Speculative Grammarian Podcast

Informações:

Sinopsis

Speculative Grammarianthe premier scholarly journal featuring research in the neglected field of satirical linguisticsis now available as an arbitrarily irregular audio podcast. Our podcast includes readings of articles from our journal, the occasional musical number or dramatical piece, and our talk show, Language Made Difficult. Language Made Difficult is hosted by the SpecGram LingNerds, and features our signature linguistics quizLies, Damned Lies, and Linguisticsalong with some discussion of recent-ish linguistic news and whatever else amuses us. Outtakes are provided.

Episodios

  • The Joy of Old and Odd Books

    10/06/2011 Duración: 02min

    The Joy of Old and Odd Books; A Letter from the Managing Editor; From Volume CLVIII, Number 2 of Speculative Grammarian, February 2010. — As I was perusing my signed 1355 first edition copy of Jötunn Svartálfar’s Teach Yourself Gothic in Six Score Minutes per Fortnight, I was struck by the stark disparity between my personal and professional collections of books, as compared to the utter disregard for the written word displayed by the general American populace. Old books and odd books, musty treatises and crumbling tomes, flights of fancy and important, eternal ideas fill the bookshelves of my library and inhabit the chambers of my mind. In contrast, the average person—barely deserving of the appellation homo sapiens—cover what shelves they have with worthless gewgaws while their minds echo hollowly with a vapid emptiness. (Read by Trey Jones.)

  • Language Made Difficult, Vol. IV

    20/05/2011 Duración: 33min

    Language Made Difficult, Vol. IV — The SpecGram LingNerds discuss the anatomical oddities of phoneticians, the fact that Big Brother may now be watching your every word, and more Lies, Damned Lies, and Linguistics. We also enjoy Words of Wisdom from Lady Fantod and discuss Twitter Feedback from “fans” of the show. Someone leaves the tape running too long, but power through it for an explosive musical bonus at the end of the episode.

  • Survey of Linguistic Evidence of Meta-Consciousness in Tier-19 Terran Primates

    22/04/2011 Duración: 24min

    Survey of Linguistic Evidence of Meta-Consciousness in Tier-19 Terran Primates; by Cëŏjpruustcrêrt êe Âgriüsturttâiy Fuördrêostsklanöukklėû Růŕskramnnuũrgciwä and Ëø Daerl stiic Uasŝăź swerz Ê; From Volume CLV, Number ζ of Speculative Grammarian, January 2009. — The following message arrived several months ago at the SpecGram main offices as a steganographic message encoded in the gift card attached to a Big Ol’ Bucket O’ Meat gift basket from Big Stu’s World of Taste—which had been the usual method of communication between the SpecGram editorial board and one of our top informants, known only to us by the code name Elbüo. We have good reason to believe Elbüo has regularly worked as a top exolinguistic consultant to one or more three-letter agencies of the United States government. We have not heard from Elbüo since this message was sent. In keeping with Clause 17 of our consulting contract with Elbüo, we must (1) assume he or she is dead, (2) stop payment to the numbered Swiss account, and (3) publish this,

  • Language Made Difficult, Vol. III

    15/04/2011 Duración: 29min

    Language Made Difficult, Vol. III — The SpecGram LingNerds discuss linguistic “thought experiments”, physicists modelling bilingual societies, a letter from a young proto-linguist concerning the word “lukewarm”, and Lies, Damned Lies, and Linguistics.

  • The Other Sino-Tibetan Languages

    10/04/2011 Duración: 03min

    The Other Sino-Tibetan Languages; Book Announcement from Psammeticus Press; From Volume CLII, Number 2 of Speculative Grammarian, March 2007. — This volume fills in the considerable gaps left by Routledge’s slim 2003 volume The Sino-Tibetan Languages. Displaying an uncharacteristic lack of ambition, Thurgood and LaPolla treated, in that otherwise excellent work, less than 40 of the 400+ languages of this important family. Clearly, much work remained to be done, and we at Psammeticus Press have undertaken to do it. The Other Sino-Tibetan Languages describes the remaining 90% of the languages in the family. (Read by Keith Slater.)

  • Doing Fieldwork on Constructed Languages

    10/04/2011 Duración: 06min

    Doing Fieldwork on Constructed Languages; by Curtis U. Lehder; From Volume CLIX, Number 1 of Speculative Grammarian, May 2010. — As all linguists know, there are only about 6,000 languages left in the world today, and that number is shrinking rapidly. Constructed (or created or invented or planned) languages, on the other hand, number more than 128 trillion, according to conservative estimates, and more and more flower into existence each and every day. Though up to now, formal linguists (or, at least, respectable formal linguists) have largely ignored the works of language creators, it seems inevitable that at some point in time during the late 21st or early 22nd century, there will remain only one natural language (Lithuanian), while constructed languages will number, quite literally, in the decillions. (Read by David J. Peterson.)

  • Language Made Difficult, Vol. II

    20/03/2011 Duración: 28min

    Language Made Difficult, Vol. II — The SpecGram LingNerds discuss mammal individuality and population size, architectural linguistics, a letter from a young proto-linguist concerning Urban Dictionary; and Lies, Damned Lies, and Linguistics.

  • Language Made Difficult, Vol. I

    10/03/2011 Duración: 34min

    Language Made Difficult, Vol. I — The SpecGram LingNerds discuss the Sapir Worf Hypothesis; “New” vs “Nyoo”; and a letter from a young proto-linguist concerning IBM’s Watson on Jeopardy. Plus Lies, Damned Lies, and Linguistics.

  • Nursery Rhymes From Linguistics Land

    20/02/2011 Duración: 03min

    Nursery Rhymes From Linguistics Land; by Yune O. Hūū, II; From Collateral Descendant of Lingua Pranca, October 2009. — Continuing in the great tradition of Stepfather Goose, the following nursery rhymes are presented to ensure their preservation for future generations of young linguists. (Read by Peter iVox, Trey Jones, Rachel iVox, Ryan iVox, Heather iVox, Klaus iVox, Lucy iVox, and Graham iVox.)

  • An Iñupik Linguistic Fragment (or, the Last Grammarian)

    20/02/2011 Duración: 07min

    An Iñupik Linguistic Fragment (or, the Last Grammarian); by Metalleus; From Lingua Pranca, June 1978. — The following fragment was found in a shoe box at Indiana University. It was translated by Metalleus with the help of a Phi Beta Kappa key. The author is unknown. (Read by Trey Jones.)

  • Regular Isomorphisms of Categorization in the Apathetic Informant

    10/02/2011 Duración: 08min

    Regular Isomorphisms of Categorization in the Apathetic Informant; by Angus Æ. Balderdash, Esq.; From Volume CXLIX, Number 3, of Speculative Grammarian, July 2004. — Unfortunately, it is often the case that when working with data sets containing particularly uncommon kinds of data, the number of qualified consultants available to provide native-speaker interpretations of the data is quite low. In such cases, it is often necessary to work with consultants who have one or more sub-optimal characteristics: poor work ethic, lack of attention to detail, weak fashion sense, surly attitude, inclination toward insubordination, poor personal hygiene, difficulty following instructions—the list is all but endless. (Read by Peter iVox.)

  • They Don’t Have a Word for It

    10/02/2011 Duración: 01min

    They Don’t Have a Word for It; Book Announcement from Psammeticus Press; From Volume CLVII, Number 4 of Speculative Grammarian, December 2009. — With the inexplicable success of pseudo-lexicons such as Howard Rheingold’s 2000 “They Have a Word for It: A Lighthearted Lexicon of Untranslatable Words and Phrases”, C. J. Moore’s 2004 “In Other Words: A Language Lover’s Guide to the Most Intriguing Words Around the World”, and Adam Jacot de Boinod’s 2005 “The Meaning of Tingo: And Other Extraordinary Words from Around the World”, a native speaker of English could get the sinking feeling that English lacks the basic expressiveness needed to convey the most basic human needs and desires. (Read by Trey Jones.)

  • The Oxford Comma: A Solution

    20/01/2011 Duración: 01min

    The Oxford Comma: A Solution; by Eliza Doolittle; From Volume CL, Number 2, of Speculative Grammarian, April 2005. — The Oxford Comma has once again raised its nasty little head in linguistic circles, thanks largely to the efforts of one Ms Truss and her book, Eats, Shoots and Leaves. It is time once and for all to put this little beast to rest. (No, not Ms Truss, you moron—the Oxford Comma). (Read by Rachel iVox.)

  • Twenty Special Forms of Rhetoric

    20/01/2011 Duración: 05min

    Twenty Special Forms of Rhetoric; by Dawn B. Seely; From Volume CXLVII, Number 3, of Speculative Grammarian, March 1993. — Rhetoric has been a topic of academic interest for, approximately, forever. Below are detailed a number of special types of rhetorical argument, some of which, for example, Proof by Impressiveness, have been observed since the time of Aristotle and before. Others, for example, Proof by Intimidation, have been clearly recognized only within the last century. Some of these, for example, Proof by Loudness, have never been explicitly delineated before. The uses of rhetoric are manifold and many explications of such have been made before, which this paper will not repeat. (Read by Peter iVox, Trey Jones, and Joey Whitford.)

  • Ready! Fire! Aim!—A New Approach to Military Combat Using Language Science

    10/01/2011 Duración: 06min

    Ready! Fire! Aim!—A New Approach to Military Combat Using Language Science; by François Achille Bazaine; From Volume CLVIII, Number 3 of Speculative Grammarian, March 2010. — One of the aims of any branch of scientific inquiry is to improve the lives of men. Surely the Science of Language is no different, and just as surely the lives of soldiers are among those most in need of improvement. The French military has had a long and varied history, with its share of both victory and defeat. There is as much if not more to be learned from failure as from success, if only one will take the time to understand. After much reading of the writings of my countryman Jean-François Champollion, I have taken it upon myself to apply the principles of Language Science to the goal of the betterment of the French military. (Read by Trey Jones.)

  • An Introduction to Linguistics in Haiku Form

    10/01/2011 Duración: 39s

    An Introduction to Linguistics in Haiku Form; by Anonymous; From Volume CLIX, Number 4 of Speculative Grammarian, September 2010. — linguistic theory / hidden representations / to surface structures (Read by Peter iVox.)

  • Towards a Perfect Definition of the Term “Sign”

    20/12/2010 Duración: 03min

    Towards a Perfect Definition of the Term “Sign”; by Louis Capet; From Volume I, Number 3 of Better Words and Morphemes, The Journal of the Linguistic Society of South-Central New Caledonia, May 1991. — Saussure defined the sign as the union of the signifier and the signified. Steinmetz emphasized the importance of the interactional element. Burma-Shave proposed that a sign could only be understood in the context of adjacent signs. Modern linguistics has elaborated the concept of the sign system. (Read by David J. Peterson.)

  • French Sues English

    10/12/2010 Duración: 03min

    French Sues English; by SpecGram Wire Services; From Volume CLIX, Number 2 of Speculative Grammarian, June 2010. — The Académie Française filed a lawsuit today at the European Court of Language Slights in Brussels against the English language, claiming 650 million euros in compensation. The suit against the English language describes “the intentional misappropriation of core elements of French and imitation of its distinctive sound.” The Académie seeks damages and an injunction that, if granted, would prevent English from being spoken until the case has been resolved. (Read by Stephany Dunstan.)

  • The Linguistics Wars

    15/11/2010 Duración: 10min

    The Linguistics Wars; by Dæriam Landec, Ph.D., l’École de SpecGram, Istanbul; From Volume CLI, Number 1 of Speculative Grammarian, January 2006. — As is widely known—though not exhaustively covered in the linguistic, academic, or mainstream press—an unfortunate series of events that have become widely known as “The Linguistics Wars” unfolded in Montana in the spring of 2005. Over the course of a few days, several devastating attacks were launched between the Montana Morphemic Militia (or M³)—a group that has been variously described as a linguistic-oriented paramilitary organization and a military-oriented paralinguistic organization—and the Montana field office of the First Earth Battalion (or F.E.B.)—a formerly secret but still active unit of the U.S. Army established in the late 1970s to exploit paranormal and other alternative forms of military intervention. (Read by Trey Jones, Joey Whitford, Bill Spruiell, David J. Peterson, Kristin Franco, Colleen Barry, and Brendan “Schnookywookums” O’Toole.)

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