Speculative Grammarian Podcast

Linguists Don’t Need Prescriptivists; by Dr. D. Schkrbtov; From Volume CLVIII, Number 1, of Speculative Grammarian, January 2010 — I was very disturbed and exceedingly disappointed when I first read Afiresay, Iresaf, and Safopireop’s screed “Linguists Need Prescriptivists (and probably Pig Latin, too)”, for a variety of different reasons. The authors, in discussing language games and their importance to the field of linguistics, only mention the English transformative “games” Pig Latin and Opish. (Really, was that the best they could come up with? Even first-years should know something of Cazarny, or Obby Dobby, or Cockney Rhyming Slang!) (Read by Trey Jones.)

Linguists Need Prescriptivists, and probably Pig Latin, too; by Dr. Illiamway Afiresay, hDPay; Dr. Iamwill Iresaf, DPh; and Dr. Willopiamop Safopireop, PophopDop; From Volume CLVI, Number 1, of Speculative Grammarian, March 2009 — It has been theorized before that many of the perceived constraints on human language (and thus on any universal grammar of human language) are actually more likely to be constraints on the ways that human languages can change as they are transmitted from one generation to the next. On the other hand, language games, such as Pig Latin, Verlan, or Opish, often require transformations that violate the so-called “rules” of Universal Grammar. (Read by Trey Jones.)

Don’t Baby That Baby, Baby; by Butch McBastard; From Volume CLXVIII, Number 2, of Speculative Grammarian, October 2013 — Despite the attempts by those who study the phenomenon to dress it up in jargon (“caretaker speech”), cutesiness (“motherese”), or TLAs (IDS/CDS—“infant-/child-directed speech”), baby talk is still baby talk, and frankly as a linguist I’m insulted that you think I’d fall for that kind of whitewashing of such a despicable practice. That’s right, I said it, baby talk is despicable. (Read by Trey Jones.)

A Psychosis of the “Framework Psychosis” Framework; by Jonathan van der Meer; From Volume CLXVIII, Number 3, of Speculative Grammarian, November 2013 — Framework Psychosis, as expertly reified by Dr. Pill, is a very useful window on the world. It provides an explanatory model of the success of the most successful frameworks, of tribalism in linguistics, and of Chomsky’s successful decades-long trivialization of performance in favor of competence. (Read by Jonathan van der Meer and Trey Jones.)

Linguistic Koans; by Z. En ‘Bud’ Dhist; From Volume CLIII, Number 2, of Speculative Grammarian, November 2007 — What is the sound of one vocal cord flapping? (Read by Trey Jones.)

The Swiss Data Massage Villa; From Volume CLXVIII, Number 1, of Speculative Grammarian, September 2013 — Are your data feeling tense? Unable or Reluctant to bend gently to fit the graceful contours of your new theory? Are your N’s too small? Your P’s too big? Decimal point in the wrong place? Is your Chi not square? Is your bell curve not ringing true? (Performed by Jason Wells-Jensen.)

Where are the Vampire Linguists?; by F. Ang Bangah; From Volume CLVII, Number 2, of Speculative Grammarian, September 2009 — Though many people have had trouble coming to terms with the truth about vampires since they “came out of the coffin” in the so-called Great Revelation—made possible by the creation of the Japanese synthetic blood substitute—their presence represents a unique and untapped opportunity for historians, linguists, and anthropologists. Non-supernaturals have had much opportunity to learn about vampires and others in the biographic works of Charlaine Harris, which have recently been dramatized in the HBO documentary television series True Blood. But one aspect of vampires’ existence has been largely ignored; since vampires are effectively immortal, and several are hundreds of years old—and a few thought to be even thousands of years old—the insight and data they can provide offer an unparalleled chance to pierce the mists of time and peer back into (non-vampire) human history. (Read by Trey J

Dialect Continuum Language Studies; by Psammeticus Institute; From Volume CLIII, Number 2, of Speculative Grammarian, November 2007 — Psammeticus Institute—the Language Education branch of linguistics publishing powerhouse Psammeticus Press—allows you to harness the amazing transformative power of dialect continua in your own personal language learning. By attending a Dialect Continuum Language Studies course, you can slowly but surely transform the language you speak into the language you want to speak. (Read by Trey Jones.)

The Symptoms and Warning Signs of Framework Psychosis; by Dr. Pill, M.D.; From Volume CLV, Number 2, of Speculative Grammarian, November 2008 — Framework Psychosis, a new and dangerous affliction sweeping through academia like wildfire, is the unhealthy (and unfounded) belief that one’s framework, whatever it may be, is the one true framework. As a public service, I have written up a set of guidelines that will allow concerned individuals to identify those suffering from Framework Psychosis. If you are an academic, I encourage you to post this list in your lounges, labs, lecture halls, and latrines. With your help, we may yet be able to eradicate FP in our lifetime. (Read by Tuuli Mustasydän.)

Degenerative Grammar—Our Current State of Linguistic Degradation; by D. T. R. O’Rait, D. Bauch, and Wayne N. DeKay; From Volume CLXVI, Number 4, of Speculative Grammarian, March 2013 — Since the 1950s, linguistics has been wild with excitement over Chomsky’s insights, collectively known as “generative grammar.” As all non-linguists know, however, grammar as speakers encounter it in daily life is actually degenerative. (Read by Peter Carrillo.)

On Linguistic Death Cults; by The Managing Editor; From Volume CLXII, Number 4, of Speculative Grammarian, September 2011 — For those not familiar with the casting of pods in which some of the editors of SpecGram engage, I feel obligated to comment on a story we recently discussed, in which it was reported that the last two speakers of Ayapaneco refuse to talk to each other (“Language at risk of dying out—the last two speakers aren’t talking” by Jo Tuckman, The Guardian, April 14, 2011). This is clearly a linguistic suicide pact. (Read by Trey Jones.)

The No. 1 Linguists’ Detective Agency; by Keith W. Slater; From Volume CLXIV, Number 1, of Speculative Grammarian, February 2012 — M̥ma Makutsi had just poured the tea. Red bush tea for M̥ma Ramotswe, and ordinary tea for M̥ma Makutsi, who preferred ordinary tea and had told M̥ma Ramotswe so, though not until after a long period of uneasiness and indecision. That had been in the early days of the Agency, before M̥ma Makutsi had become an Assistant Detective and had become engaged to the morphologist Phuti Redupliphuti, indeed even before M̥ma Ramotswe, who founded the Agency, had become the wife of Mr. N.L.P. Matekoni, the finest computational linguist in all of Gabarone, in all of Botswana, perhaps even in all of Africa. Botswana had been little different then, of course, but the lives of so many linguists had changed in those few short years. Lives were always changing, M̥ma Ramotswe reflected, and one could never predict beforehand in what way they would change. (Read by Keith Slater.)

University Sues Self for Plagiarism; by SpecGram Wire Services; From Volume CLXVII, Number 4, of Speculative Grammarian, August 2013 — The University of Texas at Austin has filed suit against itself for theft of intellectual property. A countersuit, also by the University against itself, demands recompense for emotional damages. The University expects a net windfall of at least $12 million from these lawsuits. (Read by Trey Jones.)

Compound Nouns for Frances; by Keith Slater and Kean Kaufmann; From Volume CLXVII, Number 4, of Speculative Grammarian, August 2013 — Frances and her baby sister Gloria were playing dodge ball in their front yard when Albert came along. Albert was pulling a toy wagon with a large picnic hamper in it. (Read by Keith Slater.)

Speculative Grammarian—Our Story; by Trey Jones; From the Speculative Grammarian “About Us” web page — The august journal Speculative Grammarian has a long, rich, and varied history, weaving an intricate and subtle tapestry from disparate strands of linguistics, philology, history, politics, science, technology, botany, pharmacokinetics, computer science, the mathematics of humor, basket weaving, archery, glass blowing, roller coaster design, and bowling, among numerous other, less obvious fields. (Read by Trey Jones.)

The Patented SpecGram 5 Minute Interview: Arika Okrent — My guest today is Arika Okrent, linguist, author of In the Land of Invented Languages, fan of conlangs and, I think, conlangers, speaker of Klingon and Hungarian, signer of ASL, and contributor to Mental Floss and Slate’s Lexicon Valley, where she writes about conlangs, ASL, old fonts, and even makes a decent case for the use of “I could care less”.

The Patented SpecGram 5 Minute Interview: Philip Resnik — My guest today is Philip Resnik, a professor at the University of Maryland, with joint appointments in the Department of Linguistics and at the Institute for Advanced Computer Studies. Phillip is the director of the University of Maryland Computational Linguistics and Information Processing Laboratory, and a researcher and consultant with extensive experience in natural language processing and text analytics, specializing in combining knowledge based and corpus based statistical techniques. He is also a Strategic Technology Advisor to 3M Health Information Systems and the Founder of React Labs.

Language Made Difficult, Vol. XXXIV — The SpecGram LingNerds are joined by once again by returning guest Devan Steiner. After some Lies, Damned Lies, and Linguistics, the LingNerds discuss whether or not all the forms of "to be" in Indo-European languages are derived from Arabic roots (hint: they're not!), and take on Comprehensive Exam Questions in computational linguistics, pidgins, phonology, and more.

Language Made Difficult, Vol. XXXIII — The SpecGram LingNerds are joined by returning guest Devan Steiner. After some Lies, Damned Lies, and Linguistics, the LingNerds discuss how physicists rediscovered glottochronology and have used it to date the Iliad less accurately than philologists already had, and in the spirit of such cross-disciplinary enterprise, they offer a helping linguistic hand to other fields, like math, biology, astronomy, and chemistry.

Language Made Difficult, Vol. XXXII — The SpecGram LingNerds go it alone again in this episode. After some Lies, Damned Lies, and Linguistics, the LingNerds discuss their prescriptive confessions, whether science is generally screwed, and whether linguistics is a science and thus also screwed.