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Let's find a new language for the Café

squeak

 
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St. Mungo's
Cafés is hardly something that the English have invented and yet everything here is communicated in English. It is not fair, as many of us are not native English speakers and struggle with all the ambiguities, duplicities, nuances, presumptions, etc, etc. It is also getting tiresome with the same old, same old. Hence, I propose that we find a new language for the Café that we all can learn together and communicate in henceforth. It will provide a level playing field for all and is good brain gymnastics. Of course, the new language should not be something that many here already speak, such as Australian, Canadian, French, German, Kiwi or Swahili. It has to be something entirely...different. My personal opinion is that it would be best that I chose the new language, but being of such an open-minded nature, I am willing to listen to suggestions. Also, there is of course the slight caveat that I sadly don't make the decisions here. Irrespectively, I propose Toki Pona. Apparently, it only has about 100 words and it is all down to combining them in an effective manner, hence making my point about brain gymnastics. Saxophone in Toki Poni doesn't exist, so we would have to be a bit inventive there. For starters, musical instrument is "ilo kalama musi". "Siko" means curve or bend. Thus, we could agree on "ilo kalama musi siko" and we would be up an running. "Suli" is big and "lili" means small (kind of cute, I think). If we agree on just SATB and none of them silly sized saxophones, then we would have the following names for the four sizes:

Soprano = lili lili ilo kalama musi siko
Alto = suli lili ilo kalama musi siko
Tenor = lili suli ilo kalama musi siko
Baritone = suli suli ilo kalama musi siko

So anyway, who do you think the new language should be?
 
Esperanto was intended to be an international language.
Where did it go?

Edit Have to remember, this cafe was originally opened by @Pete Thomas who I think is english but he will need to confirm this.
 
Whilst I find the idea appealing.......

Learning to read and understand music has been like learning a new language for me. I learnt French and German at school.

I don't think I currently have the energy or headspace for another one yet and suspect many others will feel the same.

Jx
 
Over the centuries, there have been various 'standard' languages and lingua franca. For centuries - well over a thousand years - Latin was the international language. So: salve et bonum in occursum adventus tui.

Following the Norman Conquest, the 'official' language at court became Norman French, although educated people and written matter was still in Latin. French persisted as the international diplomatic language through to the C20th. There are remnants of Norman French in Parliament for example, when the Queen gives Royal Assent to a Bill the announcement is made 'La reine vult' - the Queen wills it.

English has become for various reasons the current 'international' language. These things change over the centuries.

I have very rusty O Level Latin and I am reasonably OK at French, and I know a few words and phrases in German and Swahili... I keep thinking about revisiting German and adding Spanish and Italian to the list...
 
I vote for Pidgin.

If you're ever feeling down and blue about what's going on in the world, just go read the news on the BBC Pidgin site.
It's a form of language that seems (to me, anyway) irrepressibly cheerful, no matter how grave the subject.
 
Surely Mandarin is the emerging international language. However, Cantose is a tonal language with 6 tones. So perhaps Cantonese should be the choice of musicians in the Asian age.
 
If we all learn to speak Google, then life will be as it should be.
 
It's going to be a long journey if your attempt to replace English starts with
Soprano = lili lili ilo kalama musi siko
Alto = suli lili ilo kalama musi siko
Tenor = lili suli ilo kalama musi siko
Baritone = suli suli ilo kalama musi siko
Replacing Italian / Latin.
 
@Tenor Viol may correct me, but most musical terms are in latin or italian, not sure which, i.e. lento, largo, forte etc, then may be for our purposes we should use which ever of those is correct.
 
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