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Shadow Wulf wrote:

Renorei wrote:

sundog wrote:they can't move like people's lips. have you ever seen a wolf pucker up?

Ventriloquist's and parrots don't need flexible lips to talk. Yet, they manage it anyway. A werewolf (especially if they are able to shift individual body parts, such as their tongue and vocal cords, etc.) would probably be able to accomplish this feat as well.

Yes but arent parrots beak are set up differently from a wolf's.

Of course. My point was that you don't need to have flexible human lips to be able to speak. A parrot's beak is even less flexible than wolf lips.

Shadow Wulf wrote:And no offence but I dont really like the idea of being able to shift individual parts like that. Mabey the hands or feet or a muscle growth or even a slight facial shift but thats about it. It will seem too corny and wierd for a werewolf to just shift its tounge.

'Corny' and 'weird' are in the eyes of the beholder. I, for one, don't think that shifting the tongue, vocal cords, and lips would be any less corny than being able to shift any other body parts. If anything, it'd be less corny because it wouldn't be so visible from the outside and so it wouldn't look weird.

Shadow Wulf wrote:Scotts idea I like more, a werewolf can simply learn to talk with its muzzle and all.

I'm ok with this as well. I've never been opposed to this idea. My suggestion that werewolves can shift individual mouth parts was simply to counter those who say that it would be physically impossible for a werewolf to speak given the mouth parts that it has. Of course, I will always maintain that a werewolf can shift individual parts, but I don't think that it would absolutely have to in order to be able to speak.

I agree that the lips of a wolf aren't given to human speech. We simply have a whole different paradigm of musculature. But the werewolf wouldn't have to shift its vocal tract (vocal cords, larynx, voicebox, et alia) to speak because human and wolf vocal tracts are virtually identical to begin with. With practice, a human can imitate the range of wolf sounds (not the entire "wolf language" — we don't have moveable ears and lack a tail and we'd have to paint our faces to accentuate our facial expressions).

For myself, I'm going to have the werewolves in my "Three Sisters" story be able to speak human language in their gestalt forms, if not their lupine forms. The literary setting and style — dark adventure/dreamlike/semi-allegorical — supports it, plus it'll help make the characters a bit easier to relate to.

Mine have a tougher time doing it, but with practice can almost pull it off. It sounds funny, and most prefer to shift to talk and then shift back. Of course, my werewolves have a comparatively easy time controlling their shifting compared to a lot of other storylines. (Not that the first shift is all fun and giggles.)

Thinking about Dean Koontz watchers on this one.
The dog had human intellegence but thanks to lacking a human tongue, vocal cords, teeth, or lips couldn't pronounce human words.

Now what about a werewolf when in its half form or fully wolf form.

Should it be able to talk? and if yes how so and to what degree?

Gutteral talk, whine talk "like that dog that was tought to pronounce words", or growl talking.

Or talk just like a person.

I can see strained talking, deep growl talking.

But if it could talk clearly despite the limits to mouth and throat how?
Now I might end up being accused of trying to turn werewolves into birds now..

think of a parrot, it pronounced words despite not having a human tongue, lips, or teeth. Becuase it has a very special set of vocal cords that can imitate most sounds.
Now if a werewolf had these kinds of vocal cords it could easily imitate human speech (and would save us the horror of seeing a werewolf pucker its mouth to pronounc O sounds.) just normal up and down mouth movements with clear human words.
and would add to them a new ability, sound mimicry to imitate other animals or people to either lure prey or evade search.
"I actaully had this thought reading a story on castle of spirits by someone who while in Germany encounterd a strange dog creature that had been imitating the sound if their baby crying out side the baby's window" and I had to think, is this how a werewolf can also talk then? like a parrot?

I'm pretty sure there is an existing thread on this. I'm just too tired at this time of night to find it.

If the werewolf had a tongue as thick as a parrot and a human does, they might be able to make a start on speech. The teeth would be fairly annoying, but if the wolf is partially human, as Gestalts would be, then they might have the thick human tongue. There's more factors than the tongue as you pointed out, perhaps those are more human-like too.

Yeah there was a thread...but I'm lazy. And you're not to blame, I think I've made double threads before.

I've been playing guitar -all day- so I'm zoned out.

being the fact that it was human to start off perhaps some human traits of vocalization and anatomy are carried over to were form and thus it would have the capacity to form deep growelling speech.....

Most likely a Deep Growling Speech of such. Kinda slow and slurred, but with a deep and Wolfish accent. They wouldn't be able to talk like Shakespeare, but would be able to make Basic human communication possible by a few words.

So instead of saying "Hey I'm Hungry, I think I'll get some meat." in human form, in full werewolf form, they would say "Me hungry... want.. meat..." and if it's half form, perhaps "I'm... hungry... I want some... Meat..."

Possibly....
I think there wouldn't be any speech involved. It's all about body language and scents. You know how dogs can sense or smell when your scared? I think that's the way werewolves would communicate.

I wouldn't have my werewolves talk either, in Gestalt or wolf form, mine usually mind communicate or general canine talk they all understand. But it is possible they could talk in the Gestalt form, I guess, with the right human vocal structures.

Jamie wrote:I'm pretty sure there is an existing thread on this. I'm just too tired at this time of night to find it.

there is.

http://calypso-blue.com/werewolf/viewtopic.php?t=28

Threads will be merged soon.

Aside from the silly parrot thing.

I have had magical werewolves that could talk because they manipulated the air to vibrate in the form of sound,

Psychically,

Or ones that tried to stand as upright as possible and held their throats and made whine/growl sounds close to human speech.

Werewolves can talk cause they know how to, like a parrot except smarter.

I think they shouldn't talk cause how many animals in the world kno how to speak?? Parrots only, so i beleive talking in wolf form is a big no no.

Actually, there are plenty of birds that can talk. Not just parrots. Hell, you can teach a raven to speak.

I take it also you've never seen the "talking dog" videos?

I have also seen a pig to say, "mama"
and
a cat to say "no" and even "hi"

Its what sounds they are limited to and trying to copy the sounds they hear people make. A Parrot is just that much more talented.

Ravens can copy even the beatiful songs of mockingbirds. It seems most Ravens just don't care to copy sounds.

Well, considering that speech is mostly a memory action (which is why people with brain trauma can forger how to speak), I would imagine at first a werewolf wouldn’t be able to speak, but once they got use to new muscles in the throat, I can see a werewolf being able to speak (in gesalt form). In full wolf form, because the vocal range of a wolf is so different than a human, I would take much longer to learn how to speak. It is very possible though.

Set wrote: Hell, you can teach a raven to speak.

Gives new meaning to "Quothe The Raven, Nevermore"

Birds of Paradise can "talk" too. Have you ever seen the documentary where a BoP mimicked the photographer's camera click and incorporated it into his courtship song?

i still think Werewolves shouldn't talk in wolf form.

vrikasatma wrote:Birds of Paradise can "talk" too. Have you ever seen the documentary where a BoP mimicked the photographer's camera click and incorporated it into his courtship song?

Never let these types of birds listen to techno-music or that new beep, click techno stuff. They seem to love artificial sounds.

No talking. A wolf's mouth structure would not allow for any human communication.

neoritter wrote:No talking. A wolf's mouth structure would not allow for any human communication.

well I believe we are thinking more in the biped half form more so than the full wolf form.

The bipedal still has a wolf shaped head. Meaning they have a wolf muzzle/mouth and all the things that go with that. Meaning they can't form the words correctly.

neoritter wrote:The bipedal still has a wolf shaped head. Meaning they have a wolf muzzle/mouth and all the things that go with that. Meaning they can't form the words correctly.

Ever seen videos of dogs talking? its a trick as they don't know what they are saying, they do it with whineing and growl sounds.

The biped werewolf may have a wolf like head but it also has a biped's neck, so it may retain human vocal cords and memory. So may make some human words, but would be very hard to understand.