Learning a Language: A Lesson in Geography

I wasn't the only one who was intrigued with my niece Tamzin's antics with writing lyrics in her invented language, Ingaaric. My friend Mary wrote:

"Checked out your recent blog about Tamzin - brought to mind the country that my daughter and a couple of her friends "invented", starting in middle school, named Tamyeva- with a geography, history, language, culture, and cuisine (I remember that there was no wheat in Tamyeva, and the kids spent lots of time trying to grind rice into flour!)."

Now I've spent plenty of time in fantasy land, staring out the window and gathering wool. Apparently I even had some imagination when I was a kid. But I was more concerned with what streetlights were going to be when they grew up than I was with creating new countries and languages.

So with the rice grinders in mind, I wasted more time looking up what other, better informed people had to say about invented languages. Which led me to Arika Okrent's book, In the Land of Invented Languages. She's been trained as a linguist, so she's thought about these kinds of concerns more than most people.

I had fun with this book. So did my best guy. It pushed me to think about "real" languages - specifically, which languages are considered worthy of being taught today.

Ahhh yes, so I goofed off a bit longer to look at what both Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone had on offer.  The usual suspects, as it turns out, except that Pimsleur also offers a language - Twi - which I had never heard of. Turns out it is a language spoken in southern Ghana. Where most of the country's petroleum can be found. That little clue helped explain why Pimsleur, in addition to the expected oil-producers' languages, also lists two separate versions of Armenian: Caspian Sea oil.

But Objiwe? Why that one North American language when there are so many? It took me a while to do the geography... How do you say "Alberta Tar Sands" in Objibwe? I have no idea, but somewhere out there, at least a few non-native speakers are learning.

So imagine if the Iroquois had stayed on top in New York - just think how many languages the hydraulic fracturing people would have to learn. Provided that the Iroquois would even be sufficiently shortsighted to allow fracking...

Rosetta Stone, instead, offers lessons in Latin, describing it thus:  Develop the Latin language skills to enjoy social interaction and learn to share your ideas and opinions. 

Now I just want to know, I really want to know, where I could possibly "enjoy social interaction" in Latin, short of time-travel. Travel to Rome, perhaps, to hobnob with the new Pope? Time-travel seems more plausible, and certainly a lot more entertaining. In the meanwhile, I'll just stick with Italian, Spanish, or maybe even Ingaaric.