Lexember 2023

[zyma]

Happy December, everyone!

Welcome to Lexember, a monthlong "game" that challenges participants to create at least one new word in one of their conlangs daily from the 1st through the 31st of December, and to post the results here in this thread. This is the 12th year of the Lexember tradition, I believe, and its 11th year here on the CBB!

Commenting on the words others have made is always encouraged, as is taking inspiration from them! Even if you're not participating yourself, you're still welcome to leave comments here in the thread. It's been mentioned in previous years that communities of conlangers on various social media platforms also participate in Lexember (in fact, I believe it was started on the site formerly known as Twitter), so if you're active elsewhere, you might consider posting your words there as well. Of course, if you'd like to participate in the challenge, but would prefer not to post the words you come up with anywhere, that's perfectly fine.

I want to emphasize that there is no "correct" way to participate in Lexember. I don't want anyone who might be interested in the challenge to be discouraged from participating just because they feel that they might not be able to participate every single day or make their posts as detailed as they would like, or that none of their conlangs are "ready" enough. I've tried to address these potential concerns under the spoiler:

Spoiler:

If you miss a day, you always have the option of posting two words the next day, but making up for missed days is never a requirement. You can also simply start or stop participating at any time, with no explanation needed.

Some participants like to include example sentences, IPA transcriptions, cultural notes, and/or etymological details with their entries, but none of these things are required. You can include as much, or as little, information as you'd like in your posts. The amount you include is entirely up to you, and it doesn't have to be consistent from day to day.

It's perfectly alright to either use the same conlang throughout the month or to switch back and forth between using different conlangs as the month goes on. Participants also have the option of making entries in multiple conlangs or coining multiple words per conlang on any given day.

Finally, there are no objective requirements your conlang must meet in order for you to be able to participate in Lexember. If your conlang is very new and you end up deciding to completely rework parts of it as the month goes on, that is absolutely fine, even if your previous Lexember entries end up becoming "outdated" as a result.

If you have any questions about Lexember, please feel free to post them here in the thread or message me directly at any point throughout the month.

Additionally, participants have the option of challenging themselves to learn a new word in a natural language they're studying each day, and to include it with their Lexember entries. Credit for this idea, as far as I'm aware, goes to qwed117, who first did this four years ago with Sardinian.

The six weekly "themes" for this year's Lexember, based on suggestions from prospective participants that were submitted here in the thread over the course of the week leading up to December 1st, can be found below. These are intended to serve as potential sources of inspiration throughout the month, so I've tried to choose themes that will hopefully help facilitate the creation of pretty basic vocabulary for anyone who's participating with a fairly new conlang, but which are also broad enough and open enough to interpretation that those participating with more developed conlangs should also be able to follow them, if they so choose. Next to each theme, I've credited the user(s) whose suggestion(s) inspired it. Naturally, no one is ever required to follow these themes at all, let alone throughout the entire month, and those who do choose to follow them should feel free to interpret them however they'd like. If anyone would like to suggest additional or alternative themes at any point throughout the month, please feel free to do so.

Weekly Themes: 

• Week 1 (Dec. 1-2): Two, Duality, Dichotomy, Pairs 
• Week 2 (Dec. 3-9): Technology, Techniques, Tools, Invention, Innovation, Advancement (Iyionaku)
• Week 3 (Dec. 10-16): Food, Cooking, Cuisine, Ingredients, Tastes, Textures, Smells, Odors, Colors, Sensations (Arayaz, lurker)
• Week 4 (Dec. 17-23): Speaking, Speech, Speech Acts, Verbal Communication, Spoken Language, Vocalization (Khemehekis)
• Week 5 (Dec. 24-30): Culture, Ideas, Philosophy, Beliefs, Customs (lurker)
• Week 6 (Dec. 31): One, Unity, Singularity

Previous years' threads can be found here: 2013 / 2014 / 2015 / 2016 / 2017 / 2018 / 2019 / 2020 / 2021 / 2022

[Iyionaku]

As every year, I'm going to join with Yélian again!

As a topic suggestion I'd say something like "Technological advancements". From the handaxe to the microchip, from the taming of the fire to the nuclear fusion reactor, from the invention of the transistor to having a conlang collaboration board with people from all over the world.

[eldin raigmore]

How much trouble would it be to make this a two-month game from November 1st to December 31st ?
And does anyone like (or dislike!) that idea ?

[zyma]

As every year, I'm going to join with Yélian again!

Yay! I'm glad to hear it.

As a topic suggestion I'd say something like "Technological advancements". From the handaxe to the microchip, from the taming of the fire to the nuclear fusion reactor, from the invention of the transistor to having a conlang collaboration board with people from all over the world.

Great idea!

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How much trouble would it be to make this a two-month game from November 1st to December 31st ?
And does anyone like (or dislike!) that idea ?

I'm afraid that I definitely dislike the idea, personally. I'm not sure I see the point of making it longer. As for how much trouble it would be, creating the thread a month earlier would be easy, but I feel like actually participating would be a different story. I'm always more than ready for a break after just one month, and while that's certainly not a universal experience, I'm pretty sure that I'm not alone in feeling that way, either. I imagine that I would find the challenge more taxing and less enjoyable if it were extended to two months.

Of course, hopefully it goes without saying that people are completely free to challenge themselves in whatever ways they'd like and for however long they'd like.

[Arayaz]

I'll join, for now with Ruykkarraber, but it's possible I'll have scrapped it by the time December begins (he says on November 27th).

As for a weekly theme, I'd like to suggest "foods, cooking styles, ingredients, and food-critic adjectives."

[zyma]

I'll join, for now with Ruykkarraber, but it's possible I'll have scrapped it by the time December begins (he says on November 27th).

No worries!

As for a weekly theme, I'd like to suggest "foods, cooking styles, ingredients, and food-critic adjectives."

Sounds good to me! Could I ask what you mean by "food-critic adjectives", though?

[Arayaz]

As for a weekly theme, I'd like to suggest "foods, cooking styles, ingredients, and food-critic adjectives."

Sounds good to me! Could I ask what you mean by "food-critic adjectives", though?

Delicious, disgusting, flavorful, and more specific stuff that doesn't translate to English? things like "musty" or "sharp" or "savory" or "piquant."

[Khemehekis]

How about a category for speaking verbs (to accuse, to lie, to state, to apologize, to announce . . .)?

[lurker]

I'll give this a try with Commonthroat.
Words from the Swadesh list?
Words that demonstrate cultural quirks of the language's speakers?
Words for concepts that don't translate into English?
Words for sensations that humans can't perceive (I have to come up with a bunch of colors below the human visible spectrum and very neuenced words for odors).

[zyma]

Thank you all very much for your suggestions! I'm going to be a bit busy tomorrow, and I believe it's already November 30th in some parts of the world, so I've decided to update the OP now.

Weekly Themes: 

• Week 1 (Dec. 1-2): Two, Duality, Dichotomy, Pairs 
• Week 2 (Dec. 3-9): Technology, Techniques, Tools, Invention, Innovation, Advancement (Iyionaku)
• Week 3 (Dec. 10-16): Food, Cooking, Cuisine, Ingredients, Tastes, Textures, Smells, Odors, Colors, Sensations (Arayaz, lurker)
• Week 4 (Dec. 17-23): Speaking, Speech, Speech Acts, Verbal Communication, Spoken Language, Vocalization (Khemehekis)
• Week 5 (Dec. 24-30): Culture, Ideas, Philosophy, Beliefs, Customs (lurker)
• Week 6 (Dec. 31): One, Unity, Singularity

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As for a weekly theme, I'd like to suggest "foods, cooking styles, ingredients, and food-critic adjectives."

Sounds good to me! Could I ask what you mean by "food-critic adjectives", though?

Delicious, disgusting, flavorful, and more specific stuff that doesn't translate to English? things like "musty" or "sharp" or "savory" or "piquant."

Got it! Thanks for the clarification.

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How about a category for speaking verbs (to accuse, to lie, to state, to apologize, to announce . . .)?

Sure! Although I'd prefer not to restrict any of the themes to just verbs, for instance, I like the idea of "speaking".

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I'll give this a try with Commonthroat.
Words from the Swadesh list?

As much as I think the Swadesh list can be a helpful resource for conlang vocabulary creation, my aim is to have the weekly themes be semantic/lexical fields.

Words that demonstrate cultural quirks of the language's speakers?

Excellent! I'm always very interested to see what people come up with in terms of cultural vocabulary.

Words for concepts that don't translate into English?

I think that "words without simple, short English translations" is a bit too broad, unfortunately, but I feel like this suggestion could be tied in with the one above regarding cultural quirks.

Words for sensations that humans can't perceive (I have to come up with a bunch of colors below the human visible spectrum and very neuenced words for odors).

That's a very interesting idea, but for anyone participating with a language spoken by humans who don't have access to certain kinds of technology, I worry that they wouldn't be able to do very much with this. Perhaps just "sensations" more broadly, including colors, odors, and so on?

[_Just_A_Sketch]

This is gonna be my first year participating in lexember!
Im planning on using the three languages Im currently working on, Hɛlcɛso, 'ai'u, and Tsjàta. I don't have any experience with this so I might be going in over my head, but Im going to try [:D]

[Arayaz]

This is gonna be my first year participating in lexember!
Im planning on using the three languages Im currently working on, Hɛlcɛso, 'ai'u, and Tsjàta. I don't have any experience with this so I might be going in over my head, but Im going to try

Are you gonna do each language every day, or alternate?

[_Just_A_Sketch]

This is gonna be my first year participating in lexember!
Im planning on using the three languages Im currently working on, Hɛlcɛso, 'ai'u, and Tsjàta. I don't have any experience with this so I might be going in over my head, but Im going to try [:D]

Are you gonna do each language every day, or alternate?

I want to do all of them daily but we'll see how that plays out

[Corphishy]

For this month i will be using an as of yet unnamed proto-language for my Project K language, similar to Proto-Garnet which connected a bunch of previously unrelated old language stubs.

*riðellemju /riðelˈlemju/ adv. "(in the) morninɡ"
From the deverbal form of *ðelle- "rise, erect; get up, awaken," essentially a compound word meaning "at the rising"

[Pabappa]

Play

pūmna, a twin; one of a set of twins. Its etymology in MRCA (the parent language of Play and all its known relatives) was pum ŋana, to share a crib.

The dual form of this word is pūmnabup, which is regular, and refers to a set of two twins born together. This is separate from saying pūmna nūs, which means two people who both are twins, regardless of whether they were born together.

[Iyionaku]

Alas, it begins!

Lexember 1 - Yélian

prenigiys [pɾəˈniːga̯iːs] - binoculars
Etymology: from prena "two" + prigiys "lens; magnifying glass"

Vat cityaletarai! Siy parcas yivalai pi blido reo acusorcund fecun prenigiys!
[vɐt‿ɨt͡ʃɐləˈtaːɾaɪ̯ | sa̯iː ˈpaɾkɐʃ ɕɨˈvaːlaɪ̯ pi ˈbliːdɔ̈ ˈɾeː.ɔ̈ ɐˈkuːsɔ̈ɾkʉnd ˈɸeːkʉn pɾəˈniːga̯iːs]
DEM NEG-believe-1SG | before moon PST-see-1SG that watch-INV.1SG 1SG.POSS neighbor-pervert with binocular-
I cannot believe it! Yesterday I saw that my pervert neighbor is watching me with binoculars!

[Arayaz]

Friday, Lexember 1
Theme: Two, Duality, Dichotomy, Pairs

Ruykkarraber deseguyna "couple"
< dese "girl" + guyna "boy"

Ruya, Iddu deseguyna in tar.
Ruya Iddu couple as LOC.COP
"Ruya and Iddu are a couple."

• Due to the order of the component nouns, when stating couples, the woman is generally said first. This can be useful because Ruykkarraber names usually don’t have a gender association.
• This is an example of a relatively rare compounding strategy in which the two components of something combine to make its whole. Another example is suyres "fishline," combining suy "line, rope" and res "hook."
• This is only used for heterosexual couples. While the Ruykkarranat don’t have quite as modern a perspective on gender as we, they are a diverse and accepting melting-pot society, and have terms for homosexual couples: guynakubra "boy" + "pal" and desdese "girl" + "girl."

[_Just_A_Sketch]

Lexember 1

Hɛlcɛso
Alkwam /'alkʷam/
Noun (non-human) - a pair of eyes
Verb - to see

Derived terms:
Alkwamam /'alkʷamam/ - adj - visible
Alakwam /'alakʷam/ - verb - to show

'ai'u
Walhe /ʋaɬə/
Noun (class XVIII) - eyes

Tsjàta
Ätén /æ'te˩˥n/
Noun (neuter) - an eye

[zyma]

Day 1

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Hannaito (Entry 1):

nümanüt /nɯᵝmanɯᵝt/ [ˈnɨᵝ.mɑˌnɨᵝt̚]
Noun:
1. a twin; one of two individuals (often, though not necessarily, human) born together as the result of a single pregnancy
2. (rare) one of three or more individuals (almost always human) born together as the result of a single pregnancy
3. understudy, body double, stunt double
4. replacement, substitute, surrogate, stand-in
5. doppelgänger, lookalike
6. imposter, decoy
7. half of a two-act play

Etymology
A fossilized dual form of nüman "birth, genesis" (< Proto-Hannaitoan *ñiwman "placenta"). Cognates include Gampyo ngyunnur.

The dual suffix, seen here in the form -üt, is likely descended from a reduced form of PH *buwde "two", whence Hannaito büde "two". The dual is no longer productive in Hannaito, but a number of words for "natural pairs" or members thereof preserve the suffix.

[lurker]

Let's do this! Commonthroat is read from right to left. Yinrih use their left forepaw to write with. Humans can approximate the shape of the writing claw with a fountain pen with a stub nib.

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Dawn of the First Day. 744 hours remain



rDFrlmqrLPq

/chuff, long high strengthening whine, chuff, short low strengthening grunt, huff, chuff, long rising strengthining grunt, huff/

Etymology
rDFr (near) + lmq (speed) + rLPq (light)

Adjective
Quasiluminal, near light speed. A speed regime at which relativistic effects cease to be negligible.

Womb ships are the fastest yinrih spacecraft, able to reach 10% the speed of light.



CDlmqrLPq
/long rising weakening whine, short low strengthening grunt, huff, chuff, long rising strengthining grunt, huff/

Etymology
CD (above) + lmq (speed) + rLPq (light)

Adjective
Superluminal, faster than light

The yinrih use ansibles to communicate instantaneously over arbitrarily large distances. Ansibles transmit information instantly via the Underlay, which is like hyperspace. They've been trying to transmit matter via the Underlay as well, but haven't been successful so far.