The Language Problem

[JoanDrake]

I've been writing a story where the characters are traveling from one Universe to another through an inter-dimensional portal/nexus thingie. The story is going along swimmingly until I recognize one major problem. Language. How can all these worlds speak the same language? (They're not really parallel worlds, all are rather different from each other.)

Do I just ignore this and hope the reader will too? It seems that a lot of stories I've read must have done that because I can remember lots of stories like this one and this language problem either never came or I missed the explanation somehow. (That is possible, I'm rather dense)

Can anyone help?

 

[Hex]

I guess either ignore it -- I think that's what Diana Wynne Jones does in books like A Sudden Wild Magic, though her worlds sound more parallel than yours -- or have something small to explain why they can speak the same language -- e.g. something about the portal influencing the language centre in their brains/ an implant (or fish...?)/ magic etc. I wouldn't spend ages on it, though.

 

[HareBrain]

I have a similar problem, on the same world, but with different countries. I have invented an explanation I'm loath to use as it's so ropey, but so far no reader has questioned the fact that people from different countries a thousand miles apart speak the same tongue. I'd say that unless your story is hard SF, don't worry about it, unless the problem particularly interests you. Having to account for language differences tends to slow down a story, unless you make it an interesting story element. Sometimes it just has a tacked-on feel, and then it's pointless.

 

[Dan Jones]

I think many SFF authors have similar problems; I certainly did on WIP1, and the way I got around it was to use the very occasional "foreign" word to imply different languages in different settings, and keep the rest of the prose in English. You could always say in the description that the characters are conversing in their own language and then just write in English.

Or you could have some kind of "Interpreter" character who understands the different languages encountered (assuming they've had sufficient previous exposure to the different cultures to enable them to learn the language) and therefore negates the need for writing in "foreign".

I'd definitely avoid going down the inventing a new language. It's exhausting, requires deep knowledge of grammar and syntax and other stuff (arguably much deeper than is required just to write general prose), and you just know that out there in SFF Reader World that someone will "learn" your invented language and start to pick it apart.

 

[Droflet]

Why not make it part of the technology. A language of the mind. That sort of thing. Or if you want to be clinical say that the nexus interprets all languages into standard Anglo. One quick sentence and the reader is happy. Worked for Dr Who.

 

[sliver magpie]

I was going to suggest exactly what Droflet has suggested.

Now I worried, it's like he's used some sort of technology to translate my neural activity and therefore know's what I'm thinking, feeling and saying. (The 'saying' bit is important because I'm from Northern Ireland, you'd need a translator).

Or perhaps not, probably just coincidence.

 

[Droflet]

You're on to me Maggie. I do indeed have the gift. Hey, I heard that. Mind your manners.

 

[Locrian]

As it stands now, voice recognition and translation programs are miles ahead of where they were ten years ago. Throw in some directional sound systems in a far future sff setting, real time translation isn't implausible. In some other settings they justify common language by a common point of origin. If they want to get really into it, some authors create different dialects to show divergence.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

real time translation isn't implausible.

But with phrase latency.

voice recognition and translation programs are miles ahead of where they were ten years ago.

Voice recognition hardly changed in 15 years. Just more ubiquitous.
Translation has gone backwards, technically. Google Translate uses brute force of known texts that are translations. They started by "slurping" EU documents as they are each in all the EU languages. Then translations of books. It's actually quite poor and has almost no context. But the sheer size of the database Google has built makes the "brute force" approach work better than "proper" parsing + grammar + dictionary translation.

But perhaps alien in a thousands of years more advanced tech are better. But you'll have latency to accurately get context.

SF / Fiction etc you can do what you like if it seems believable and doesn't obviously contradict logic, mathematics or science.

 

[tinkerdan]

I've had to deal with those voice recognition things with some of the utilities and they never come close.
Especially numbers. I say 449 and they say back did you say 483? And I'll enunciate clearer and they say did you say 476; I think they just make it up as they go along.

That might be interesting to have an interpreter that just makes stuff up.

Oh but I didn't say that.
You clearly did.
But no I said Blah Blah Blah.
Well there you go again so what's the big deal.

 

[Cli-Fi]

I've been writing a story where the characters are traveling from one Universe to another through an inter-dimensional portal/nexus thingie. The story is going along swimmingly until I recognize one major problem. Language. How can all these worlds speak the same language? (They're not really parallel worlds, all are rather different from each other.)

Do I just ignore this and hope the reader will too? It seems that a lot of stories I've read must have done that because I can remember lots of stories like this one and this language problem either never came or I missed the explanation somehow. (That is possible, I'm rather dense)

Can anyone help?

It's funny you mention this. As the television show Tyrant takes place entirely in the middle east yet, they all speak English!! They throw in an Islamic Call to Prayer every now and then to remind you, it's not a western culture.

Also Firefly is a good example of how you can mix two cultures, namely chinese and english together in the future. If mixed well it can be great, if not done realistically. It can seem silly.

 

[J Riff]

Mild telepathy is good enough.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

The story is going along swimmingly until I recognize one major problem. Language. How can all these worlds speak the same language?

My Characters use the time decelerating from "deep space" after a Jump (usually no closer than 15 light days, so TV / Radio can be analysed), which can be 3 to 4 months learning the language, they have computer assistance (5,000+ years since they started Tech age) and on coming "down below" do use microphone/earpiece coupled to computers and also experts to start with.

 

[hopewrites]

I read a book that delt with different cultures speaking different languages and it was hard to follow who understood what. There were lots of confused looks, on both sides of the page.

 

[Piousflea84]

In any version of the future with some form of "neural connectivity" (brain-machine interfaces), it's not implausible that computers could translate speech with good accuracy and no delay. A machine that monitors the speech-generating centers of your brain could figure out what you are trying to say before you actually say it. All you'd need is the proper translation software and you could have a conversation with any neuro-compatible life-form in the galaxy. (that is, beings whose psychology isn't so incredibly alien that they are impossible to understand)

 

[JoanDrake]

Thank you all, very helpful and I would appreciate more solutions here, if anyone has any.

HareBrain, I'm sure we'd all find your meaning of "ropey" to be "brilliant" if you'd just tell us what your method is. Please excuse me though, if I am prying into your Arcana (I just had my ears shrink back and I STILL have a real liking for carrots from the last time I did that)

Cli-Fi, "Tyrant" actually has a good explanation, at least IMO. All the people here are in the same family, that of the President of Abuddin, but one branch is American expatriates, so there would be solid reason for all of them to be or become bilingual.

 

[J D Foster]

In my "first contact" story they use some software that tries to work out what is being said, but gets it constantly wrong suggesting vegetables instead of far more likely words. No help for your cross universe story.

However: There is a lot of fun and difficulty for your characters if they can't understand each other. If that will get in the way of the story, I would just make them all speak English. As a reader I would understand that it was a necessary construct to make the story flow.

 

[Cli-Fi]

Cli-Fi, "Tyrant" actually has a good explanation, at least IMO. All the people here are in the same family, that of the President of Abuddin, but one branch is American expatriates, so there would be solid reason for all of them to be or become bilingual.

Yes that works well for the family but even the Red Hand and the Caliphate speak English! lol Where in reality that would be akin to blasphemy for at least one of those groups. Jamal doesn't and wouldn't speak English to his people when making an announcement but the show is better in English to appeal to the western audiences it's catered to.