Do You See Na'Vi Going Anywhere?

[Tìng Eywatikìte'e]

I'm all for children's stories. My favorite books as a child were simplistic in language but very creative and played on words.

I'm not sure how well Dr. Seuss style would work at the moment since it would be confusing what was Na'Vi and what was made up, but what about something like Where the Wild Things Are? I think Na'Vi would sound simply beautiful with that story line.

[kranapan]

Yeah, let's start with translating children's books and move up to Shakespeare.

[Kaltxì Palulukan!]

Yeah, let's start with translating children's books and move up to Shakespeare.

.

or . . . write a few, perhaps nawm-a tsmukan?

Baby steps, due to baby language. Small accomplishment breed more than confidence. They leave a trail of stones for others to follow, while simultaneously building a solid platform from which to tse'a (see). (I wish I could say THAT in Na'vi!)

Still looking for the word "chicken," but only because saying "chicken" in Na'vi would make me laugh. 

[Motxokxen]

One day we will all be speaking fluently! (i hope)

[Tìng Eywatikìte'e]

I would love to see some original stories, but translated already beloved stories is a great way of reeling in some interest. People will think of the fond memories they had reading it as a child, and since they already know the story reading it will be a bit easier.

[Dr. Strange Lulz]

This thread is actually what spurred me into posting an introduction.

Figure I should at least introduce myself before giving out suggestions.

I've shown this site to 8 people, since then all but 1 of those people has told me "Screw that." Not for lack of desire to learn the language, instead due to the overwhelming amount of information and nonexistence of any sort of learning structure. The way learning Na'vi is structured at this point is similar to saying,

"Here's an English dictionary and a link to the Wikipedia article for English Language. Good Luck."

I've taken 5 languages while in school, In every single one of those classes there was a similar base for learning the language.

Every first year language textbook starts out the same way, a bit of information about the culture itself, followed by a short list of basic vocab and introduction to basic sentence building, conjugation, and pronunciation.

Whereas our starting text is A Crash Course in Linguistic Terminology used for Na'vi. Really?

While I have a history in languages and understand it for the most part, your average Joe who's just seen the movie and decided to learn the language is not going to have a damn clue what you're talking about... And they're going to give up before they ever get started.

"Where do I start?" is a fairly common question around here. As it stands there is no real guide for beginners, what I'm suggesting is a series of lessons (preferably in video form, audio with text only) to serve as an introductory guide to the Na'vi language. This would give beginners an absolute starting point and a way to get involved in talking to the community from the very beginning. The videos out there right now are neither informative nor structured, and they frequently contradict each other in terms of both pronunciation and sentence structure.

Ex.

Lesson 1

1. Na'vi Alphabet and Pronunciation
2. Vocab and short phrases
oe - I
aynga ['aj.ŋa] pn. - You
po [po] pn. - He,she
poan [po.'an] pn. - He
poe [po.'ɛ] pn. - She
ayoe [aj.o.'ɛ] pn. - We (exclusive)
ayoeng [aj.o.'ɛŋ] pn. - We (inclusive)
ayfo ['aj.fo] pn. - They
pongu ['poŋu] pn. - Group of people,party

kaltxì [kal.'t'ɪ] n. - Hello
irayo [i.'ɾa.jo] n,i. - Thank you
Eywa ngahu ['ɛj.wa 'ŋa.hu] int. - Good-bye,Eywa (be with you)
kìyevame [kɪ.jɛ.'va.mɛ] n. - Good-bye (good-bye, see you again soon)
Na'vi [naʔ.'vi] n. - The People (name for themselves)

(Or whatever)

3. Basic sentence building
An explanation of exactly what the cases are (In Layman's Terms), what they mean, and why they are necessary.
Simple sentences, "Hello my name is..." "What is your name?" etc.

Or whatever the community feels would be a good starting lesson.

Some of you folks are amazing at this already, and a voice recording of the above lesson would take 10 minutes at the most. I'm new here and I'd be more than willing to do the actual video editing if someone was willing to do the voice work.

Anyway, just a suggestion.

I just hate to think of the people who wanted to learn this language but decided to give up already...

[txur txe'lante]

It depends what you mean by go places. I will learn this language. I will speak it. and any who wish to join me in that are welcome. will this become Klingon? yes. if more people like me and other dedicated people to this make it. If one person speaks Na'vi fluently it has gone somewhere. I think that if we make friends through this site and stick together we could potentially have a real thing going here. The Na'vi prospered due to their loyalty and love for each other and their clan. we are our own clan now and now we must stick together to keep Na'vi alive. find people around you who want to learn and learn with them in person. one day we will all meet and converse together be it on Pandora or in some place on our own lovely planet Earth.

[Tìng Eywatikìte'e]

I agree that we need to start working on making a clear guide for beginners since it's a bit of a mess now. Sadly since there is so little we know it's a bit difficult, we only have bits and pieces. Still I think we have enough to make at least a couple of user friendly lessons. I'm all for video and podcasts! I think those would be the best to learn from, along with more work sheets.

Still, it's all so new, people can't expect this site to have to much in means of lessons yet. We're still all learning! It's only been a few weeks, I bet most people just don't feel like they have quite the grasp you need to form lessons yet.

[Sngä'i Tìrey-yä]

Has anyone thought about making podcasts or other kinds of audio lessons in a sequential building order like what Dr. Strange Lulz suggested? It would be much easier for those individuals learning on the go, and being able to listen to accurate pronunciations and sentence structures would be incredibly helpful for students.

Also has anyone thought about creating a sentence list to help illustrate all these grammatical structures? I see that there's usually one sentence for each grammar point, but most language lessons will offer multiple sentences at varying levels of difficulty to really illustrate how the grammar points work. It would also really help Na'vi learners understand grammar the first time, so less posts would be needed about the minute details.

[Kip Pizayu]

Some of you folks are amazing at this already, and a voice recording of the above lesson would take 10 minutes at the most. I'm new here and I'd be more than willing to do the actual video editing if someone was willing to do the voice work.

Anyway, just a suggestion.

I just hate to think of the people who wanted to learn this language but decided to give up already...

You make a really good point. I found these grammar worksheets really helpful!
http://forum.learnnavi.org/index.php?topic=627.0

More stuff like those needs to be created.

[Tìng Eywatikìte'e]

Has anyone thought about making podcasts or other kinds of audio lessons in a sequential building order like what Dr. Strange Lulz suggested? It would be much easier for those individuals learning on the go, and being able to listen to accurate pronunciations and sentence structures would be incredibly helpful for students.

Also has anyone thought about creating a sentence list to help illustrate all these grammatical structures? I see that there's usually one sentence for each grammar point, but most language lessons will offer multiple sentences at varying levels of difficulty to really illustrate how the grammar points work. It would also really help Na'vi learners understand grammar the first time, so less posts would be needed about the minute details.

I mentioned podcasts a while back and it sparked a bit of interest, I think the higher ups are talking about it.

In the vocab/phrases childboard in the beginning section has a megalist thread in the stickies that is a long list of grammatically correct sentences. It helped me a lot!

[wm.annis]

I just hate to think of the people who wanted to learn this language but decided to give up already...

There is no one who knows this language right now — except Frommer.  The sort of lessons you describe would be very useful, but we cannot produce anything like that now, not without making stuff up to fill in gaps we don't have data for.  This is the totality of known correct Na'vi we have: Corpus.  That is not enough to start a textbook with.

When we have the full picture, more can be done.

[Tìng Eywatikìte'e]

I just hate to think of the people who wanted to learn this language but decided to give up already...

There is no one who knows this language right now — except Frommer.  The sort of lessons you describe would be very useful, but we cannot produce anything like that now, not without making stuff up to fill in gaps we don't have data for.  This is the totality of known correct Na'vi we have: Corpus.  That is not enough to start a textbook with.

When we have the full picture, more can be done.

We have enough to make a little bit though, something that'll catch the interests of those who can't make sense of linguistic speech. A video about proper way to pronounce the alphabet would be huge help to many. Even someone just reading out the pocket dictionary and stopping to explain in greater detail what some of the bits mean.

I think the biggest problem is how spread out all the documents are, getting them all in one place will make it seem a little less daunting.

[Sngä'i Tìrey-yä]

I think the biggest problem is how spread out all the documents are, getting them all in one place will make it seem a little less daunting.

This.

Not just documents, but also audio files. I spent most of the day running from site to site trying to find audio files from the movie and from 'experienced' (read as: people who can pronounce) speakers. If we could get a decently compiled list of all documents, audio files, and videos in a concise format it would make undertaking this language a lot less formidable.

[Tìng Eywatikìte'e]

Yes, same with video. I know we have a sister site, talknavi.com, but it would be best to have everything on this site in one place. That'll be best for newer members who aren't aware of sister sites and will keep them from getting scared off before they have a chance to learn.

[Lehrrap Uniltìranyu]

Agreed to the agreement of the statement above the one above mine.

We need everything in one place.

[Ayzìsìt Alenantang]

If James Cameron's smart, he'll publish a guide to Na'Vi. The language can't develop if we don't even know it all yet.

[kranapan]

People will start making new words, which will be the death of the language. We've gotta have a few words coming out now and then from Frommer.

[Atoki Atanyä]

I tell you all now, that we will have something, trust us on that. We have people in touch with Frommer, the language WILL NOT CHANGE without his consent

Frommer is keen to release material, so untill then, we just have to wait for Fox to sort out merchandising rights to other companies.

(PLEASE LET ROSETTA STONE HELP, FOX)

Oe sìman ma smukan, ke kawng, we will have our way eventually

Spoiler

As i said my brothers, no evil (take it to mean no worries)

[Night Raider]

The movie is still playing and making some money. We need to wait patiently and hope it makes a lot of money. If it makes a lot of money there will be sequels. With sequels there will be more Na'vi.

Also, we need to wait until the special edition DVD is out. I am sure there will be quite a few things on Na'vi there.