This month, theatergoers watched the new Superman movie in 76 countries. Though the film played in many different languages, every showing included a new language created by David J. Peterson ’03 and his wife, Jessie Peterson.
The duo created Suh Ankripton, the latest version of the Kryptonian language used on Superman’s home planet. A pivotal scene that changes the world’s opinion of Superman involves characters speaking the language.
David and Jessie began work on Suh Ankripton in early 2024, scouring the comics for words and names. Then, they broke these terms into component pieces, eventually creating root words, grammar rules, and a phonetic system.
They are conlangers, meaning they construct new languages. Many conlangers create for personal enjoyment or to add a world-building element to their own fantasy or science fiction project. Only an elite few get paid, and only David and Jessie get to work full-time creating languages. It’s a dream job for an English and linguistics double major like David.
“You go back and watch Casablanca: there is German, French, a little bit of Russian, Italian. There are no subtitles at all,” said David. “It gives a sense of what that place was supposed to be like at that time—this huge melting pot. This is what you’re trying to do when it comes to a created language. It’s the whole point of having costumes, props, or CGI. You’re trying to make it interesting. You’re trying to make it a real place.”
David is the brains behind many of your favorite pop culture phenomena. His big start came from Game of Thrones, where he developed Dothraki, High Valyrian, and other languages. The hugely popular HBO show became a cultural touchstone and launched David’s career. He eventually partnered with Duolingo to create a free course on High Valyrian.
Game of Thrones was based on George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire books. Martin took pains to add realism to his historical fantasy series, but he admitted he lacked the gift for languages that famous conlanger J.R.R. Tolkien demonstrated in The Lord of the Rings. Instead, Martin painted the chief tongues of Westeros and Essos in broad strokes.
Dothraki had just a few dozen words when David won a competition to work on the show’s pilot episode. Now, it has over 3,000. High Valyrian had but two phrases in the books—“Valar morghulis” and “Valar dohaeris”—before David began working on the third season.
“I won the competition, partly because I did nothing but work on it between 16 and 18 hours a day,” said David. “In less than a month, I had over 300 pages of material.”
Since his triumph with Game of Thrones, major studios have made David one of the industry’s go-to language consultants. He worked on Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon, HBO’s Lovecraft Country, Netflix’s Bright, Peacock’s Vampire Academy, Pixar’s Elemental, Showtime’s Penny Dreadful, and Syfy’s Defiance. Despite Superman being a DC Comics character, David has two titles from the rival Marvel Cinematic Universe on his résumé: Thor: The Dark World and Doctor Strange.
Creating a language isn’t as easy as grouping together letters in a way that sounds cool.
After building out the Chakobsa language spoken by the Fremen people of Dune: Part One, David teamed up with Jessie on Dune: Part Two. The husband-wife team is currently working on Dune: Part Three along with the new seasons of House of the Dragon and The Witcher. Combined, they have created over 60 languages.
“It’s still a shaky proposition to even get on a film or TV show as a language creator,” said David. “There was another movie we were about to close where they essentially decided to go with gibberish. Imagine if they’re talking about hiring a costume designer, but at the last minute, they say, ‘Actually, we’ll just have the actors wear whatever they want. They have clothes at home; why do we need you?’ We still have those conversations about language creation every single time, and we’re the biggest names.”
David’s first language was inspired by a student-led DeCal class on Esperanto and faculty-taught courses in Arabic and linguistics.
“I didn’t see the purpose of studying language without learning it to fluency, but after a day in my linguistics course with Sam Mchombo, I got it,” said David. He enjoyed playing with language data, finding patterns, and covering many different languages at once. “It immediately drew me in.”
Creating a language isn’t as easy as grouping together letters in a way that sounds cool. There must be a logical order that allows for consistent translations and pronunciations. David sets a high bar for himself so his languages sound authentic, as if they had evolved naturally over time.
David records himself reading his languages so actors can refer to them while memorizing their scripts. Of course, not every person will speak perfect Dothraki, just as many people don’t speak “proper” versions of their own language. Jason Momoa shifted his enunciation to create a dialect for his character, Khal Drogo, whereas Emilia Clarke’s Daenerys Targaryen mispronounced words to reflect that she was a non-native speaker.
Each language David creates must be grounded in the culture from which it originates. The Dothraki people, for example, have a society that resembles ancient Mongolians, with many words related to horses. Many created languages also bear the marks of their creator. Superman was born as Kal-El, which means “star child” in Kryptonian. However, the name also bears close resemblance to the Hebrew words for “voice of God,” reflecting the real-life Jewish roots of the superhero’s creators.
In developing Suh Ankripton, David and Jessie used the established word “kal” (child) to determine how to say related words and phrases like “kalo” (children), “ankalaz” (from the children), and “yovigahum ikalaz” (I didn’t see the children). Each translation had to make logical sense so the language can continue to adapt to script rewrites and future releases.
David and Jessie build up the conlanger community through online Q&As, conferences, and a weekly series on YouTube. Ultimately, David wants to create a system where language enthusiasts can get jobs like his. He cofounded the Language Creation Society and helped develop a jury process so companies can find vetted conlangers for their projects. His ultimate aim is to establish a system similar to the Writer’s Guild where there are more opportunities and protections for the profession.
If he gets his way, maybe another Berkeley English or linguistics major will craft the next big language in pop culture.
The Petersons and Suh Ankripton will return in Supergirl.