Interlingua
Interlingua (/ɪntərˈlɪŋɡwə/; ISO 639 language codes ia, ina) is an international auxiliary language (IAL) developed between 1937 and 1951 by the American International Auxiliary Language Association (IALA). It ranks among the most widely used IALs and is the most widely used naturalistic IAL[2] – in other words, those IALs whose vocabulary, grammar and other characteristics are derived from natural languages, rather than being centrally planned. Interlingua literature maintains that (written) Interlingua is comprehensible to the hundreds of millions of people who speak Romance languages,[3] though it is actively spoken by only a few hundred.[1]
Interlingua was developed to combine a simple, mostly regular grammar[4][5] with a vocabulary common to the widest possible range of western European languages,[6] making it unusually easy to learn, at least for those whose native languages were sources of Interlingua's vocabulary and grammar.[7] Conversely, it is used as a rapid introduction to many natural languages.[2]
The name Interlingua comes from the Latin words inter, meaning "between", and lingua, meaning "tongue" or "language". These morphemes are the same in Interlingua, thus "Interlingua" would mean "between language".
Interlingua recognises that many European languages share common vocabulary – due to the historical prominence of Latin and Greek – and therefore aims to extract and standardize the most widespread words for a concept. To qualify for inclusion in Interlingua, the presence of words must be shown in the primary control languages (English, French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese) or secondary control languages (German and Russian).[6] However, words from a diverse range of languages are found in Interlingua, including Japanese (geisha and samurai), Arabic (califa), Guugu Yimithirr (gangurru) (Interlingua: kanguru), and Finnish (sauna).[6]
Speakers of other languages can learn to speak and write Interlingua in a relatively short time, due to simple grammar and regular word formation using a small number of roots and affixes.[8] This is particularly true for speakers with a good knowledge of Romance languages and international scientific vocabulary.
Research with Swedish students has shown that, after learning Interlingua, they can translate elementary texts from Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish. A 1974 study showed that an Interlingua class could translate a Spanish text that students who had taken 150 hours of Spanish found too difficult to understand.[2] Gopsill has suggested that Interlingua's freedom from irregularities allowed the students to grasp the mechanisms of Romance languages quickly.[2][8]
