Serran language

 

Serra Language
Serră Langană
Native to	File:Flag of Brazoria.png Brazoria Columbia Sierra United States
Date	20th century
Region	Western North America
Native speakers	15,000,000~ (2014)
Language family	Language isolate Serra Language
Writing system	Latin alphabet, Serran alphabet
Official status
Recognised minority language in	Sierra United States
Regulated by	International Order of the Serran Language
Language codes
ISO 639-3	sb

Serran (Serran:   ; Romanized: Serră Langană) is a constructed language spoken primarily in Brazoria, Columbia, Sierra, and the United States. It is the official liturgical language of the Canaanite faith. Approximately 15 million speak Serran worldwide, with 95% of the speakers living within North America. It was created in 1867 by social progressives seeking to overcome language barriers and unite racial differences by replacing English. The hope would be the creation of a purely Sierran-borne language (hence the name, Serră Langană) which literally translates into "Sierran Language") to complement Sierra's new culture. It would later be adopted by Canaanites in 1910 seeking to pursue a similar goal of bringing down barriers and centering around a new, unique culture.

The goals of the original Serran proponents have never been realized as most Sierrans found it unnecessary in learning a new language and claimed that it would be confusing to both natives and foreigners. However, Serran's usage in Canaanism has flourished with its use pervasive in both worship services and the Canaanite secular culture. In Sierra, the language has been preserved to the present-day and is taught in most higher education classes. Revived proposals to promote the use and study of the Serran language as a secular working language have appeared and was made an official language by Parliament in 2011.

Being a constructed language, it is an isolated language in its own right. Today, the International Order of the Serran Language is the official governing body which oversees the use of the language and is based in Porciúncula.

Linguistic properties

Alphabet

There are 33 letters in the Serran language (26 "standard" and 7 "special" characters) which are based on no particular script. There are no minuscule counterparts to the letters in Sierran script. The Romanized form of the Serran alphabet, however, features minuscule forms and additional letters to the traditional 26. Aside from the Roman letters, there are several diacritics including Á and Ê which are used to denote stress on the particular vowel or syllable. However, Serran is a non-tonal language with rare instances of letters deviating from their "normal" sound on the alphabet with certain words or letter-combinations. The alphabet system has however, been manipulated and experimented in a way that thousands of new phonemes previously nonexistent in Serran to arise.

Standard Characters

Aa /ə/, /eɪ/, /æ/

Bb /b/, /ɓ/

Cc /ɕ/, /c/

Dd /d/

Ee /ɛ/

Ff /f/

Gg /g/

Hh /h/

Ii /i/

Jj /dʒ/

Kk /k/

Ll /l/

Mm /m/

Nn /n/, /ŋ/

Oo /oʊ/, /aʊ/

Pp /p/

Qq /q/

Rr /r/

Ss /s/

Tt /t/

Uu /u/

Vv /v/

Ww /w/

Xx /tʃ/

Yy /ʎ/

Zz /z/

The standard characters are the original 26 letters created to supplement the reading and writing of the Serran language in a unique form of script. Most letters correspond roughly to their English counterparts in terms of pronunciation although there are some exceptions. In addition, the Serran alphabet is organized by letters and sound identically to that of Latin script.

Special Characters

Ââ /eɪ/ File:Serran Â.png

Ăă /æ/ File:Serran Ă.png

Ƃƃ /ɓ/ File:Serran Ƃ.png

Çç /c/ File:Serran Ç.png

Ññ /ŋ/ File:Serran N (with tilde).png

Øø /aʊ/ File:Serran Ø.png

ẞß /ʃ/ File:Serran ẞ.png

The special characters are 7 letters (both in Serran and the Romanized form) that were officially amended to the Serran alphabet to differentiate the specific sounds of the letters A (), B (), C (), N (), O (), and S (). The usage of the special characters are, however, purely cosmetic and can be interchanged with its standard counterpart. The aim of the special characters were to give clarity to learners as well as provide context to words placed in indiscernible situations or awkward syntax.

Phonology

Consonants

Consonant phonemes of Serran

	Bilabial		Labio- dental		Dental		Alveolar		Post- alveolar		Palatal	Velar		Glottal
	plain	pala.	plain	pala.	plain	pala.	plain	pala.	plain	pala.		plain	pala.	plain	pala.
Nasal	m			n								ŋ
Stop	p b		t d		k ɡ
Affricate									tʃ dʒ
Fricative	f v		θ ð		s z		ʃ ʒ	ɕ				x		h
Approximant							r				j	w
Lateral							l

• All of the consonants except approximants can be geminated.

Vowels

monophthongs IPA Word Romanized Meaning i Sifa Where ɪ Jidka What ɛ Esali Ground æ Ăshana Kitchen

monophthongs IPA Word Romanized Meaning ɨ Malê Shadow ə Venida Ocean ɜr Ler Cruelty ʌ Suudi Milk

monophthongs IPA Word Romanized Meaning u Nună Girl ʊ Moana Tree ɔ Yahni Beautiful a Hoßt Insurance diphthongs IPA Word Romanized Meaning eɪ Prâsă Prussia oʊ Sotai Soda aɪ Baiski Sheep aʊ Lowdi Rude ɔɪ Choi Exceptional

Grammar

Serran is an inflected language with a two-gender noun system. Serran has two morphological tenses: the present and the past. References to the future can be achieved through modal auxiliary verbs with the present-tense verbs. Nouns and verbs are generally inflected based on gender, number, and seniority. Although Serran is considered predominantly right-branched (due to its verbs preceding direct objects), it features some left-branched features, mainly adjectives being placed before nouns. Prepositions are also present in the language and sentences are generally structured in subject–verb–object (SVO) order.

Like most Indo-European languages, of which Serran is structured after, Serran follows the rules and characteristics of accusative morphosyntactic alignment.

Example

Ne

chă

pashi

ki

na

Dashâ

ki

Serră

tăl

ne

Dash

seyo

pashtân

mashal

The

great

leader

of

the

Kingdom

of

Sierra

is

the

King

who

rules

fairly

Det.

Adj.

Noun

Prep.

Det.

Noun

Prep.

Noun

Coupla

Det.

Noun

Pronoun

Verb

Adv.

Nouns

Gender

Serran nouns are inflected based on gender, number, possession, and seniority. There are two main categories of nouns: proper nouns and common nouns, with the latter further divided into concrete and abstract nouns, and count and mass nouns.

Generally, nouns are inflected to reflect the gender of the subject or object it is referring to. Nouns themselves, typically have a conventional, "default" gender form. The grammatical rules on gender with nouns generally apply to adjectives to which are dependent on the nouns they are describing. Feminine words typically end with the suffix -a () or -i (), while masculine words end with -o () or -e (). The definite articles for feminine nouns are na (; the) and ita (; a) while the masculine versions are ne () and ito () respectively. Ambiguous and invariable nouns (i.e., those that do not end with either -a, -e, -i, or -o, are under most cases, treated as masculine nouns. The following examples assume the default seniority case or the case assumed when two people have a similar age, status, and relationship.

Ne	nune	hantâni	garao
The	girl	ate	fruit

All indirect objects, except for pronouns, must be inflected based on the subject or object it is related to regardless of its own default form. In this case, "nună" () or girl, a feminine noun, is modified to become masculine as "nune" () because "garao" (), is the direct object and is a masculine noun. Consequently, the definite article "na" () becomes "ne" ().

Number

Masculine Singular Romanized Plural Romanized Meaning Garao Garaote Fruit/Fruits

Feminine Singular Romanized Plural Romanized Meaning Măli Mălita Dress/Dresses

Most count nouns can be inflected with for a plural number through the suffix -te/-to (/; masculine) or -ta/-ti (/; feminine).