SUDDENLY, LANGUAGE LAWS!

[hughes]

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT!

IT IS HERE, FINALLY. That which many of you have been waiting for and asking for, and that which we mods have been racking our brains over and which we finally figured out! That which comprises yet another BEHEMOTH of Landel's Damned guidelines!

LANGUAGE LAWS AT LANDEL'S

We tried our best to explain everything as thoroughly as we could, and though there's a simple little version of the rules up top, we'd like it if everyone read through the giant thing at least once so that we're all on the same page and there aren't any misunderstandings.

But haven't all these rules been contradicted by just about everybody in the past? Yes, they have! But it's okay, since we're just going to do a cleansweep and make it so that, suddenly, at the very beginning of this Nightshift, Landel's magic will make everyone's language perception snap to fit those rules, and from then on, we'll be working off of those guidelines.

I know it's a lot to read, but at least it'll help us all be consistent, yeah? D:

In other news, as you can see here, Court has totally kicked my ass again we're slowly but surely getting to the finish line! (I sacrificed app-reading time today to work on the Language Laws, as I figured we should clarify all that before Nightshift.) Hang in there, those of you who haven't gotten e-mails yet! D:

Also, Leora, where are yoouuuu? MR. PUDDLES NEEDS YOU

Comments

[sugarsweetblood.livejournal.com]

Questions go here, yes?! along with the people determined to make it difficult, but that's a given~~

D.Gray-Man canon (oh, don't you just love it!) holds that everyone in the world speaks English when dealing with each other. That makes the canon language English (I'm assuming?). However, just about every character comes from a different country of origin - Kanda's Japanese, Rinali's Chinese, Ravi's... I don't know, but he's probably fluent in about 20 different languages at least** - so they no doubt have their own languages that they use.

((**and on that note, how do you handle characters who are well versed in a good number of languages and technically have more than one second language?))

Should the characters from the D.Gray-Man world assume English as their Main Language since that is how everyone communicates in the canon, or are they to assume their language of origin as their main language? I wouldn't ask since it should fall under the personal choice section, but the examples given there were of people who were not in a world that had a common language of communication world-wide as D.Gray-Man does.

[whiteychan.livejournal.com]

not a mod of course, but I'd ~guess~ that you can choose, since (say, with Rinali), she'd be fluent in Chinese and English, and since canonically she's assumed to be speaking English most of the time, I can choose English or Chinese.

[whiteychan.livejournal.com]

and that was totally not the icon I wanted to use. :P

[sugarsweetblood.livejournal.com]

(riiiiiiiiiight, I'm so suuuuuuuuuuuuure~~~~)

But another thing that just came up (in chat) was that if some D.Gray characters chose their background language as their main - example, if Kanda chose to have Japanese be his default, it would mean he would hear everyone else speaking in Japanese to him, right? So then, how do you think Kanda will respond when someone like Allen Walker starts speaking fluent Japanese to him when he's used to everyone from his canon communicating with English? It'd be like if a Japanese transfer student came to America and all of his/her American peers were speaking in perfect Japanese.

D.Gray is just overly complicated, I'm convinced

[hughes]

Jumping in--we actually cover that particular phenomenon in the WEIRD SIDE EFFECTS SECTION, so if you want to take a look, feel free. 8D

[sugarsweetblood.livejournal.com]

But it said to skip that section, RAWR!! *pouts*

Kind of wish I knew where Rhode was from originally so I could have some fun, but at least it's cleared up in case I ever do get some canon info on her~~ <333

[hughes]

SORRY! IT LIED! D:

And woo!

[hughes]

Yes, Questions here! :D

((**and on that note, how do you handle characters who are well versed in a good number of languages and technically have more than one second language?))

As explained in the Second Language section, every language other than the language you declare as your character's main language counts as a second language. So basically, treat each "second language" (or third or fourth or fifth or hundredth language...) in the ways explained in that same section. They'll still be fluent in all of them, but only people who also canonly know whichever language they're speaking at the time will be able to understand what they're saying.

Should the characters from the D.Gray-Man world assume English as their Main Language since that is how everyone communicates in the canon, or are they to assume their language of origin as their main language?

As David said up thar, you still have a choice between your character's native language and the language generally spoken by your character in canon, but(!)... we mods would strongly suggest you guys pick English, since that's more practical and easier to handle overall, especially considering the canon circumstances you guys are describing.

[sugarsweetblood.livejournal.com]

I'm definitely picking English, but it would be funny if one of the D.Grayers picked their origin language~~~ <333 Just for the crack!

And time for question the SECOND!!

Ok, so I should have thought of this back when I should have been asleep, but anyway... I'm considering that there are different "eras" of languages. Like if you compared modern English to Ye Ole Shakespearian English, or something. It's pretty easy to differentiate if you have an English character like that (because hey, we all should know English), but how should characters with like... old Japanese versus modern Japanese react? The Bleach Shinigami would probably still use an older kind since their world is a few eras behind the modern one, and there are other characters coming from the feudal eras of Japan as well.

*flees as it's the second time she's been difficult*

[hughes]

Good question! What I'm thinking is that we'd leave some suspension of disbelief and have it so the characters are able to distinguish that the versions of the languages are newer/older, but that they're still able to understand them.