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Languages in Star Wars
From Wikipedia, the freeencyclopedia (6/7/2012)
The fictional universe of Star Wars contains many languages. The languages have a role in the story lines. Because of the various languages
characters speak in Star Wars they often cannot understand each other. The
character C-3PO is a translator fluent in over six
million languages[1] who acts as a go-between for
other characters in the stories.
"Aurebesh"
alphabet
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Contents
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[edit]Basic: the common intergalactic language
The spoken language most often heard, a lingua franca, in the Star Wars films
and stories is Galactic Basic (shortened to Basic), although
this name itself is never explicitly mentioned in the films.[2] Basic is heard or printed in
the vernacular of the audience (Englishin
English versions, Spanish in
Spanish translations, etc.) and most often written in "Aurebesh", an
alphabet which has letters corresponding to each of the 26 letters of the basic Latin alphabet,
as well as letters representing Latin digraphs (letter
combinations) such as "th", "sh", "ng", etc.
[edit]Other Languages
[edit]Bocce
Bocce is a language of trade within the Star Wars
Universe. Developed by a merchant fleet, it combines multiple
languages to provide trade communication between different species."[3]
"Luke, tell Owen that if he gets a
translator to be sure it speaks Bocce."[4]
[edit]Huttese
Another lingua franca in the Star Wars Universe
that is spoken by many groups and species is Huttese, spoken
on Tatooine and other worlds in and around
Hutt space. It is spoken in the films by both non-humans (Jabba the Hutt, Watto, Sebulba and
others) and humans. In fact, the whole Max Rebo Band communicates and sings in
Huttese. Its phonology is said to be based on the Quechua language.[5]
[edit]Tribal tongue of the Ewoks
The Ewoks of
the forest moon of Endor speak
a "primitive dialect" of one of the more than six million other forms
of communication thatC-3PO is familiar with. Ben Burtt, Return
of the Jedi’s sound designer, created the Ewok language.[6] Burtt has told rather differing
stories about how he developed the language. In Bantha Tracks #17
August 1982, he states
"For the Ewoks, I was inspired by a
recording on a BBC documentary of an elderly woman speaking Tibetan. It was
very high-pitched and sounded like a good basis for Ewokese to me. Eventually
then, what evolved was a pidgin, or double talk version of words from Tibetan,
Nepali and other Mongolian languages [sic, neither Tibetan nor Nepali are Mongolian languages]."
Several years later, on the commentary track
for the DVD of Return of the Jedi, Burtt identified the language
that he heard in the BBC documentary as Kalmyk, a tongue spoken by the isolated
nomadic Kalmyk people. He
describes how, after some research, he identified an 80-year old Kalmyk refugee. He recorded her telling folk stories
in her native language, and then used the recordings as a basis for sounds that
became the Ewok language and were performed by voice actors who imitated the
old woman's voice in different styles. For the scene in which C-3PO speaks
Ewokese, actor Anthony Daniels worked
with Burtt and invented words, based on the Kalmyk recordings.[7]
Marcia Calkovsky of Lethbridge University
maintains that Tibetan language contributed to Ewok speech along with
Kalmyk, starting the story from attempts to use language samples of Native
Americans and later turning to 9 Tibetan women living in San Francisco area, as
well as one Kalmyk woman. The story of the choice of these languages is
referenced to Burtt's 1989 telephone interview, and many of the used Tibetan
phrases translated. The initial prayer Ewoks address to C-3PO is actually the
beginning part of Tibetan Buddhist prayer for the benefit of all sentient
beings, or so called four immeasurables,
but also there is a second (out of four) part of refuge prayer. Tibetan diaspora was puzzled as
many of the phrases they could make out did not corellate to events on screen.[8]
[edit]Wookiee language of
Shyriiwook
Shyriiwook (also called Wookiee
Speak, or contracted as "Wookieespeak" in the Expanded Universe, and video games) is the native language of the Wookiee race. They also speak xyro. The
language consists of roars and growls.[9] Although it can be understood
by members of other species, it is extremely difficult for those with
non-Wookiee physiology to speak. Conversely, Wookiee mouthparts physically
cannot create the sounds of Galactic Basic, thus while Wookiees such as
Chewbacca can understand characters speaking Basic, he cannot speak it. In
Timothy Zahn's "Heir to the Empire", Leia Organa Solo encounters a Wookiee
with a speech impedimentwhich
conveniently renders his Shyriiwook pronunciation much easier to understand by
Leia. Another Wookiee language, Xaczik, is indigenous to Wartaki Island on Kashyyyk and several outlying coastal
regions.
[edit]Ithorians
Ithorians have two mouths, one on each
side of their head. As a result, their native language is extremely complicated
and essentially impossible for non-Ithorians to speak. Despite the stereophonic
quality of their voices, Ithorians are able to speak Basic, and be understood
by others, with ease.
[edit]Geonosians
Geonosians,
insectoid species seen in Episode
II whose language includes click consonants.
[edit]Tusken Raiders
The Tusken Raiders of Tatooine, according to the video game Knights
of the Old Republic, speak a language of their own; it is, however,
difficult for non-Tuskens to understand this language. In the game, a droid
named HK-47 assists the player in communicating
with the Tusken Raiders. Generally, they utter roars and battle cries when seen
in public.
[edit]Jawaese and Jawa Trade Language
The Jawas,
also found on Tatooine, speak in a high-pitched, squeaky voice, many times
shouting, "Utini!"
[edit]Ryl language of the
Twi'leks
Twi'leks speak their own language, Ryl,
which incorporates spoken words and a form of sign language, using subtle
manipulations of the tips of their lekku (head tails).
[edit]Rodian language
Rodians have
their own language called Rodese.
[edit]Hapan language
Hapan was the language developed by residents
of the Hapes Cluster due to their isolation from the rest of the galaxy. Due to
their limited contact with residents outside the Cluster, Basic was not
commonly known to the average Hapan.
[edit]Droids and computers
Droids (robots) and computers in Star
Wars use either the natural languages or machine languages. C-3PO is
"fluent in over six million forms of communication" and protocol
droids are often employed as translators. Astromech droids such as R2-D2 communicate
through an information-dense language of beeps and whistles known as Binary;
devices exist that can translate this language into Basic. A few non-droids can
also learn to understand it through working with the droids for long periods of
time, and protocol droids are able to translate Binary into other languages.
[edit]Writing
Hindu-Arabic numerals appear
throughout the films, mainly on computer displays counting down time or
distance. At least one instance of the Latin alphabet crops up in the original
version of Star Wars
Episode IV: A New Hope ("POWER – TRACTOR BEAM 12 (SEC.
N6)"). Text in the other films is either illegible, offscreen, or in
fictional scripts. For the 2004 DVD release, this writing
was changed to the Aurebesh alphabet. In the novel The Truce at Bakura,
the Ssi-ruuk speak some sort of tonal language which involves whistles. A
human prisoner devises an orthography for this language.
[edit]Language building
The languages of some fictional worlds have
been worked out in great detail, with grammatical rules and large vocabularies,
such as J. R. R. Tolkien's Elvish
languages, and the Klingon language of Star Trek. The fictional languages of Star Wars, in contrast, are not
systematically worked out. The Wookiee growls and the beeps of the astromechs
mainly carry emotional indicators for the audience via intonation, and Huttese
is mainly a jumble of words taken from numerous real human languages. The language
most often heard in the films, Galactic Basic, is itself identical to modern
English (or whatever language the film is shown in), with only a few changed
idioms and additions of words related to the Star Wars setting. Mando'a, the language of the Mandalorians, is being developed into a
working language by Star Wars author Karen Traviss.[10]
Other languages heard are also human
languages, albeit ones likely unfamiliar to most of the audience. In A
New Hope, for instance, the language spoken by the character Greedo in conversation with Han Solo (in the cantina)
is actually a simplified version of Quechua, an indigenous language of the Andean
region of South America. In Return
of the Jedi, Lando Calrissian's copilot, Nien Nunb, speaks the real human
language Haya, spoken in Tanzania (Star Wars Insider #67,
31). Nunb's voice was performed by a Tanzanian exchange student. In Return of
the Jedi (2:12:00)Lando Calrissian's co-pilot briefly speaks Gikuyu, spoken primarily by the Kikuyu people
of Kenya. Similarly, the Ewok language was based on Tibetan, although some fans[who?] claim
that they also hear English being spoken by the Ewoks at some points during the
film. One can also hear some Finnish in the The
Phantom Menace, and "Teräs Käsi", the name of a martial art in
the Expanded Universe, comes from Finnish and translates as "steel
hand".
The Star Wars: Galactic Phrase Book
& Travel Guide summarizes book and movie information pertaining to
Huttese, Bocce, Ewok, Shyriiwook, droid, Jawa, and Gungan.
[edit]References
2.
^ Encyclopedia of Fictional and Fantastic
p.173–178 previewed at http://books.google.com/books?id=cQhke8K9G60C&pg=PA176&dq=%22Star+Wars%22+languages&ei=kpkYSYPCDI-SMpaTrdQE
4.
^ George Lucas (15 January 1976). "BlueHarvest.net - Star Wars: A New Hope
script". Retrieved 17 November 2011.
5.
^ Crit Minster, Paula Newton, and Ricardo
Segreda, Viva Travel Guide to Peru: Exploring Machu Picchu, Cusco, the
Inca Trail, Arequipa, Lake Titicaca, Lima and Beyond (Viva Travel
Guide to Peru: Exploring Machu Picchu, Cusco, the Inca Trail, Arequipa, Lake
Titicaca, Lima and Beyond), 26.
8.
^ Marcia S. Calkovsky. Is There Authoritative Voice in Ewok
Talk? On Postmodernism, Fieldwork, and the Recovery of Unintended Meaning, in:
Culture, Canadian Anthropology Society, 1991. Vol. XI №1-2.
9.
^ Daniel Amara, Prima Temp Authors Staff, Star
Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided: Prima's Official Strategy Guide (Prima
Games, 2003),22.
10.
^ On her official website, she claims,
"Yes, it's true. There's now a Mandalorian language, Mando'a. I developed
it for Lucasfilm and now it's a functioning language that you can learn and
speak." See "Ke jorhaa'ir Mando'a!" at Karen
Travis Science Fiction and Fantasy Author.
[edit]Further reading
§ Ben Burtt, Star
Wars: Galactic Phrase Book & Travel Guide, ISBN 0-345-44074-9.
§ Stephen Cain, Tim Conley, and Ursula K. Le
Guin, "Star Wars," Encyclopedia of Fictional and Fantastic
Languages (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2006), 173-176.
[edit]External links
§ "Language," Wookieepedia
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