Question for Ted Chiang

Meredith somewhat asked my question, as a Communicative Disorders major (Speech/Language Pathology) the linguistics of the Heptapods interested me greatly. I too was wondering what you based their language upon. I have really enjoyed this book of your short stories, Story of Your Life has been my favorite because it deals with one of my favorite science fiction mediums; alien visitors to Earth. I love imagining what it would be like if visitors from another galaxy stopped in on us earthlings some day. Hopefully, they would be peaceful observers like the Heptapods!