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Some highlights of Na’vi (upenn.edu)
53 points by waterlesscloud on Dec 20, 2009 | hide | past | favorite | 6 comments



This is pretty awesome, that they got a real linguist to put together the language for the movie.

One thing I noticed, both when listening and while reading this description: While the syntax and morphology is nothing at all like English (so it sounds alien), basically all of the vowel sounds are very American ("ay" and "aw" instead of the "e" and "a" sounds of French or Spanish). Seems like a nod to the fact that the people who'd actually need to speak it would be American.


“Seems like a nod to the fact that the people who'd actually need to speak it would be American.”

Yeah, because multi-million marketing campaigns for Avatar didn’t roll over any other nation but the US, right? :)


I think he was referencing the actors and not the viewers


Is this hyperinflation? Such a voting storm for a honest misunderstanding?


It was a highly-voted article (almost hit the top), so lots of people came in here to see what people had already said. Then some bikeshedding happened: since the discussion was on linguistics, no one felt qualified to add anything—but they did feel qualified to notice that you hadn't picked up on something. :)


The tone of your comment, combined with the fact that it repeats the old 'Americans think they are the center of the universe' trope makes it seem like you have an issue with Americans. Add to that the fact that your apparent dis was based on a misinterpretation of the previous poster, and you came across as rather rude and ignorant, I'm sorry to say.

I didn't vote you down for that, but apparently four people did.




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