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English Language Experiments

Language X: A Controlled Experiment in Pidgin Creation

David J. Peterson received a BA in English and Linguistics from UC Berkeley in 2003 and an MA in Linguistics from UC San Diego in 2005. He created the Dothraki and Valyrian languages for HBO’s Game of Thrones, the Castithan, Irathient and Indojisnen languages for Syfy’s Defiance, the Sondiv language for the CW’s Star-Crossed, the Lishepus language for Syfy’s Dominion, the Trigedasleng language for the CW’s The 100, and the Shiväisith language for Marvel’s Thor: The Dark World. He’s been creating languages since 2000.

Abstract

In the fall of 2001, David Peterson ran a semester-long project to have participants create a pidgin on the fly. This paper is his final write-up of the project, and includes the full word list of the invented pidgin.

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