- How do aliens in the story language and communication style different from the human language (oral, pictographic, phonetic, etc.)?
For the aliens’ oral language(Heptapod A), there is no such fixed word order, and even there is no preferred order for the clauses in a conditional statement. But for the human language, we have the regular patterns of word order in contrast. For the aliens’ pictographic language(Hetapod B), it is a unique two-dimensional, at the same time, human language is more likely lineal language, which can be read in the line. There are a lot of pictographic variations in Hetapod B that lead to so many differences in the actual meaning and reflect the grammar usages.
- How does the physical structure of our body inform the way we communicate? How about the aliens?
From the physical structure, the biggest difference between humans and aliens is that aliens are more symmetric, which means “any of its limbs could serve as an arm or a leg,” and every direction can be forward to them. But the human seems like a single-dimensional creature because we can only perceive only one direction. To reflect on the writing language for aliens, Hetapod B looks complicated which combines many elements together, like a picture.