Re: Speculative linguistics(*)

Zeborah <zeborah@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

(*) In which "linguistics" can be read as any scientific field which
hasn't traditionally been the focus of science fiction.

(snip)
So how does one speculate on linguistics, without those tropes to rely
on? Should I be looking at how early sf writers speculated on physics
back before they had the tropes that are now second nature to us?

I don't think so.

I could be wrong, but my hunch is that it is more that "people" (i.e.
not just sf readers) are exposed to popular science articles: in the
press, on TV etc. So there is already a background of ill-understood
terms and concepts.

The sort of people who are exposed, but don't even notice, aren't the
people who read SF. The sort of people who read SF (I conjecture) will
absorb *some* popular science.

My guess is that stories which clarify the unclear, and explain the
ill-understood (if they do it well), get plus points for some/many
readers.

ISTM that what you lack is popular linguistics articles in your local
down market (or even up market) newspaper, on the news etc.

Consider the state of popular linguistics: how many words do eskimos
[substitute PC word as necessary] have for snow? Wrong answer: about 40,
right answer: maybe fewer than there are in English ...

But (according to a comedy quiz show I was watching earlie this week)
they have rather a lot more demonstrative pronouns, including one
meaning "that one which we can't see".

Reading those early works now, they so often seem clunky and
infodumpish; was that necessary to introduce readers to then-new
speculative physics?

No, it was because clunky and infodumpish was fashionable.

Or is it possible to introduce readers to
speculative linguistics while retaining a modern (incluing-based?)
style?

Yes.

And is it possible to include throwaway speculative linguistics in a
story,

Yes.

or does the whole story need to be about linguistics

No.

in order to
support the reader into the new tropes?

But it has to be *interesting* speculative linguistics. That depends on
(a) the reader, (b) the speculation and (c) the writing.

You only have control over (b) and (c).

And one difficulty with introducing speculation about a *new* subject,
is that you are not explaining the ill-understood until after you first
introduce new concepts. So it's harder. But more rewarding (for the
reader) if you succeed.

Jonathan

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