What Is Lojban? [Paperback]

Nick Nicholas (Editor), John Woldemar Cowan (Editor)

Product Details

• Paperback: 184 pages
• Publisher: Logical Language Group (June 2, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0966028317
• ISBN-13: 978-0966028317
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.3 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #114,643 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good summary, August 20, 2003

By 

Bruce R. Gilson (Wheaton, MD United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: What Is Lojban? (Paperback)

In 1960, James Cooke Brown developed an idea for a language based on predicate logic, which he called "Loglan." in 1986 Brown's followers split into two groups, mainly based on Brown's desire to retain a tight proprietary control. The other group (naming itself the Logical Language Group) had to reformulate the vocabulary, and as a result, "Lojban" was created. This book is a description of the resulting language. (Of course, none of this history is given; in particular, the bitterness of the Loglan/Lojban split is not even hinted at!)

The main difficulty that the reader may have with this book is one that is not specific to these authors or this book, but endemic to all LLG's writing on Lojban. At some point it was decided that normal words like "noun," "verb," and such, as well as the expressions like "simple predicate" that J. C. Brown used in his Loglan article, were inappropriate to the description of Lojban, and only Lojban words like "lujvo," "gismu," etc. are to be used. They _are_ defined in this book, but their constant use can be a barrier to easy use of the book.

You will not learn to speak or write Lojban from this book (it is sparing in vocabulary) but if you want an idea about how Lojban works, this book is an excellent introduction as long as you can take the constant use of Lojban words for grammatical terms.

One caveat, however. The book claims that "Lojban is not a word-order language; it is a particle language." Nothing could be further from the truth. This reviewer helped to create Voksigid, which is truly a particle language as opposed to a word-order language, and one reason was as a reaction to Lojban.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A good intro, February 13, 2008

By 

Jboseth - See all my reviews

This review is from: What Is Lojban? (Paperback)

The book did an excellent job of its designation, namely, to give one a broad, interesting taste of Lojban and its many potential benefits to society and to the individual. As mentioned, the Lojban terms for grammar may be a bit strange at first, but are necessary and easily grasped. The book helped me want to learn Lojban, and I recommend it to any lover of linguistics, logic, and anyone else who is considering learning Lojban or has never heard of it. Two thumbs up!