International Auxiliary Languages (IALs) are languages constructed with the aim of facilitating communication between people who would otherwise have no other language in common. They are usually designed to be significantly simpler, and thus more easily learnt, than national or "natural" languages.

As well as the general information available from this page, I also provide information on the IALs Ido, the language of the Delegation, and Novial by Otto Jespersen. Links to information on other IALs will be found further down this page. Please address any comments on these pages to me at idojc@hotmail.com

Please note that there is now a backup of this website at this address, with subsections eg. books archived separately here.

The following materials are now available at this site:

• Histoire de la Langue Universelle par L. Couturat et L. Leau, 1903 [under construction]
• International Language and Science by L. Couturat, O. Jespersen, R. Lorenz, W. Ostwald and L. Pfaundler, 1910
• Interlinguistics by Otto Jespersen, 1931
• The Function of an International Auxiliary Language by E. Sapir, 1925
• On Language Making - Paper read to the Philological Society of London by Henry Jacob, 1948
• Artificial Languages after the World-War by Otto Jespersen, 1918
• The Preparatory Work for an International Technical Terminology by Henry Jacob, 1945
• An International Language by Otto Jespersen, 1928
• A Planned Auxiliary Language by Henry Jacob, 1947
• On the Choice of a Common Language by Henry Jacob, 1946
• History of Our Language (Ido) by Otto Jespersen (English version)
• Historio di Nia Linguo da Otto Jespersen (Ido-versiono originala)
• Otto Jespersen - his work for an international auxiliary language by Henry Jacob, 1943
• Wilhelm Ostwald on World-Language (in Ido)
• Discussion pri International Lingue - Discussion between Otto Jespersen and Edgar de Wahl, Helsingør 1935
• Men Labore por un International Lingue - 1. Ante li mondemilite by Otto Jespersen, from Novialiste, 1937
• Men Labore por un International Lingue - 2. Pos li monde-guere by Otto Jespersen, from Novialiste, 1938
• Pri Nonmediati Derivatione in li International Lingues by Siegfried Auerbach, 1930
• Esperanto - a critique by James Chandler, 1997
• Ido-Novial Comparative Texts
• Bibliography to "A Planned Auxiliary Language", 1947
• Modified English as a Universal Language by Otto Jespersen, 1934
• Rudolf Carnap on IALs - a philosopher's view of international languages
• The Universal Adoption of Latin Letters by Otto Jespersen, 1934
• Euro Babel - English translation of an article about IALs and the EU, from Progreso 1995
• What is the use of phonetics? by Otto Jespersen, 1910
• Project Optima - a new project to find and formulate an optimal human language
• Nature and Art in Language (Part 1) by Otto Jespersen, 1933
• Nature and Art in Language (Part 2) by Otto Jespersen, 1933
• Otto Jespersen Online Bibliography - Directory of his books and articles
• Otto Jespersen by Niels Haislund, 1943
• Adversative Conjunctions by Otto Jespersen, 1933 (linguistic article giving the theory behind the Ido article Linguala questioni - Ma vice sed)
• Language: its Nature, Development and Origin by Otto Jespersen, 1922 [under construction]
• The Approaches to Artificial Language by Harold E. Palmer, D.Litt. (preface to A Planned Auxiliary Language)
• Efficiency in Linguistic Change by Otto Jespersen, 1941
• English-Dutch-Swedish word list 1000 common words
• Textos e traductiones in Interlingua de IALA

Here are some links to information on other International Auxiliary Languages. These links should lead you to all the information that is available on each language.

• Esperanto - Don Harlow's compendious site.
• Virtual Esperanto Library by Martin Weichert.
• The International Language Ido maintained by myself.
• The International Language Ido: improved Esperanto - Includes English-Ido, Ido-English vocabularies. By Robert Carnaghan.
• Novial - Novial-Informatione, maintained by myself.
• Novial - Bruce Gilson's pages on the language of Otto Jespersen.
• Union Mundial pro Interlingua - Official Website of the International UUnion for the IALA's Interlingua.
• Interlingua 2001 - Celebrating 50 years of Interlingua. Pages by Thomas Breinstrup and others.
• Glosa - Official-looking Glosa site with information in several languages, by Marcel Springer
• Glosa - a possible second language for the world by Robin Gaskell.
• Occidental - Naturalistic IAL published by Edgar de Wahl in 1922. Occidental Community site by Bob Petry.
• Cosmoglotta - Electronic journal in Interlingue-Occidental. Pages by Robert Petry.
• Latino sine flexione - Nice new pages from Jay Bowks on Peano's "Latin without inflexions".
• Basic English - Simplification of English invented by C. K. Ogden. Pages by Jim Bauer.
• Volapük - First IAL ever to gain mass acceptance, now looks quite archaic. Pages by Ken Caviness.
• Idiom Neutral - Complete grammar of Idiom Neutral. Also see the Idiom Neutral blogs Vok Neutral and Lingu Neutral.
• Dutton Speedwords - Shorthand system also proposed as an international language. Pages by Robert Petry.
• Dutton Speedwords - Dutton World Speedwords at Kafejo.com
• Novial 98 based on the language of Otto Jespersen.
• Romanova - New naturalistic IAL. Pages by David Crandall and others.
• LangX/Lang53 - New project to define a hierarchy of languages. Pages by Antony Alexander.
• Lango - Project for an IAL based on a spelling reformed English, by Robert Craig and Antony Alexander.
• Ceqli - Language based on English and Mandarin, by Rex F. May
• Unish - International language project by Sejong University in South Korea. This site is now the home of the Language and Translation Research Institute
• Lingua Franca Nova - Romance-based IAL by Dr. George Boeree
• Intal - Novial-like system developed by Erich Weferling
• Folkspraak - Germanic-based IAL, presented by the The Folkspraak Institute
• Universal Picture Language - context-based picture language, presented by Wally Flint
• Aiola - New Esperanto-like project by the Aiola Research Group (ARG)
• Blissymbolics - Symbol system by Charles K. Bliss. Site by Blissymbolics Communication International (BCI)
• Lojban - Logical language developed from James Cooke Brown's Loglan. Presented by the Logical Language Group (LLG)
• Esata - Based on English cut down for international use. Including complete description of the language
• Sona - by Kenneth Searight, designed with sonority in mind, based on a limited set of "radicals"
• Neo Patwa - formerly Dunia Patwa, creole-based system by Jens Wilkinson
• Atlango - Esperanto-derived system by Richard A. Antonius
• Mondlango - Another Esperanto-based system, this time with a fair helping of English, by He Yafu
• Kotava - La langue de communication universelle, aprioristic system developed since 1975
• Latinvlo - a development of Stephen Chase Houghton's Master Language, by Paul Bartlett
• Medilingua is an attempt to reform Novial in the direction of Interlingua (IALA)
• Europaio / Modern Indo-European is a project to revive Proto-Indo-European, with multilingual website
• Temenia is an international auxiliary language, or model for constructing one, which is unusual in that it uses the Greek alphabet
• Pandunia is a constructed language with a cross-cultural vocabulary and phonology with traits from the most widely spoken languages of the world, by Risto Kupsala
• Toki Pona is a constructed language with a limited vocabulary, simple phonology and positive outlook, by Sonja Elen Kisa
• Let's Learn Toki Pona blog - a blog about my personal attempt to learn Toki Pona, also mirrored here and here
• Sasxsek - A Language for Earth, a constructed language designed to be used as an auxiliary language, by Dana Nutter
• Lingwa de Planeta or LdP, a new project based on world languages such as Chinese, Russian and Arabic. By Dmitry Ivanov and others.
• Sambahsa-mundialect is an IAL based on reconstructed Indo-European, by Olivier Simon
• Globasa The Language of the World Citizen
• Euriziano A common language for Europe, by Marco de Grandis

• Don HARLOW's constructed languages page
• IAL Wikia an editable IAL wiki by Jay BOWKS
• Chris BOGART's constructed languages pages
• Paul O. BARTLETT's constructed languages page
• William W. PATTERSON's language page
• Richard Kennaway's constructed language links page
• Model Language Links - Constructed language links page by Jeffrey Henning
• Artificial Language Lab - Collection of essays and resources, by Rick Harrison
• Essays on Language Design - Several interesting essays by Rick Morneau
• Learn not to speak Esperanto by Justin Rye
• Why Esperanto is not my favourite artificial language by Geoff Eddy
• UTL - Universal translation interlanguage project by Marcos Franco
• Archives of the Auxlang mailing list (discussions on International Auxiliary Languages)
• Conlang archives 1991-94 - Archives from the days before Auxlang
• Bibliography of Planned Languages (excluding Esperanto) - not comprehensive, nevertheless lists a large number of books about planned languages
• Esperanto Studies and Interlinguistics by Mark Fettes, with a tendency of information towards Esperanto
• Auxlang-Dialog/IAL Basis Project website - Website of the Auxlang-Dialog mailing list and the IAL Basis Open Project which aims to identify the common features in the major IALs
• The Future Global Language - Take Part in the World's First Global EElection of Languages!
• Visual Languages - Links to various constructed language sites
• ONE LANGUAGE FOR THE WORLD and how to achieve it by Mario Pei - the complete book
• Ardalambion - Comprehensive site on the invented languages of J.R.R. Tolkien, including Quenya and Sindarin. Presented by Helge Kåre Fauskanger
• Bruce R. Gilson's Language page has information on Novial and Bruce's own project Voksigid
• Blueprints for Babel - Irreverent guide to various international languages
• Don Blaheta's Auxlang links - Links to information on auxiliary languages, especially Novial
• World Auxiliary Language website - New site promoting the idea of an auxiliary language, by Brett Zamir
• Wanted: A World Language - essay by Edward Sapir
• Archives of the Eurocreole list: page 1 - page 2 - page 3 -- page 4
• Plansprachen.ch - Swiss neutral information site on IALs, from the Centre de Documentation et d'Etude sur la Langue Internationale (CDELI)
• International auxiliary languages - a conlanger's perspective on IALs. Three essays by Jörg Rhiemeier
• Creoles or planned languages: which have the simpler grammar? Liu Haitao compares Esperanto, Ido and LsF with creole languages (PDF)
• Polimetrica articles on interlinguistics - five short articles on interlinguistics by various authors
• Garrett's Links to Logical Languages is a collection of links to information on various constructed logical languages
• Acadon Project website with information on the Acadon language and essays on language design, by Leo J. Moser
• International Auxlang Community - new site with articles and discussions on IALs, with a tendency towards Occidental-Interlingue, by Bob Petry
• List of Worldlangs compiled by Risto Kupsala
• Ekolingvo - Economic Aspects of Language Inequality in the European Union, multilingual site by Áron Lukács
• ENIONI - new site by Rostislav Levchenko
• In the Land of Invented Languages - website of a book on constructed languages by Arika Okrent

Here are some collected links to other sites which have useful and interesting information on languages in general:

• Travlang's Foreign Languages for Travelers site - includes sound files so you can hear useful phrases spoken in over 60 languages
• Language Futures Europe - a site which deals with language policy with respect to the European Union, with links
• The King's English - the complete book
• International Phonetic Association - home page, includes a chart showing the International Phonetic Alphabet
• Principles of Spelling Reform - Appendix to Henry Sweet's Handbook of Phonetics
• European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages in English [UPDATE: unofficial Welsh and Basque versions are now available!]
• Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights signed in Barcelona, June 1996
• Prague Manifesto of the Movement for the International Language Esperanto - though my providing this link does not imply endorsement of the Esperanto language, the message contained in this document seems worthy of serious consideration
• iLoveLanguages - formerly the Human-Languages Page, seems to have the same information
• The Linguist List - Linguistics resources
• Ethnologue - Languages of the World - claims to list 6,700 languages spoken in 278 countries
• The numbers 1 to 10 in over 5000 languages with a clickable map, plus other language pages, by Mark Rosenfelder
• Estuary English - Web documents relating to the popular accent of south-east England, maintained by Prof. John Wells
• SAMPA - Computer readable phonetic alphabet, using ASCII characters to represent the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). Pages by Prof. John Wells.
• Noam Chomsky: A life of dissent - Complete biography of the famous linguist
• The Babel Text - Translations of the Babel Text into many languages, compiled by Jeffrey Henning
• The Creolist Archives - Archives of the Creolist mailing list; the excellent Creolist site is unfortunately no more
• Sabir, the original Lingua Franca of the Mediterranean at Wikipedia
• Glossary of Lingua Franca - another site on Sabir, by Alan D. Corré
• SIL Electronic Working Papers - Working papers of the Summer Institute of Linguistics
• George Boeree's Language Pages - Language families of the world with excellent maps, Indo-European languages, English spelling reform and alphabets. Pages by Dr. C. George Boeree, author of Lingua Franca Nova
• JAARS Museum of the Alphabet - Information on the alphabets of the world, with many illustrations and samples
• The Routes of English - Website of the BBC Radio 4 series on the history and diversity of English around the world, presented by Melvyn Bragg. With sound files.
• POLYGLOT learn language - new site that puts you in touch with native speakers to help you learn foreign languages
• Symbols.Net - Directory to the world of Signs, Glyphs and Symbols
• AncientScripts.com - Writing systems, Phonetics and more
• Learning Languages - assorted language pages by FX Micheloud, including language learning resources, book reviews and the ideographic system SAFO
• Lingva Prismo - A website for and about languages. Available in 8 language versions
• On the Romanization of Bulgarian and English - paper by Dr. Lyubomir Ivanov, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
• Unilang - site where people interested in languages can unite, openly discuss, and find resources related to language(s), linguistics and translation
• Papiamentu - Papiamento The creole language of Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao - introduction by Attila Narin
• La Prensa - the best creole news site, in Papiamentu out of Curaçao
• Omniglot - writing systems and languages of the world, with gallery of language-related art
• The Four Essential Travel Phrases in 421 languages, 232 dialects and 46 conlangs, by David McCreedy
• Language Miniatures Mini-essays about human language in its endless kaleidoscope of aspects, by William Z. Shetter
• L'enseignement des langues étrangères comme politique publique - paper by François Grin, Université de Genève

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