From Elvish to Esperanto to Dothraki to Belter

The panelists for the titular panel were: David Peterson (as moderator), Lawrence M. Schoen, Ryn Yee, and Jean Bürlesk. The panel description was as follows:

This is not a 1950s movie. The aliens don’t speak English. Fictional societies, whether on distant planets, in the far future, or in secondary fantasy worlds, will have their own languages unlike our own. These constructed languages (conlangs) can be fun–and devilishly difficult–to construct. Language experts and writers (aren’t writers language experts?) will talk about making a conlang, and how they figure into stories, from first contact to diplomacy to bargaining for your life.


How Far Should You Go?
When reading a book — like Lord of the Rings or Embassytown or watching a tv series — like Star Trek or Babylon Five, or even a movie like Arrival, even the casual fan can pick up a word or two in a constructed language (or conlang). But, from the outside-looking-in, it can be hard to determine: did the writers invent a word? Or a full language?

More importantly — if I’m writing a story, how much of this language do I need to invent? Do I need to act like Tolkien?

Well? All languages are comprised of a multitude of layers.

Layers of a Language
Vocabulary — The most readily apparent. The conlang consists of words with meanings. But, let’s think about the ways the vocabulary we use reflects on us.
Word choice can demonstrate a particular culture (references to particular gods or rituals, expected life events, etc)
Word choice can also demonstrate class (“How y’all doing? versus “How do you do, today?”)
Words also have connotations, that may not be familiar to non-native speakers. (“My big sister” versus “my large sister”).
Grammar — Most humans are designed to recognize patterns, if only to make sure they can tell when something seems ‘off’. What is grammar if not patterns of word use?
What order do you put your parts of speech — your nouns, verbs, adjectives, and more?
Do the verbs/nouns/etc change form based on other factors in the sentence? (i.e. verb conjugation based on tense or subject)
Punctuation (I love the Oxford comma!)
Do I Need The Whole Language Before I Can Write?
Short answer? No.

Long answer? It’s up to you. And you can always write your story and then layer the language part in.

Options for Conlangs
Treat language as world building!

Opt out! Use universal translators.
But! Think about idioms and how poorly they translate between earth cultures. “Raining cats and dogs”.
Think about things that can translate content, but not intent.
A few words here and there, just thrown in.
You can spell it either in the way that makes it more pronounceable by the majority of your audience, or stylized to give a sense of culture, (but harder to pronounce).
A few sentences — an idea of the spelling of things, a form of grammar, what letters and vowels are more common in the language.
Try to be consistent for certain sounds. For example, pick either “ck” or “k”, and “s” or “c”. Unless there’s a cultural explanation.
Give the created culture verbal ticks (“like”, “um”, etc). Plus, their own accents – both with their own language and yours.
Remember those idioms? Think about what sort of hyperbolic phrases the created people’s culture might use.
Have a creole language! Now, is a creole language — using part alien/ part your language easier? No. All languages have their own grammar and patterns and cultural baggage! Even dialects of your own are internally consistent.
Some languages have a better vocabulary for certain concepts. Show the characters switching languages based on conversation subject matter.
This also means you can imply words that are too complex to be said in one (for example) English word.
Next step? Think about the history of the culture. Invaders and conquests, what sort of languages got filtered in.
English has “beef” that comes from “cows”. How did these words get to be so different? Because “cow” is from the Germanic, while the conquering Norman (i.e. French) lords used the term “boeuf“, giving ranchers one word, and the people eating the meat another.
More! What font, alphabet, pictograms, logographic, syllabaries, etc would your society use? Could it be translated into the language you’re writing in? Or not?
Okay. You’ll need a glossary by now, and might be time to start thinking about a dictionary. Maybe a grammar book.
In conlang circles, the Darmock (season 5, episode 2 Star Trek: The Next Generation) is infamous. In the episode, while the translators work as usual, the culture uses references to famous (on their world) stories for many concepts.  For example, the expressions “Darmok on the ocean, Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra, Darmok and Jalad on the ocean”, convey a sense of two opposing persons, who arrive separately at an isolated place and, forced to cooperate when faced with a fierce beast, leave together as friends.(1)

Things To Be Wary Of
Science fiction and fantasy has overused the apostrophe in created names and more. Be sure you need it before using one.
Is borrowing from a dying language a good idea?

I mean, science is known for using Latin for its naming conventions.

No. Remember those connotations and contexts we mentioned? If you’re not a native speaker, it’s easy to get those wrong. And using one language to represent an imaginary language is kinda the definition of cultural appropriation.
What about using words from a real language?

Is it because you have characters from that culture? Sure! Just make sure a native speaker reads it and makes sure it both says what you meant for it to say, and that the connotation is what you intended. (‘Big sister’ versus ‘Large sister’). Just make sure the words are there for a reason, not just window dressing.
Are you ready to start creating a language?

Have you created one in the past?

Let me know how it goes/went!