I'm doing a google search of writers' forums and this one was close to the top of the results, so I decided to drop in. This looks like a comprehensive, yet friendly place, so I thought I'd sign up and stay a while. A bit about me. I am a published writer. I've had quite a few articles published and one non-fiction book that went through 6 editions over a period of about 11 years. It's been out of print for a while now, but from what I understand, my publisher has recently released an ebook version of it, so I guess that now it will actually never go out of print. I have a BA and MA in Linguistics and have received quite a bit of favorable feedback on my Master's Thesis, including recommendations that I make a book out of it. This is something I'd like to do some day, but I have other priorities at this time. My passion is fiction, however. I'm currently working on a novel. I'm about 17 chapters into it -- about 60,000 words so far -- and I've become somewhat stalled out in the dreaded middle. Recently, however, I've realized that I'm going to have to introduce two major changes to the book, which will require an extensive rewrite. Maybe that will unstick me. I know this place welcomes submissions. In my case, about all I'd be prepared to submit would be portions of my novel, which is (hopefully) a future copyrighted work, so I'm wondering how that is dealt with here -- issues of copyright, that is. I suppose I could also submit portions of my Master's Thesis. If you folks like academic-style writing, that is, which I don't particularly. Well, that's about it. I'm gonna go browse the forums. See y'all on the boards.
Hi Carly. Yeah, probably not the best choice of words, but you got what I meant. Thanks for the explanation.
Welcome to the forum! Here's our New Member Quick Start to get you started. It should answer most of your questions, I hope. What is your area of interest in linguistics? It's definitely a fascinating field. I just completed a linguistics course myself; our final "exam" was to create a language of our own. From our FAQ: We also don't "proofread" school work. If your thesis has been accepted and graded already, you can post it, but we can't offer feedback to it otherwise. Makes sense, right? But I assume since you mention you already have a degree, you should be fine. Anyway, I hope you'll stick around! -Kat
Hello Kat. Well, that was a rather ambitious final exam your professor gave you. So, tell me, did you invent a grammar, word order, any sort of inflections and or cases, or did you just create a new vocabulary? Oh, I graduated with my Masters in 2002, so it's long since been graded. It was, in fact, the professors who did the grading who recommended that I think about turning it into a book. My area of interest in Linguistics grew out of a fascination for human evolution. I took an upper divisional class in Darwanism and the Modern Synthesis, and as I delved deeper into the subject of evolutionary theory, I grew increasingly interested in the topic of the biological origins of language. So, I devoted much of my thesis to this topic, but during my research I became aware of a very interesting trend in the data that, as far as I knew, nobody had tumbled to before -- and apparently the linguistic community still hasn't. So that became the point of my thesis. And I'd rather not discuss it any further until the book finally comes out. Dang it, I really should work on it some more, else someone else will beat me to it and steal my thunder.
