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Re: meeting of minds

From:Diana Slattery <glide@...>
Date:Sunday, December 20, 1998, 16:16
Sally Caves wrote:

<snip>
and how does one get in touch with them?  and why would "others" who are =
imagined to think those who indulge are "mental" fear such explorations?

> > Guess this is a hot topic for me! > > diana > > And yet Diana, by your own account, you have begun doing this so recent=
ly! Many of us feel
> the way we do because we've had years of hiding this from peers, profes=
sors, parents. But
> from what I gather about your conlanging and Glide, and correct me if I=
'm wrong, you started
> your amazing language project this summer, and soon after joined the gr=
oup where it is licit to
> admit to doing this. So have you been indulging in conlanging projects=
or world building much
> earlier and haven't told us? ;-) I should really slip you the Lunati=
c Survey.
> > Sally > scaves@frontiernet.net > http://www.frontiernet.net/~teonaht.html
sally, world-building is lifelong. from the 'invisible palymate' i had from the= time i started to talk, through make-believe games and then into verbal = expressions, writing fiction. language-making--only the lifelong sense t= hat i have always been learning others languages, never speaking my own. = together with a sense of a place called 'home' that was just out of reac= h, like an image dropped into a mirror long since shattered. (wrote novel= la on that called 'the lost'--another story). but somehow the world-buil= ding and language- constructing activities seem inextricably linked. and= somehow in this activity that conlangers are involved in lies some deep = insights into the nature and source of language in general, IMHO. regarding academia and responses: before i found y'all, when i came back= this summer, started talking about making a language, visual language, m= odel language, and showing the profs and fellow students what i was up to= , beginning to announce that somewhere in here i was going to find my gra= duate studies interest. i am breaking so many rules, and moving so fast = i guess that i'm running between the bullets which have already started t= o fly. but there are more puzzled looks and interested questions than bu= llets. my three zones of difference (innovation? rule-breaking? perver= sity?) are 1) the subject matter--visual language and conlanging 2) narra= tive thought--that i consider world-building epistemic, that that is how = --per Kristian's description, and the meeting of minds thread--i am gaini= ng/making/sorting out knowledge about the language-making and 3) that i a= m beginning to express, even in this initial gathering, not only in words= but in image and sound and that this is intrinsic to the process. the fun is just beginning. first attack ca= me in the form of 'what's the different between this (the glyphs) and a p= ile of pebbles and bottlecaps?" i guess i have a lifetime of being an oblique line to whatever geometry i= s local. diana