order logic—also known as predicate logic, quantificational logic, and first-order predicate calculus—is a collection of formal systems used in mathematics, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science. First-order logic uses quantifie ...

but can also be based on any system of formal

logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the science of deductively valid inferences or of logical truths. It is a formal science investigating how conclusions follow from prem ...

. The two best-known logical languages are the predicate languages

Loglan Loglan is a logical constructed language originally designed for linguistic research, particularly for investigating the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis. The language was developed beginning in 1955 by Dr. James Cooke Brown with the goal of making ...

and its successor

Lojban Lojban (pronounced ) is a logical, constructed, human language created by the Logical Language Group which aims to be syntactically unambigious. It succeeds the Loglan project. The Logical Language Group (LLG) began developing Lojban in 198 ...

. They both aim to eliminate

syntactical ambiguity Syntactic ambiguity, also called structural ambiguity, amphiboly or amphibology, is a situation where a sentence may be interpreted in more than one way due to ambiguous sentence structure. Syntactic ambiguity arises not from the range of meani ...

and reduce semantic ambiguity to a minimum. In particular, the grammar of Lojban is carefully engineered to express such predicate logic in an unambiguous manner.

Philosophical languages

Philosophical languages are designed to reflect some aspect of philosophy, particularly with respect to the nature or potential of any given language.

John Wilkins John Wilkins, (14 February 1614 – 19 November 1672) was an Anglican clergyman, natural philosopher, and author, and was one of the founders of the Royal Society. He was Bishop of Chester from 1668 until his death. Wilkins is one of the ...

' Real Character and Edward Powell Foster's Ro constructed their words using a taxonomic tree. Vocabularies of oligosynthetic languages, for example Ygyde, are made of

compound word In linguistics, a compound is a lexeme (less precisely, a word or sign) that consists of more than one stem. Compounding, composition or nominal composition is the process of word formation that creates compound lexemes. Compounding occurs when ...

s, which are coined from a small (theoretically minimal) set of

morpheme A morpheme is the smallest meaningful Constituent (linguistics), constituent of a linguistic expression. The field of linguistics, linguistic study dedicated to morphemes is called morphology (linguistics), morphology. In English, morphemes are ...

s. Sonja Lang's

Toki Pona Toki Pona (rendered as ''toki pona'' and often translated as 'the language of good'; ; ) is a philosophical artistic constructed language (philosophical artlang) known for its small vocabulary, simplicity, and ease of acquisition. It was create ...

is based on

minimalistic Minimalism is a movement in visual arts, music, and other media that began in post–World War II Western art. Minimalism may also refer to: *Minimalism (computing), a philosophy of programming and configuring computers *Minimalism (philosophy), ...

simplicity Simplicity is the state or quality of being simple. Something easy to understand or explain seems simple, in contrast to something complicated. Alternatively, as Herbert A. Simon suggests, something is simple or complex depending on the way we ...

Experimental languages

An experimental language is a

constructed language A constructed language (sometimes called a conlang) is a language whose phonology, grammar, and vocabulary, instead of having developed naturally, are consciously devised for some purpose, which may include being devised for a work of fiction. ...

designed for the purpose of exploring some element in the theory of

linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Ling ...

. Most such languages are concerned with the relation between language and thought; however, languages have been constructed to explore other aspects of language as well. In

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...

, much work has been done on the assumption popularly known as the

Sapir–Whorf hypothesis The hypothesis of linguistic relativity, also known as the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis , the Whorf hypothesis, or Whorfianism, is a principle suggesting that the structure of a language affects its speakers' worldview or cognition, and thus people' ...

, Suzette Haden Elgin's

Láadan Láadan (/ˈlɑ˦ɑˈdɑn/) 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 s ...

is designed to lexicalize and grammaticalize the concepts and distinctions important to women, based on

muted group theory Muted group theory (MGT), created by Edwin Ardener and Shirley Ardener in 1975, is a communication theory that focuses on how marginalized groups are muted and excluded via the use of language. The main idea of MGT is that "Language serves its cre ...

Examples

References

External links