Fantasy TV in the service of science: An open letter to HBO about "Dothraki"

[bananas]

http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=fantasy-tv-in-the-service-of-scienc-2010-04-26

Apr 26, 2010 05:25 PM
Fantasy TV in the service of science: An open letter to HBO about "Dothraki"

By Joshua Hartshorne

Editor's note: Joshua Hartshorne is a graduate student at Harvard University's Psychology Department interested in human behavior and language. He wrote the open letter below because HBO is currently creating a new fantasy language, called "Dothraki," for an upcoming television adaptation of George R. R. Martin's A Game of Thrones. At least some fans are guaranteed to try to learn Dothraki, just as thousands have studied Klingon, Sindarin and Na'vi. The letter to Martin, the show's executive producer David Benioff and Dothraki creator David Peterson suggests a few different elements or structures for the language that could do science a favor by inventing a language that includes exactly those features that researchers would like to test to see if subjects—in this case, the show's highly motivated fans—can learn.


Dear David Benioff, David Peterson and George R. R. Martin,

As a long-time fan of George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, I have eagerly followed news of HBO's upcoming adaptation of A Game of Thrones, the first book in the series. I followed this news as a fan only—until I learned that the creative team at HBO had commissioned David Peterson to create Dothraki, a language spoken by several important characters in the story. As Mr. Martin explains in his blog, this will add detail to the rich tapestry of the story. It also presents a unique opportunity for science, and I urge you to consider the possibilities. I lay out the reasoning below:

Language universals and the human mind
Fundamental to understanding humanity is understanding language. Something about the human brain allows nearly every human child—but no chimp, mouse or kangaroo—to learn a language; children will even invent a new language if there are none available to learn. Linguistic universals provide clues as to what this something is.

<snip>

These universals may reveal the structure of our minds: all languages share these properties because we can't learn languages that work differently. However, the fact that all languages do share a property isn't proof that they must share that property. Universals could also arise by historical accident. The fact that Barack Obama's name sounds similar in every language isn't evidence of a universal, innate property of how the human mind conceives of the 44th president—rather, every language has imported his name from the same source.

Artificial languages
The only way to prove humans are incapable of learning a language with feature Y is to create such a language and prove that people can't learn it. In fact, researchers regularly teach people "artificial languages" in order to study language learning by humans (and animals) under experimentally controlled circumstances (here's a fun experiment you can do online), and some of these probe the psychological reality of language universals.

<snip>

Are human languages the way they are by accident, or does their structure reveal deep truths about the human mind? By constructing Dothraki such that it violates common principles of existing languages, you could set the stage for a powerful natural experiment. I imagine you are going to the expense and trouble to construct a full language for Dothraki at least partly out of an interest in and love of language. I only ask that you take it one step further.

<snip>

[enlightenment]

1. Fascinating idea.

I'm looking forward to the series, because I like the books. Not particularly interested in learning the language, as I haven't been stricken with an extreme case of fannishness - but will be interested in seeing how the language goes over. There has been considerable conversation about it on one of the blogs about the series; some of the comments are quite thoughtful (some not so much).

Haven't looked at the blog for awhile - I suspect this article has stirred the pot over there, once again.

If you're interested in how the fans perceive the concept, look here:

http://winter-is-coming.net/

[exboyfil]

2. I would think Dothraki could

be simulated with Mongol - that is what I think of when I think of the Dothraki. I guess you could consider post-equine introduction Plains Indians as well, but my money is on Mongols.

[enlightenment]

3. Not that I know squat about language development,

but I agree with Mongol, sort of - I guess because that's what I 'see' in the description of the Dothraki characters. At the same time, I 'hear' the language as something more fluid than Mongol (which sounds very 'choppy' to me) . . . more like Lakota.

It will be interesting to see what they come up with, certainly!

[exboyfil]

4. Exciting and a reason to subscribe to HBO or buddy up with someone

who has HBO.

Just wish Martin would finish the next book and the series. If the HBO series goes over four seasons that would put the push on him to finish. Doubt it will though, but the first three seasons would be magnificant even if the series is never completed.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

5. How about they just screw the stupid language and concentrate on making a good show?