Episode 429: Lindsay Ellis!

July 18, 2020

Episode 429: Lindsay Ellis!

Episode 429 of The Drunken Odyssey, your favorite podcast about creative writing and literature is available on Apple podcasts, stitcher, spotify, or click here to stream (right click to download, if that’s your thing).

Ellis.2.credit Emily VanDerWerff — Photo by Emily VanDerWerf.

In this week’s show, I talk to novelist and video essayist Lindsay Ellis about science fiction; the structure of novels; exploring character interiority; alien invasion narratives; Chomskyian linguistics; the joys of making academic arguments about pop culture outside the academy; Transformers; and author platforms.

TEXT DISCUSSED

NOTES

This episode is sponsored by the excellent people at Scribophile.

TDO Listeners can get 20% of a premium subscription to Scribophile. After using the above link to register for a basic account, go here while still logged in to upgrade the account with the discount.

Check out Lindsay Ellis’s youtube channel!

Or these vids.

The music for today’s show is by Modal Plane, used by permission. Check out more of his music over at Circuit Church.

Modal Plane

Check out my literary adventure novel, Guy Psycho and the Ziggurat of Shame.

Craft of Fiction Writing, Episode, Film, Science Fiction

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thedrunkenodyssey

6 responses to “Episode 429: Lindsay Ellis!”

D J Rout

July 18, 2020 at 7:39 am

What was the name of that language that’s ‘a grenade in linguistics’? The audio dropped out for half a second 😦

Reply
1. thedrunkenodyssey
  
  July 18, 2020 at 10:15 am
  
  I don’t remember the phrase, DJ, but the outlier language that seems to contradict the Chomskian model was not mentioned by name, to the best of my memory. My analogy was the platypus of languages. But your recall on the facts of this show have been demonstrated in the past to exceed my own.
  
  Reply
  1. D J Rout
    
    July 18, 2020 at 8:19 pm
    
    Ah, it did sound like ‘platypus’, but I wasn’t sure and I couldn’t work out what you meant by a platypus analogy. From the Southern hemisphere, venomous and lays eggs – much like me? No. But Ms Ellis has supplied the answer below, so I will now look that up.
Lindsay Ellis

July 18, 2020 at 2:22 pm

Pirahã is the name of the language

Reply
1. thedrunkenodyssey
  
  July 18, 2020 at 2:33 pm
  
  Thank you for the clarification. 🙂
  
  Reply
2. D J Rout
  
  July 18, 2020 at 8:23 pm
  
  Yes, thank you. I can now look that up.
  John was right, too, you don’t hear Chomsky mentioned in linguistic conversations nowadays. He’s the modern Einstein – great (transformative?) work in his field, with an opinion on everything.
  
  Reply

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