There are obvious similarities between a lot of these examples, e.g. scent-based languages, ultrasonic languages, squid-like colour-change-based ones, "too complex for humans to understand", etc. I think either the examples should be subdivided, or the page should be given subtropes.
Trash bin of shielding
Does Greshnik actually exist? A google search only leads me to this page, and I can't find anything on any conlang forums or wikis.
Did some troper just made it up?
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The only other place I can google is some FIM fan-fic. Perhaps it's not a real-world conlang after all... P.S. Funny thing - in Russian, "greshnik" means "sinner". Not entirely sure why creator have chosen this term :)
Why no real life examples? i think we should be able to talk about things that communicate different then humans, for example, ants communicate primarily through smell. i also highly doubt a native speaker of ant would complain
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See this post
and the one following it. Most real languages seem to be Starfish Languages to those who don't speak them, but few* of them are incomprehensible to native speakers. If we allowed examples about animals, it would probably become debates about whether animals have language and in what sense.
Why no real life examples? i think we should be able to talk about things that communicate different then humans, for example, ants communicate primarily through smell.
I got the feeling that this was supposed to be really exotic languages that are incomprehensible to the main characters but from the examples it seems to be "any language you don't personally understand". Which is right?
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It's something of both. The trope is basically about languages that the main characters either cannot understand, or can understand only with great difficulty. In the case of real world languages, the languages are being judged against other language families.
What counts for more Starfish Language is being just plain alien from what they'd understand. Having features that they don't understand properly, being given through a different medium , or lacking things which the cast takes for granted.
Enya's album, Amarantine, used Loxian which is pretty much a starfish language. More on it here from the other wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loxian
And on the album: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amarantine_(album)
But then again, Enya's Irish tracks are also rather star-fishy themselves...
Removed "Any language will seem like this to a native speaker of an unrelated language family, and often even to those who speak a related language."
This isn't true at all, in general. Most languages do have similarities (false friends etc) and at least sound like a human spoken language, that's why the examples given below are so interesting. Maybe the trope had a different meaning when that first example was added.
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But the examples *are* human spoken language. There's nothing alien about them if you're a native speaker of them. And of the examples, pretty much only Piraha breaks out of standard patterns expected of human languages, and even that's hugely controversial. So yeah, I'm putting it back in, because we are not all living in the Anglosphere.
Star Trek The Next Generation had "Darmok," which involved a race whose language translated incompletely: they appeared to speak entirely in metaphors whose significance was unknown to Starfleet.
"Gilgamesh and Enkidu at Erech" is Darmokish for "friends" because all Darmokers know the original myth of the heroes fighting the monster and becoming best friends.
So far so good, the resolution of the Story is that STNG meets aliens who really are alien.
But, the Fridge Logic is how do Darmok bards tell the original myth?
Do the Bards tell the story in English or do they refer to earlier myths?
The hero attacked the Monster and there were lots of fireworks and explosions like in the myth of A versus B. Then the Side Kick did stuff for Laughs And Tears like in the myth of C versus D and NOT like the myth of D versus E because everybody knows that odd numbered myths are cursed.
In December 2016, I removed the following:
"*A Series of Unfortunate Events: The weird noises that baby Sunny makes are treated like this, with her siblings understanding her perfectly."
It felt like Square Peg Round Trope to me. Could anyone please tell me if I was wrong to make this assumption and that particular edit?
Edit: Reversed edit until someone replies to this.
Edited by Lloigor