Conlangery 139: Ainu (natlang)

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Christophe Grandsire-Koevoets joins us to talk to us about Ainu, a minority language of northern Japan.

Top of Show Greeting: Bwángxùd by alr2569 (Translation Notes)

Links and Resources:

Conlangery #138: Jessie Sams and Conlangs in the Classroom

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Jessie Sams comes on the show to talk to us about how she uses conlanging in the classroom. We discuss how these courses can be designed, what fields of linguistics they address well, and the results she saw from the course. Jessie also requested the following message be added to the notes:

I would also like to thank David J. Peterson, who has visited with my conlang students the last three times I’ve offered the course. His visits have been incredibly beneficial for both my students and me. Students don’t often have the chance to speak with the author of their textbook, so it’s an amazing experience.

Top of show Greeting: Nál [nɑːl] by Carl Avlund

Links and Resources:

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Conlangery #137: Telicity and Lexical Aspect

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George and William come back to talk about telicity and lexical aspect. Listen to us talk about endpoints in events and puzzle over why achievement and accomplishment are supposed to mean different things.

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Conlangery on hiatus!

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I apologize for being quiet for so long. Many of you will notice that we have not put out a new episode for a couple months. I (George) am currently working furiously on finishing my dissertation. Between data wrangling, writing, looking for jobs, and playing with a toddler I haven’t had much time or opportunity to record and edit a show.

Conlangery will return as a monthly podcast as soon as I am able to get into a place where I can carve out the time to do it. In the meantime, I have suspended our Patreon, as I felt uncomfortable continuing to take monthly payments without making content. If you would still like to support the show during the hiatus (maybe as an appreciation for past episodes), we will accept one-time donations through Ko-fi. Me being in a bit of a transitional period, it would definitely be appreciated.

I thank all our listeners for their patience. I promise that we will be coming back, and I will be sure to make the next episode a good one. In the mean time, I need to put my head down and finish my degree.

Conlangery SHORTS #28: Fuzzy Phonetics

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George gives a short talk about how phonology affects phonetic transcriptions and why the narrow “phonetic” transcription of your language does not have to be overly specific (especially with vowels!). We should have a regular episode again next month.

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Conlangery #136: Nymeran with Colm Doyle

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Colm Doyle comes on to talk about his Nymeran language, created for the comic series Glow, as well as some of the process and challenges of making a conlang and script for comics.

Top of Show Greeting: Vaq’ǫ̀ʔ Nąśą /vàqʼõ̀ʔ nã̀ʃã́/

Glow issue 2 Kickstarter

Conlangery #135: Using Linguistic Theory for Conlanging

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Joey Windsor and Christophe Grandsire-Koevets join George to discuss what tools we can get from more advanced linguistics theoretical frameworks. What tools do they provide the conlanger, and where do you have to be careful about applying them.

Top of Show Greeting: Gidurguyt [ɡɪ-ərdɡuː-jɪt]

LCC Presentations:

  • Doug Ball’s Talk
  • Unfortunately, the video of Joey’s talk is incomprehensible. I also cannot find video for William’s talk. Please forgive the inconvenience.

Academic Sources and Textbooks:

  • Mihalic̆ek, V., & Wilson, C. (2011). Language Files: Materials for an Introduction to Language and Linguistics. Ohio State University Press.

  • Dresher, B. E. (2009). The contrastive hierarchy in phonology (Vol. 121). Cambridge University Press.
  • O’Grady, W., & Archibald, J. (2015). Contemporary linguistic analysis: An introduction. Pearson Canada.
  • Kager, R. (1999). Optimality theory. Cambridge University Press.
  • Gussenhoven, C., & Jacobs, H. (2013). Understanding phonology. Routledge.
  • Trask, R. L. (2004). A dictionary of phonetics and phonology. Routledge.

Conlangery SHORTS #27: #Lexember 2017 Wrap-up

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George discusses last year’s Lexember and some of the things that came out of that. Also, help us correct our transcripts on the Conlang Sources Wiki.

What we reblogged on Tumblr.

The Conlangery Twitter account. (Sorry, twitter search is bad, so I can’t  conveniently direct you just to Lexember retweets.)

ANNOUNCEMENT: Patreon Fee Changes

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Conlangery Statement on Patreon Fee Changes (audio and transcript)

We use Patreon to get a little money to pay some of the site fees and such for Conlangery. Our Patreon has grown some since it started, and I’m grateful to all our Patrons.

However, I need to inform you that the way you pay through Patreon has changed. Patreon has added a thirty-five cent fee on all transactions, which is paid by the patron. Previously, all fees would just be deducted from the pledges, meaning that I’d get less money, but patrons would pay exactly what they signed up for. Now, they are shifting some cost over to patrons.

Thirty-five cents is not a lot, but we have several patrons who pledge only one dollar, and several more pledging five dollars. I really value these small donations. A one dollar option lets more people participate and helps me build a broader base of support. But if someone is only wanting to pledge a dollar, and then they have to spend an extra thirty five cents, that could be enough to discourage them, and I don’t like that.

So, it’s safe to say, I don’t like this change Patreon made. It was done without my input and I have no way to change it. Right now I’m exploring other funding options. I will let people know about those when I make them available. The Patreon will stay open for now, but I do understand if anyone gets this message and decides to cancel, especially people who had small dollar donations.

I would like to ask our listeners what you think. How do you feel about the fee change? Would you prefer a different system? Would you be more or less interested in donating to the podcast if we did things differently? I’m open to suggestions.