Podcast – LangTime Chat: Recent Episodes
Jessie Sams and David J. Peterson
In this episode, we talk about linguistic theory and its place in conlanging. As a spoiler alert, we specifically talk about how theoretical approaches are not so helpful to the art of language invention.
I’ve attached the PDF of slides we use throughout the episode, some of which have visual examples of theoretical approaches to show how language is analyzed in that particular approach.
LangTime Chat – Ep47Download
In this episode, we chat about tackling academic linguistics articles, providing strategies for approaching articles and figuring out if they will be helpful to you or not. This episode is especially dedicated to anyone who has tried picking up linguistics articles but then feels overwhelmed because, well, academic articles are generally kind of notoriously cumbersome to get through. Our goal moving forward is to have episodes dedicated to specific articles that maybe you want to have read but don’t want to read–we will read them for you and tell you what they’re about!
I have attached the PDF of the slides we used (complete with all the original typos…), and I have attached the Haspelmath article we used for a focused discussion on reading strategies.
Happy reading (and happy sending us your reading wish lists)!
LangTime Chat – Episode 46DownloadHaspelmath article in Ep46Download
This is a Jessie-only kind of episode. In it, I walk through my thought processes as I attempt to get ready to translate a passage into Zhwadi. It focuses on how I’m thinking through decisions rather than on the actual creation of roots/words/items. The goal is to demonstrate just how much translation can help when you’re at a stage with your language where you’re ready to expand its features but aren’t sure what direction to go. Translation as an exercise can really push you to better understand your language and the features you most want to incorporate.
Attached is the PDF of the Keynote slides I used while talking through decisions. Also attached is the final translation of the passage(s) with notes throughout. If you want to hear the thought processes before seeing the final decisions, wait to look at that PDF until you’ve listened to the episode!
LangTime Chat – Ep45DownloadLangTime Chat, Episode 45Download
We give a recap of our glorious day of conlang fun, otherwise known as Kopikon. In this episode, we give a rundown of the speakers and their talks from the day, which we hope will be especially useful for anyone who couldn’t attend and wants to know more about what went on that day. We give some behind-the-scenes info throughout, and we let you know why you should go watch each and every talk from the day! (Eventually, those videos will be separated out so you can watch them individually on YouTube instead of scrolling through a full day’s worth of talks in a giant video. We promise we are working on it!)
Attached you’ll find the PDF of the presentation we used while recording the episode.
We hope you enjoy the recap of what was an incredible day!
ltc_kopikon_discussionDownload
David and I discuss common expressions in languages, including greetings and thanks. We hope it inspires you to think about some of these kinds of expressions in your own languages!
(The slides used during the episode are attached here, though they really just provide the words we talk about. You can, however, see just how weird “Thank you” looks in the Noto Serif font!)
LangTime Chat – Ep43Download
In this episode, we wrap up our discussion of some best practices and other advice for Romanizing a conlang. While chatting, we used a Pages document to take some random notes, and a PDF of that document is attached here. (When I say random, though, I mean it. The notes won’t make sense without listening to the episode.)
LangTime Chat Ep42Download
In this episode, we begin a discussion on Romanization, talking about goals for Romanization and differences between an orthography, phonetic transcription, and Romanization. The PDF of the slides we used in the beginning of the episode is attached here.
We didn’t quite make it to the “best practices” portion, so we are extending this discussion into a two-part series that will continue in next month’s episode!
LangTime Chat – Ep41Download
In this episode, we talk about the kinds of information that make a conlang’s written grammar more helpful and accessible to other conlangers who want to learn about your language. (And also that make it better for you to keep track of your own language!) We provide examples from conlangers’ grammars to show strategies you can use in your documentation.
The PDF of the Keynote presentation we use is included as an attachment (where you can see the fonts David was so excited about!).
Happy documenting!
*SPOILER ALERT!***
At the end of the episode is a suggestion for using the Grambank features list as a method for documenting and sharing information in a readily accessible way and for noting areas of your language that you haven’t yet addressed. Click herefor a link to a Google Sheet that includes all the features, links to descriptions of the features on Grambank’s website, dropdown menus for selecting the response best matching your language, and cells for you to provide information about your language.
The first sheet is the full list of features. There is a second sheet (look at the bottom of the screen to find the second sheet) called “Instructions” that provides more information about how the sheet is organized and what you can do with it.
The sheet is view-only, so you’ll need to make a copy (an option under the “File” menu) before you can edit it and use it for your language.
LangTime Chat – Ep40Download
Jessie put together a trivia game for David based on language features provided in Grambank’s database (https://grambank.clld.org/)! You can play along as you listen, and you can also download the attached PDF to see all the features and examples discussed.
LangTime Chat – Ep39Download
We wrap up our discussion of types of borrowings in the history of the English language and end with some book recommendations for anyone interested in learning more!
At one point, we discuss the ampersand, so I’ve attached a fun poster here to show what we mean.
Evolution of the ampersandDownloadLangTime Chat – Ep38Download
In this episode, we finish our four-part focus on tonogenesis in the language sketch we created to explore the introduction of tone. The PDF of the sketch with the information we worked on is included as an attachment to this post so you can see the final products of our sound changes that introduce tone! Also, […]
In this episode, we finally introduce sound changes that incorporate tone into our language sketch! During the episode, we reference an article on tonogenesis by Michaud and Sands, which is attached as a PDF to this post. We hope you enjoy listening!
In episode 14, we began a language sketch that will eventually incorporate tone as a way of addressing tonogenesis in language. We continue that language sketch in this episode, as we add more details to the phonological inventory and sound shifts. While we don’t quite make it to tone (there is always more to add […]
In this episode, we start a new conlang sketch to target Mike K.’s suggestion that we focus on tones in the podcast. Rather than just talking about tone, we are crafting a language with tone in it, taking opportunities to discuss options and reasons for making particular decisions along the way. This will be a […]
On our Patron Discord server, Jasmine suggested an episode focusing on gaming, and we were very happy to spend an hour talking about games! We also managed to talk about language at various points during this episode. 🙂 We hope you enjoy the game-centric discussion!
This episode focuses on how to create fanlangs, or conlangs created for existing fantasy worlds. The episode provides advice for conlanging within an existing framework and things to think about as you work, such as remembering that fanlangs don’t have to be true to every aspect of the canon, especially where the canon has incongruities. […]
In this episode, we talk about teaching and conlanging (otherwise known as conlang pedagogy)! After recording this episode, David let me know that my terminology may not be universally known, specifically my use of “made” in a sentence like “The course made.” For me, that means the minimum number of students enrolled in the course […]
Neither David nor I can believe we have already reached episode 10 of our podcast! That fact will become pretty evident in the opening 15 seconds when we try to remember how long we’ve been recording these episodes. This episode is titled “Jessie’s Conlangs.” In this episode, I introduce five of my conlangs, which are […]
In this month’s podcast, we play a round of “Name that language!” where I read language facts and have David try to guess the language being described. In honor of National Indigenous Peoples Day, all languages discussed are native to North America. SPOILER ALERT! If you want to play along with David, don’t scroll down […]
Welcome to LangTime Chat! In this episode, Jessie creates a language-based game for David to play called LINGsanity (if you’ve ever seen Winsanity, then you’ll know the gist of what David’s in store for). In terms of gameplay, contestants are presented with numerical-based facts and must “stack” those facts in the correct order to win. […]