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koolkat9 · 2 years

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English Tea

Author’s Note: I swore I posted this fic back in March when I first wrote it, but I can’t seem to find it in my archive. I wanted to reshare it since the newest chapters of the manga reminded me of this fic, but I’ll guess I’ll have to post/repost it all together. Oh well.

Rating: T

Pairing: GerEng

Word Count: 1393

It was actually a sunny day for once. Not that England hated the rain (he loved such weather), but considering his plans, today involved being outside, the nice weather was welcomed. He had spent most of the morning baking. Scones, Fairy cakes, sponge cakes. You name it, he was baking it. He even made his own icing for certain desserts. He may have been unable to cook, but he sure as hell could bake.

After finishing most of the sweets and having a small breakfast of tea and toast, England went out into the garden, watering and tending to the many plants. Usually, such tasks brought him joy, but on this particular day, he couldn't stop his hands from shaking or his mind from racing about everything else that needed prepping. He carefully ran his fingers over the red petals of his prized roses, taking in their soft texture. As he looked over the plant, his mind wandered to a familiar, flustered face with his bright blue eyes and stern frown. The thought of seeing that face that coming afternoon made his heart swell with both excitement and nervousness.

Normally, England wouldn't be going to this extent for tea time. Even if he was having friends or family over, a cup of tea in the kitchen of his cottage on the outskirts of London was all he needed. But having Germany over was different, it was special. Sure the two were not super close, but since the 1960s which let them get to know each other, England had found himself with a small crush on the German. Okay...maybe it wasn't a small crush. His eyes always seem to wander to Germany at every meeting, they started going out drinking together, and even when Germany was nowhere near, he was constantly thinking of him. He hoped this afternoon tea could be the start of something new, so he had to make sure everything was perfect with just the right amount of romance thrown in.

---

"England? Where are you?" an accented voice called from inside the house.

England, who was arranging the silverware and cups for the hundredth time, was pulled out of his concentration. "I'm out back," He shouted back, pulling away from the table having just finished setting it.

"Guten Tag," Germany greeted, a small smile spread on his face. That smile made England melt every time he saw it. It suited him so well and made his eyes shine even brighter.

"Ahem...yes...good day. Please have a seat."

After their greetings and the pouring of the tea, things became quiet. The only sounds that could be heard were the clinking of cups and the chirping of birds. Though he tried to be discreet, England kept stealing glances at his companion. He watched as Germany sipped his tea and looked around the garden. He quickly averted his gaze as Germany's eyes landed on him. "Your garden is beautiful."

"Thank you." If England's cheeks weren't pink from almost getting caught, they were certainly bright red now from the compliment. Unfortunately, this sparked no conversation and they returned to silence and England returned to his glances. He noticed Germany kept looking over to the array of baked goods laid out, though he never made a move to take one. "Would you like one? Feel free to take whatever you like."

"I-I'm fine."

"Oh please, I won't be able to eat all this myself and I would hate for them to go to waste." He picked up one of the fairy cakes and handed it over to Germany. "Don't worry, I followed the recipe exactly."

Hesitantly, Germany took the treat and took a small bite. The way his eyes lit up made England's heart flutter. "This is amazing," he exclaimed, then went back to eating.

England couldn't help but beam. "I-I'm glad you like it."

As Germany finished, England noticed that some frosting got smeared on the corner of his mouth. "You got some frosting on your face." He gestured to the spot, but no matter how many times he pointed to the corner of his mouth, Germany couldn't seem to find it. so, taking a napkin, he reached over and wiped off the frosting himself. As he leaned back he saw Germany's whole face go red, leading to his own blushing face. Trying to move past the little "moment", England picked up one of his scones (unburnt for once) and took a bite, refusing to look at the man across from him.

By the time they finished their tea and cakes, England's embarrassment had mostly subsided and his confidence was slowly coming back. "So...I was thinking..." he began, "perhaps we could play a bit of croquet before you have to go."

"Uh...w-w-well...I...I don't. I can't say I-I played before."

"I'll teach you."

Soon, the hoops were set up and England was handing Germany a mallet. England began to explain the rules and stance as he got into position to show Germany. "Now you try," England offered, "remember, just bend the knees slightly." He guided the German's hands into position and fixed his elbows until it was in almost perfect position. "You should be good now. Just hit the ball and we'll aim for just getting it through the hoop until you get the hang of it."

Despite having the proper stance, Germany seemed unable to put the needed force behind it. England could tell he was getting frustrated by the knitting of his brows and the tightness of his jaw. Taking a place behind him, England placed his hands over Germany's, pulled the mallet back, and shot the ball through the hoop. "There we go," he mumbled, tickling Germany's neck in the process. As the two parted, their faces and necks were bright red. "I-I-I think that's enough for the day. Ahem...Care for a stroll?" Germany could only give a nod as a response.

The walk started off quiet as neither dared to speak after the little "moment" they had just had. Every so often, their hands would brush sending England's heart into his throat.

"I know I've already said this, but your garden is so beautiful. It's as if it came from a fairytale."

England let out a strained laugh. "Th-thanks. I tried."

"You're very talented. You can bake, garden, sing, draw. I'm a little jealous."

"Oh please. You're hard-working, well organized. And if you think I'm good at baking, you are 10 times better. And not only that you are han-" before he finished his statement, he realized what he was about to say and slapped his hand over his mouth. He prayed that Germany hadn't noticed, but luck and God were not on his side.

"England are you okay?" Germany asked, his voice laced with concern.

"I-I-I-I'm f-fine. I just...haven't been complimented so much...and it's even more meaningful coming from you." When he looked back up at Germany, the man's face was completely red. "D-Don't take it the wrong way. You're just...just a really admirable person a-a-and-"

"I-I get it. Forgive me."

"It's fine."

At this point, they had stopped in front of a willow tree that stood in the center of the garden. Another moment of silence and avoiding looking at each other. "C-Can I try something?" they eventually said, though at the same time. England let out a genuine laugh at the situation, making Germany's heart leap out of his chest.

"You go first," England offered with a soft smile.

"O-Okay." He reached out a shaky hand and took hold of England's. "Y-You can tell me to stop."

First England's eyes go wide in shock, but it is quickly replaced by another chuckle. Germany was about to pull his hand away, but the Englishman grasped both hands in his before he could pull away. "I'm sorry for worrying you. But I was wanting to do something similar. I'm relieved, elated honestly, but I wasn't expecting it." He pulled Germany closer, debating whether he should go ahead and kiss him, but he was interrupted by the chiming of the church bells. He pulled away slightly, but refused to let go of Germany's hands. "W-Well...it's about time for dinner."

"I'll take you out. Since you did so much for this afternoon...a-a-and..."

"Say no more love." So the two headed back into the house to get ready for dinner (and their first date).

#hetalia #hws #gereng #engger #geruk #hws england #hws germany #fluff #confessions #fanfiction #hetalia fanfiction

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sweetlittlevampire · 4 years

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Rima’s Wangxian Fic Rec

So I’ve compiled these specifically for @inessencedevided , but hey, we’re all here to spread the love, so please, share and reshare to your heart’s content! :D

I’ll start with “Personal Favourites” - there are many more that I would consider a Personal Favourite, but I’ve picked those specifically because I thought you’d enjoy them. AU fics will also be included, because there are some real gems out there, and some still take place in canon universe, but with a twist, so...yeah.

Main pairing is Wangxian; I somehow don’t tend to read much else. ^^;

This thing is going to be loooong, so please find everything under the Read More. And feel free to let me know if a link doesn’t work so I can fix it.

Personal Favourites

爱不释手; never let me go by yiqie

Rating: Explicit

Warning: Graphic Depictions Of Violence

Length: 68713 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s summary: “Wei Wuxian has certainly hoped so ardently in his two lifetimes, for so many different things, in so many different ways, that he could have summoned the demon to his front door with his bare hands. His eyes wander to Lan Zhan, settle on the back of his head, the blue-black curtain of his hair. Oh, how he has hoped.”

A case fic! And one of my personal all-time favourites as well! It is so well-crafted, with an engaging and captivating plot, a TON of OCs who actually do contribute to the story, and a few scenes that are so beautiful I could weep. Got hyped up on twitter, and rightfully so. It’s a delight to read.

Rabbit Heart by Suaine

Rating: Mature

Warning: N/A

Length: 56590 words in total

Chapters: 6

Status: Completed

Author’s summary: “ Wei Wuxian walks his lonely road, but he’s not going to leave Lan Wangji entirely alone. That would be boring. “

Another case fic! Set after the show’s ending, Wei Wuxian goes his way, but leaves the paper man behind to keep Lan Wangji company. I loved this one to pieces - it has intriguing subplots and will make your heart melt several times.

Those are actually thonly two case fics I’ve read so far, but for more, be sure to visit @wangxianfics ‘s Case Fic section. It has many more, and I am planning on reading several of them.

the earth remembered me by remux

Rating: Teen and Up Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 30321 words so far

Chapters: 2 out of scheduled 4

Status: Ongoing

Author’s Summary: “All around him, summer throbs like a heartbeat, undeniably alive. Wounds begin to heal. And Wei Wuxian, with sweat on his brow, feels ripe. Wei Wuxian, with his hands deep in the soil and mud between his toes, remembers something simple and primitive and utterly transformative: It feels good to make things grow. OR: Wei Wuxian’s travel guide to finding your place in the world.”

This fic changed me. Like, literally. It’s still ongoing, but I don’t even care. It’s not a case fic, but I’m 100% sure you’ll love it. It’s pure poetry and catharsis, and it hurts so much, but it’s so necessary. I think I cried several times while reading each of the chapters, and I’m eagerly but patiently awaiting the next one. It follows Wei Wuxian’s journey after he leaves the Cloud Recesses in episode 50 and tells the story of what he does and experiences before he returns back to Lan Wangji. So it’s absically only Wei Wuxian, Lil’ Apple, and the people they meet along his way.

Begotten by ecorie

Rating: General Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 37279 words

Chapters: 6

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “He’s mine.” He echoed what had once been teasingly said in jest, and added, “This is my son.” Against all odds and without a choice, Lan Zhan brings A-Yuan back to Cloud Recesses. Xichen keeps his brother’s secrets, and shields the child when Lan Zhan could not.“

Also known as: Filling in the blanks with everything that happened in those 13 years. I loved this one. Wangji = Best Dad, Sizhui = Best Son.

Canon Universe

(not necessarily canon compliant though)

the soft animal by cafecliche

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 5046 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “You don’t think that’s strange?” he says. His voice, his new voice, is familiar now. But sometimes it almost startles him, hearing it come from his mouth. “It’s been nine months. I’ve used them almost every day. I should know how long these legs are.” (Or: Wei Wuxian has a plan to train Mo Xuanyu’s body. The results aren’t quite what he expects.)“

A very interesting take on Wei Wuxian, and how he comes to terms with his new body. Something I had not seen previously explored, and I really loved how the author handled it.

Come let me love you (Come love me again) by obsessivereader

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 9105 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “The notes from the dizi cut off as Wei Ying goes absolutely still. Over the quiet whisper of the wind through grass, Lan Wangji can hear the rapid beat of his own heart. Wei Ying's hands drop to his side slowly, so slowly, as though time has slowed down for both of them. He turns, a look almost of fear on his face. And then...And then, Wei Ying smiles—slow and beautiful and warm and relieved as though Lan Wangji standing before him is a treasured dream fulfilled. "Lan Zhan," he breathes.“

A “What happens after the end of the last episode?”-fic. I’m kind of a sucker for those. This one is very sweet and tender; I absolutely loved the interactions between Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian, and the gentleness of it all. I also adore the song it’s been titled after (”Annie’s Song” by John Denver, if you’re curious).

Death of a Ghost by Gotcocomilk

Rating: Explicit

Warning: N/A

Length: 107397 words in total

Chapters: 30

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “There was a ghost that haunted the decks of Lotus Pier, it was said. If you stepped across the wooden planks at night, walked along the endless docks and flying purple banners, he would appear. He was always in darkest black, dressed as specter and shadow. In the emptiness where a face should be was a thick fog, features washed away and leaving behind only glimmering red eyes. He looked ferocious as a ghoul, it was said. Jin Ling thought he looked sad.“

Full disclosure - I am five chapters into this thing, and I am already recommending it, I am that intrigued. There is some serious Yunmeng Bros stuff in there which I think you are going to love, and the interactions between said ghost and Jin Ling are - aaaah! Cannot wait to continue!

wrap your name tight around my ribs by sasukepositive

Rating: General Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 8728 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “ In true Wei Ying fashion, his return comes with a dose of mischief. “

Another “What happens after the end of the last episode?”-fic, with a good dose of Wangxian family feels. In fact. the whole thing is a huge chunk of feels. A very soft, delicate, and sweet fic, which will leave you feeling warm and fuzzy.

please linger by sasukepositive

Rating: General Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 5636 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “ When A-Yuan begins crying, Lan Wangji knows it makes sense. He understands that crying will not harm him — he logically knows that. However, A-Yuan’s little face turns red so quickly that it leaves Lan Wangji a little panicked.“Ah,” he begins helplessly, stepping forward in an attempt at — something. He doesn’t know what. “It’s okay.” or: sometimes the man you love assures you that his mysteriously acquired child will nap until he gets back from shopping. for sure. “

If you liked the Dad Date Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian had with A-Yuan in Yiling, then you’ll love this one. It’s a fill-the-gaps fic in which Lan Wangji returns to Yiling several times to see Wei Wuxian and A-Yuan. Still follows canon events though, hence the bittersweet ending, but it is still so so lovely.

I hope that you will come and meet me by feyburner

Rating: Mature

Warning: N/A

Length: 28385 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “ The second time Lan Zhan said Wei Ying, come back, Wei Wuxian did. “

Another one of tehse post-show-canon fics. I love everything feyburner writes, and this was the first fic of theirs I came across. I love the feeloings described in it, and just how sweet it is. One of those fics in which the way the mature part is executed just makes the whole thing even sweeter.

Alternate Universe

(but sometimes within the canon universe?)

Merman Lan Wangji!AU by FleetofShippyShips ( @fleetofshippyships here on tumblr)

- which is a series of connected fics, and not one long fic with chapters, hence why the formatting is different here. 5 entries so far; ungoing. Teen And Up Audiences

...which is definetely a personal favourite of mine, - you might have noticed, since I’ve been drawing a ton for this particular AU. But since I don’t know if yu’re into merfolk!AUs I didn’t list it up there with the personal favourites.

It is following canon so far, only that Lan Wangji is, as the title suggests, a merman - with secrets.

I adore the atmosphere of this series so much, and the way Zoe writes it is just so beautiful. It’s a story in which I could live, and if you’re in for the ride, I can assure you that there will be many surprises to come.

Welcome to Gusu by perkynurples ( @bilboo here on tumblr)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 30853 words so far

Chapters: 5 so far

Status: Ongoing

Author’s Summary: “ Deep in the lush forests of Gusu hides an aging resort that hosts dozens of children every summer for an unforgettable couple of weeks. It’s where Lan Wangji grew up alongside Wei Wuxian, and when his childhood friend (for the lack of a better term) surprisingly returns years later in the position of Senior Counsellor, seemingly hell bent on causing the same kind of mischief that got him kicked out of Gusu in the first place, but also taller, broader and tanner than ever before, Lan Wangji knows he’s In Trouble. Or, this fic has it all: longing looks over campfires, found family dynamics, ill-timed skinny dipping, teenagers inappropriately shipping their counsellors, LAKE MONSTERS “

Annie wasn’t lying when she said this fic has it all. What started as some kind of crack fic turned into something beautiful that completely owns my heart. The interactions between the characters are so heartwarming, and while I sense that some major drama is going to occur soon, I also know that this will eventually have a happy ending. It’s delightful, and it does belong to my personal favourites as well.

Some of You by tangerinechar

Rating: Mature

Warning: N/A

Length: 60640 words

Chapters: 7

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “Lan Wangji gets drunk and tweets a love confession, Wei Wuxian panics, and all of twitter decides to matchmake Lan Wangji and his mystery guy. “

A social media fic! And a hilarious one at that! If you’re in the mood for an extra panicky, extra obnoxious Wei Wuxian? This is the fic for you. It has one of the sweetest love confessions ever. There’s some background Xicheng too.

Window Shopping by thunderwear

Rating: Explicit

Warning: N/A

Length: 18000 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “Lan Wangji didn't look out across the other apartment building often, but now, as he scooped up his escaped rabbit, he looked over only to see a piece of paper taped to the window of the apartment across from him. It was written on purple construction paper in big block letters, like a child had written it. WHAT'S YOUR BUNNY'S NAME???“

I did already rec this one to you, but WHO CARES? A Quarantine fic! The first one I came across, and I loved it! A friend of mine thought Wei Wuxian was OOC, but I disagree - he didn’t exactly grow up in the same circumstances as in canon, and his life situation isn’t 100% the same, so I still think it fits. A-Yuan makes an appearance, and the interactions between Lan Wangji, Wei Wuxian, and the boy are just so very cute!

Home is Where the Heart is by Alipeeps ( @alipeeps here on tumblr)

Rating: General Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 10036 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “Wei Ying’s expression is tight and unhappy, his entire body held rigidly away from Lan Zhan.He doesn’t look at Lan Zhan as he says, “You don’t have to worry, Lan Zhan, I’m never going to touch you.”The distaste in Wei Ying’s voice makes Lan Zhan’s blood run cold.“Just because our families have arranged this marriage, we don’t have to be together… like that…” Wei Ying’s mouth twists unpleasantly. “It can be a marriage in name only. A...” he swallows, looking like he might be sick, “...a business arrangement.”

Arranged Marriage AUs are also one of my weaknesses, especially if the two soon-to-be-married people are actually in love with each other but have yet to confess, This one does the trick. It’s modern era with no cultivation, and the mutual pining is REAL in this one.

what else is there? by mme_anxious

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 12917 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “Did you hear the terrible news? Yiling Laozu Wei Wuxian has gone beyond the pale! He has murdered Hanguang-Jun!”This is the first thing the swan hears flying over Yiling, and it sets him to hissing. It’s the kind of sound he would never make as a human, but as a swan—a mute swan— hissing is the only form of communication available to Lan Wangji. So he hisses. -Jin Guangyao transforms Lan Wangji into a swan. Only an act of love will break the curse.”

A fairytale!AU based on Swan Lake. You might have seen my Swangji drawing; this is the fic it was drawn for. It takes place in canon universe and is super lovely and magical. I may have cried a bit.

all your life you’ll dream of this by Attila ( @attilarrific here on tumblr)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warning: N/A

Length: 22668 words

Chapters: 1

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: “Lan Wangji should refuse. He should. He looks back down at the mask. Beneath it is the soft creamy paper of the invitation. He could present this at the door and slip into the palace and—“Go see him, Wangji,” Lan Xichen says quietly, and Lan Wangji feels his resolve crumble beneath him”

Another fairytale!AU - this time, it’s loosely based on Cinderella, with Lan Wangji as Cinderella and the forehead ribbon as glass slipper. Such a lovely lovely fic. May also have cried a bit; it’s heartfelt and magical and so warm and sweet.

Love wakes me by dea_liberty

Rating: Explicit

Warning: N/A

Length: 42812 words in total

Chapters: 4

Status: Completed

Author’s Summary: "It starts with a bet. All mistakes, Wei Wuxian thinks, start with a bet. It’s starts with a bet and ends with Wei Wuxian losing everything. Nine years ago, Wei Wuxian made a bet with disastrous consequences. Now, he is part-owner of the popular and eclectic Yiling Cafe, years and miles away from his old life, making the best of things and trying to leave the past where it belongs. When Lan Wangji walks into his cafe by accident, Wei Wuxian finds himself doing what he thought he'd never do again; reclaiming some small part of his past, and hoping for a future he'd given up as lost.”

If someone had told me that I would fall head over heels in love with a Coffee Shop AU, of all things? I would have laughed...yet here we are. I’ve read this thing in one sitting and cannot stop thinking about it. I absolutely have to reread it; it’s slowly but surely becoming one of my personal favourites.

#Wangxian #Fic Red #The Untamed #MDZS #CQL

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lingthusiasm · 4 years

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Transcript Episode 37: Smell words, both real and invented

This is a transcript for Lingthusiasm Episode 37: Smell words, both real and invented. It’s been lightly edited for readability. Listen to the episode here or wherever you get your podcasts. Links to studies mentioned and further reading can be found on the Episode 37 show notes page.

[Music]

Gretchen: Welcome to Lingthusiasm, a podcast that’s enthusiastic about linguistics! I’m Gretchen McCulloch.

Lauren: I’m Lauren Gawne. Today, we’re getting enthusiastic about language and smell. But first, we’re heading into our November anniversary!

Gretchen: Yay! Three whole years of Lingthusiasm. In celebration of that we are – as we have done for all our anniversaries – we are trying to help more people than ever find the linguistics enthusiasm that we know and love. Most people still find podcasts through word of mouth. This year, we’ve thought of something to help talk about it.

Lauren: We want to help people find Lingthusiasm by sharing with them what makes linguistics so great. We’re asking you to share a thing that you’ve learnt from Lingthusiasm over the first three years of episodes.

Gretchen: If there’s a fun fact, or a story, or an anecdote that you find yourself retelling or mentioning to people, that would be a great thing to post on social media or to tell someone about, “Hey, there’s this podcast that’s cool! Here’s something I learned from it.” It’s also really helpful to us because, Lauren, you and I have been doing linguistics for quite a while and we sometimes forget which things aren’t new to us but are actually new and exciting to other people. Help us remember which things are new and exciting for you to learn about!

Lauren: If you can’t think of one in particular, because there’re so many great things that you’ve learnt on the show, stay tuned to our social media. We’ll be retweeting and sharing other people’s facts so you can get some ling-spiration.

Gretchen: You can also reshare anybody else’s facts that you would like to co-sign. We’ve noticed that some of our biggest growths in listenerships have been from other people pointing out interesting things that they’ve learned recently. We thought we’d try to do that more formally for the anniversary. Share something interesting you’ve learned, something you find yourself retelling to other people, and other people will realise this is where they can get more stuff like that.

Lauren: I love every anniversary we come back and encourage people to share their lingthusiasm, because every year we have been growing. We have been reaching new ears. Maybe you are new ears since our last anniversary. Maybe you have been with us since Episode 1. We’re always excited to encourage new people to discover that linguistics is fun and interesting and relevant to their everyday life.

Gretchen: We also have another new Patreon bonus episode. This one is about surnames. Listen to this and support the show on Patreon. You can also share your stories about where your surname comes from and any linguistically interesting things that happened to you because of your surname.

Lauren: We talk about the origins of “McCulloch” and “Gawne” in that episode. We also have over 30 bonus episodes for you to listen to. That’s almost half the number of shows. If you’ve listened to the whole main episode back catalogue, there’s almost as many episodes again waiting for you over at the Patreon.

Gretchen: There’s your solution for “Oh, no! I’ve listened to all the Lingthusiasm episodes. What do I do now?” The answer is – go listen on Patreon. There’re lots of things for you still to listen to. Thank you if you’ve been supporting us on Patreon already.

Lauren: You help us keep the show ad-free and ticking along. We also have exciting new Lingthusiasm merch for you.

Gretchen: By popular demand, you can now get lingthusiastic socks!

Lauren: I’m very excited about the socks.

Gretchen: All three of our prints – the International Phonetic Alphabet, the tree structure diagrams, and the esoteric Unicode symbols – are now also available on socks, in addition to the scarves, and ties, and mugs that they were previously available on.

Lauren: We have multiple patterns. We have multiple colours. You can buy them along with all of our existing merchandise. We also have greeting cards that say “thanks” and “congrats” in IPA as well as some other greetings.

Gretchen: If there’re any linguists that you need to thank or congratulate as the year winds to a close, that is something you can now do. Plus, and get this – I’m really excited about this – we have water bottles that have the glottal symbols from the IPA on them. They are glottal bottles. I’m so pleased.

Lauren: You can get your nice glottal bottles for your water. Or it’s even more satisfying if you’re the kind of the person who says “water” with a glottal stop in the middle of “water.”

Gretchen: Or “bottle” with a glottal stop there too. They have the glottal stop, the glottal fricative, and the voiced glottal fricative. People won’t know that’s what they are until you tell them. I’m so pleased!

Lauren: Finally, we have new T-shirts and mugs that say, “Linguistic correctness is just a lie by big grammar to sell you more grammars.”

Gretchen: To check out the full set of Lingthusiasm merch, which there’s quite a lot of at this point, go to lingthusiasm.com/merch. It makes a great gift for the linguist or linguistics enthusiast in your life.

[Music]

Lauren: Gretchen, what is your favourite smell?

Gretchen: Ooh, there are so many good smells. I really like the smell of rose. I also really like the smell of almond. It depends on whether you’re talking about to wear or to eat. I also really like spicy scents.

Lauren: Almonds as in fresh almonds or almond blossoms?

Gretchen: No, almond extract that you bake with.

Lauren: Okay.

Gretchen: Yeah.

Lauren: Like marzipan.

Gretchen: Well, yeah. Or like amaretto, or vanilla extract but almond. It’s so good. I could eat/smell that forever. What’s your favourite smell?

Lauren: This one always slightly startles people in the northern hemisphere, but I love the smell of freshly cut grass because it reminds me of Christmas, which I think says a lot about how frequently my family ever got around to mowing the lawn.

Gretchen: I mean, I agree. The smell of freshly cut grass is really good. I didn’t think of that one. There’s also the smell of the earth when it rains. But it doesn’t really remind me of Christmas. The smell of new-fallen snow reminds me of Christmas – also a great smell.

Lauren: Hmm, not a smell that I know or identify as readily.

Gretchen: Oh, it’s a very distinct smell. The smell of crisping leaves in the fall – also very good smell.

Lauren: We have not as many of them, but we have a particular kind of lemon gum tree in Australia that always smells really amazing on campus just before the academic year starts in February/March. Whenever I smell that smell, I get really excited because it means classes are gonna start soon, we’re gonna have students back on campus, and it reminds me of undergrad days and starting university. For me, smells are often really linked – I mean, clearly, if two of my smells are really linked to particular times and places for me.

Gretchen: Yeah. I was just kind of looking around my house thinking, “What smells good around here?” Then, when you start getting the time and place, I’m like, “Oh, yeah. That leaf smell in the fall is also very back to school for me,” or the distinct smell of each season, like the spring smell, when everything is melting – also a nice smell.

Lauren: It says a lot about English that we have to be like “the smell of spring” or “the smell of freshly mown grass” or “freshly fallen snow.” We kind of just don’t have the best vocabulary for talking about smells – other than referring to the thing that they relate to.

Gretchen: Yeah, and I’m thinking of this because when you asked me, “What’s your favourite smell?” I was like “Oh!” I have a ready answer to what’s my favourite colour, but I don’t have a ready answer to what’s my favourite smell because it’s not something that we think about in terms of the abstract smell-ness of it. I’m not like, “Oh, my favourite colour is the colour of pomegranates” or something because I can actually just name that colour.

Lauren: It would be funny, though, if you’re like, “My favourite colour is the red of strawberries and not the red of cherries.”

Gretchen: Exactly! Or, “The orange-y red of a sunset, but not a neon light, but like the sunset.” We do that for smell. That’s how we talk about smell.

Lauren: There’s a long literature on the way that we talk about smell and that smell is maybe not as complicated as the other senses. But in a lot of ways, that’s a very culturally driven thing. In fact, as we’ll talk about in this episode, there are other cultures where scent is a lot more a part of the language and it makes it a lot easier to talk about it.

Gretchen: Is this an English thing, or a European languages thing, or what’s the...?

Lauren: It seems to be one of those weird European things where, if we actually look at a wider diversity of the world’s languages, things are a lot more interesting. When I say “we,” I mean a group of linguists, and particularly Asifa Majid, who works on the relationship between language and smell.

Gretchen: We’re gonna be citing Asifa Majid a lot in this episode. Go follow her on Twitter.

Lauren: All of her work is really great. I mean, there were some broad studies around smell, so we know that experts tend to be better than novices at smelling smells.

Gretchen: How does one become a smell expert? Is this a thing I can do?

Lauren: If you are a perfumer, or if you work with wine. Although, apparently, if you work in a particular industry, you might be very good at smelling wine, but it doesn’t make your ability to smell flowers necessarily any better.

Gretchen: Oh, really? This is very domain-specific smell expertise – “smexpertise"?

Lauren: “Smellspertise.”

Gretchen: “Smellspertise.”

Lauren: Yeah.

Gretchen: I would sign up for this job. Like, “Oh, I get to drink a lot of wine and smell it. I get to eat a lot of chocolate and smell it.”

Lauren: I think it’s one of those jobs that’s great in theory and then when you’ve smelled 500 chocolates...

Gretchen: That’s true. It’s probably like video game tester, where you’re like, “Actually, this is not as fun as what I signed up for.”

Lauren: I think being a linguist is as fun as I signed up for, so maybe there’s some people who are super enthusiastic about smelling chocolate.

Gretchen: I’ll stay being a linguist and just eat chocolate in my spare time. Experts are better than novices, and pollution can affect the way we perceive smells.

Lauren: Yeah. Maybe part of why you’re not as sensitive to smell as – if you’re in an olfactorily noisy environment. However, there was a study that looked at perfumers who work in perfume shops – you know how you walk into a perfume store or a cosmetics store and it’s like –

Gretchen: This wall of perfume smell.

Lauren: Yeah. That doesn’t seem to affect people in that workplace. They can kind of deal with that.

Gretchen: Oh, so it becomes the kind of white noise of smell in their background, and then they can distinguish between perfume smell still.

Lauren: Yeah. Which makes you realise just how clever human brains are.

Gretchen: That’s good! Because if I make cookies or something, first, my apartment just smells like cookies, but then afterwards, if I leave and come back, I’m like, “Oh, it still smells like cookies here.” But if I stay in there, I stop noticing it.

Lauren: Then, of course, there are another group of people who are relatively good compared to the population at discerning smells and they are people who have odour- colour synaesthesia.

Gretchen: Ooh! I have other synaesthesias but not odour-colour.

Lauren: Yeah, we’ve talked about synaesthesia a bit in other episodes. At its most basic it’s where your brain takes in one sensory bit of information but also processes it as though it’s another bit of sensory information. There are people who, when they smell things, register it as a particular colour.

Gretchen: Right. I guess this kind of makes sense to me because I have grapheme-colour synaesthesia, so when I see particular letters or numbers, I also see colours associated with them. I can see how one could have smells associated with colours, but I think for me it would just be like, “I’m picturing the thing that it smells like,” and that’s probably not actually what the synaesthesia is involved.

Lauren: They studied people who have this synaesthesia compared to regular old sniffers like me and found that they were more consistent and accurate at naming odours.

Gretchen: Interesting! Okay. Cool. Let’s talk about some of these languages that actually do have more odour terms than English does.

Lauren: Yeah. Obviously, synaesthesia is something that affects people randomly in the population. Then, there are these cultures in which there are far more words and terms for talking about smell. That seems to have implications as well for how smell is used in these languages.

Gretchen: Right. One of these languages is Tepehua. Specifically, Huehuetla Tepehua, which I hope I’m pronouncing right but I’m not completely sure. This is a language spoken in the state Hidalgo in the eastern Sierra Madre in the central Gulf Coast region of Mexico – named after the town where it’s spoken. It’s related to some other languages that are spoken around there. This is a really interesting paper with Asifa Majid and some people who work on this language in particular. They did an elicitation study on particular scents. They found 23 specific groups of scent words in this language. They catalogued them according to what types of things they correspond to. They’re often smells you can kinda recognise but that in English we don’t have specific names for those specific smells.

Lauren: Awesome. Can we hear some of these smell groups?

Gretchen: Yeah. It’s a really interesting list because some of them are really delightful and some of them are really bad, and there’s really not much in between. Group Number 1, which is /ʔuli/ or /k’uli/ or /sk’uli/ – there’re all various different versions of that sound – which is a delicious smell like flowers, or perfume, or floral, citrus. It isn’t just specifically a floral scent. It has this sort of positive connotation and this sort of rich, beautiful odour. But in contrast, there’s another smell group, which is Number 6, which is a different kind of delicious odour, and this is /kan/ or /kani/ or /kanini/. This is the delicious and beautiful odour which might smell like clove, or might be kind of fruity, or might be describing the delicious odour of a free-range chicken that eats corn instead of chicken feed.

Lauren: Right.

Gretchen: I think this one may be a little bit more food-like.

Lauren: Bit more savoury.

Gretchen: Yeah! They’re both really good. There’s another one, /k’us/, which is also a beautiful odour, but a slightly different beautiful odour. Again, English just doesn’t have the vocabulary for this. In contrast, there’s this Group 10, which is /ɬkih/, or /sʔeh/, or /ʃʔeh/, which is a delicious savoury odour like when shrimp or mushrooms are boiling, the smell of coffee or recently wet earth, incense, food, honey or sugar cooking, frying meat, beans, but sometimes also used for an unpleasant smell like skunk, human farts, burning plastic, or burning garbage. This one is a little bit more controversial.

Lauren: Hmm, wow. That one definitely covers a gamut.

Gretchen: Yeah.

Lauren: Asifa also did some work with researchers who work on Cha’palaa, which is a language of Ecuador in the Barbacoan family. Similarly, they found these smell terms that kind of have a meaning that we know immediately as a group – and some similar ones. There’s one for things that are sweet-smelling or perfume, which is “pindyu,” and then “andyu” is for fragrant and good food – and like another positive term. The one that really caught me is the smell “chijdyu,” which is the smell of burning hair.

Gretchen: Oh, wow. That was what this /ʃʔeh/ smell can also be burning plastic or burning hair, burning feathers, burning bones.

Lauren: It’s one of those smells that as soon as you smell it you just know if you’ve ever accidentally put your hair too close to a hair dryer or near a fire. We don’t have a good word for it. We have the word “the smell of burning hair.” It’s not that we can’t smell it and we can’t describe it. It’s just that we literally use the word “hair” and “burning” to describe it. Whereas, these words don’t necessarily directly relate to those words.

Gretchen: It’s like the difference between saying “the colour of strawberries” and “red.” You can still talk about the colour of strawberries but you don’t have a specific cover term that covers strawberries, and tomatoes, and apples, and fire engines, and these kinds of things.

Lauren: The really nifty thing about this is that they not only recorded the specific smell vocabulary items – there’s about 14 so far recorded for Cha’palaa – but they also turn up more frequently in narratives than descriptions of smells in English in similar narratives.

Gretchen: Oh, that’s really neat. I also really enjoyed how sometimes they draw connections between smells that I wouldn’t have thought of as related. Then, when you say that, I’m like, “Oh, yeah. These are related.” This kind of aromatic smell or also painful smell, which is /ɬkak/ or /ɬkakak/ in Tepehua, is a spicy or strong smell like peppermint, eucalyptus, lime – like calcium hydroxide, not like a lime citrus. One of the descriptions is it’s so spicy or strong that it’ll make you sneeze. It’s kind of grouping together something that I wouldn’t necessarily have immediately grouped together. This is something else that I really enjoyed about this Tepehua paper is that they also describe the methodology for how they went about getting this list of smells. Because, of course, “Can you translate these English words?” is not necessarily a good way of doing smells in particular because English doesn’t have the word to translate necessarily. Instead, they used these tools called “Sniffin’ Sticks.” There’s no G there. It’s “Sniffin’ Sticks.”

Lauren: The apostrophe there is very important.

Gretchen: Of course, when I looked it up on the website, like, “What are Sniffin’ Sticks?”

Lauren: I mean, we got really excited. We were like, “Should we have practiced this methodology ourselves? Should we get some of these and smell them?”

Gretchen: Yeah! Sniffin’ Sticks, apparently, are these little plastic tubes that look kind of like a marker, and you think maybe of those scented markers that maybe you had when you were a kid. Did you have those?

Lauren: We had those. But this is like those but more science.

Gretchen: Those but science, because they don’t smell like artificial cherry. They smell like real smells – high quality smells – and not always pleasant smells because you don’t just want a whole bunch of fake fruits. You want a bigger range.

Lauren: They also smell really consistently across all of the sticks and they have the same intensity of smell.

Gretchen: Yeah. Because I was thinking, well, maybe instead of buying the Sniffin’ Sticks for €200 from this website, maybe I could just make my own.

Lauren: This is where the plan came to a quick end.

Gretchen: It was like, “Maybe we should get some Sniffin’ Sticks, Lauren.” And then it was €200. Later, “Maybe we’re not gonna get Sniffin’ Sticks.” They have very specific flavours. Instead of buying some essential oils and dabbing them on a bit of cloth or something, these are all very controlled. They’re for things sometimes that don’t necessarily have an essential oil associated with them. Some of the flavours include – would you like a list of flavours?

Lauren: Sure.

Gretchen: Okay. Orange.

Lauren: Yum.

Gretchen: Leather.

Lauren: Hmm.

Gretchen: Cinnamon.

Lauren: Hmm.

Gretchen: Peppermint.

Lauren: Mm-hmm.

Gretchen: Banana.

Lauren: Hmm.

Gretchen: Lemon.

Lauren: Yeah.

Gretchen: Liquorice.

Lauren: Okay.

Gretchen: Turpentine.

Lauren: Ooh... Actually, no. My mom used to do oil painting, so I’m very weirdly nostalgic about turpentine.

Gretchen: Okay. Garlic.

Lauren: Mm-hmm.

Gretchen: Coffee.

Lauren: Lovely.

Gretchen: Apple.

Lauren: Great.

Gretchen: Clove, pineapple, rose, fish.

Lauren: Gahhh.

Gretchen: This is the lunchroom smell. Flower in general. Like, I don’t know what the difference is between that and these specific flowers but, okay. Pear, like the fruit.

Lauren: Yeah.

Gretchen: Cola. I guess like Coca-Cola or something? Lilac, /lɑɪlɑk/ – how do people say this word? I’ve been corrected on this word before.

Lauren: I say /lɑɪlæk/.

Gretchen: I say /lɑɪlɑk/. It’s okay. Grapefruit, grass – there’s our freshly cut grass smell – raspberry, honey, ginger, coconut, lavender, melon, peach, mushrooms, smoked meat.

Lauren: Mmm.

Gretchen: There’s your savoury smells. Chocolate, onion, menthol, soy sauce, sesame oil, caramel –

Lauren: Yum.

Gretchen: – and eucalyptus.

Lauren: What an emotional rollercoaster.

Gretchen: Yeah. It’s a really interesting list. They’re fairly pleasant smells. Some of the smells that I was seeing in the list of smells from different languages were things like the odour of sweat, or fermentation, or disgusting odour like rotting meat. They don’t seem to be forcing people in the lab to smell skunk or rotting meat, which I think is very nice of them.

Lauren: Very kind.

Gretchen: There are some more savoury smells like smoked meat, and leather, and sesame oil, and stuff like that.

Lauren: Obviously, the Sniffin’ Sticks have a lot of advantages in terms of the consistency, and they’re portable and can be shared very easily. Apparently, they last for at least a year, according to the manufacturer.

Gretchen: So, it’s more efficient than just getting a slice of lemon and putting it in a jar.

Lauren: Well, you say that, but there’s another smell research paper that I read – and I have a summary of it on my blog from a few years ago, I’ll link to it – but they were looking at whether people had an association between particular odours and colours, even if they weren’t people who had synaesthesia. To do this, they looked at English speakers and they looked at speakers of Jahai, which is a language on the Malaysian peninsula that does have a really rich smell lexicon, to do this study, because they were looking at things like coffee and banana and coconut that both groups might recognise, but they were also looking at smells that only each group might recognise. They had peanut butter for the English speakers and galangal, which is a really nice aromatic that would be familiar to the Jahai speakers but not the English speakers. They put them in plastic bottles with little spray things on top, like you use for cleaning, and would just kind of spray the air from the bottle at people.

Gretchen: Waft some smell. I mean, okay. I guess this works if you don’t have €200 to buy some Sniffin’ Sticks, you can get a lemon and put it in an empty spray bottle and spritz it.

Lauren: They did this to look at whether people associated particular colours with smells. When they recognised it, they would if it was – like for the smell of coffee, they would think of brown and for the smell of banana, they would think of yellow. Again, kind of showing that our ability to think about smells is tied to the objects that we’re smelling more than the smells independently. Whereas, Jahai speakers were much better at identifying smells. They use smell a lot. They’re hunter- gatherers. It’s much more part of their daily life skill set.

Gretchen: Have a very rich smell vocabulary.

Lauren: Yep.

Gretchen: I noticed on the Sniffin’ Sticks website, which again I can’t quite get over, but they actually have a smell training kit.

Lauren: Oh, excellent!

Gretchen: Which contains four vials smelling like lemon, rose, eucalyptus, and clove. I don’t know why they picked those particular ones. I just wanna read you this description because it’s really good. “The different sticks contain odorants from everyday life, which can enlarge your sense of smell. Will be delivered in a box with cotton hand gloves. The idea that our sense of smell can be improved via training might at first seem strange, but the more you think about it the more it makes sense. Going to the gym and lifting weights can improve muscle mass and tone and practicing the guitar regularly will hopefully improve proficiency, so will spending time sniffing odours. Estimated results starting after six to nine months.” Of regularly sniffing these plastic vials.

Lauren: What? I mean, in that time you could just learn to speak Jahai.

Gretchen: You know, that one’s only €49. I’m tempted, but I think maybe I’ll pass. If anyone has given yourself a course in smell training, please let us know how it goes. You can enrol in a wine tasting course for a similar amount of price, I feel like. Lauren, you’re the one that suggested that we do an episode about smell. How did you get into smell?

Lauren: I mean, I’m always been a fan of our sniffers’ work – I think is probably the very first reason that I get really excited about language and smell. I got an opportunity to apply all the feelings that I have about scent in language when I wrote a constructed language for P. M. Freestone’s Shadowscent fantasy series, which has been so much fun.

Gretchen: So, there’s a book that has a conlang in it, and you made the conlang?

Lauren: Correct.

Gretchen: Like, a smell conlang.

Lauren: Shadowscent is set in a world that has a lot more focus on scent. P. M. Freestone is one of those people that has, I think, a very acute sense of smell. I think because smell has been so central for her life, a lot of this story is set around scent. Even when the story is not set around it, the writing is so beautifully evocative of smell in a way that a lot of English language writing isn’t.

Gretchen: She came calling and said, “Hey, can you help me with the language aspects of this book”?

Lauren: Yes. I got involved early enough that I also got to make sure that all the characters and the place names were internally consistent with the language.

Gretchen: Oh, yeah!

Lauren: Once you start doing linguistics, it can sometimes be – I refer to this as the “Khaleesi” problem. When George R.R. Martin wrote Game of Thrones, the word “Khaleesi” – it’s spelt K-H-A-L-E-E-S-I. But the problem is, English speakers say E-E and I the same way. If you actually listen to Dothraki, the language from Game of Thrones, it’s pronounced /xəlɛɪsi/. But no English speaker pronounces it that way.

Gretchen: Right. English speakers who give their kids the name “Khaleesi,” they don’t call them /xəlɛɪsi/.

Lauren: Yeah.

Gretchen: You end up having to kind of reverse engineer a weird system for the language if you have somebody get involved for the conlang too late. Whereas, if you do it really early, then you can make sure that all the character names are internally consistent.

Lauren: Yeah. David J. Peterson talks about the challenges of – and the complexity of – working with a series that was already multiple books in. I’ll link to some of that. I had the luxury of coming in early and creating the language so that it fit the place names and the people names that also could be involved in creating the full language as well.

Gretchen: I’ve read this book because it’s available in the UK now. Even though it isn’t out in North America, you were able to send me a copy because it’s coming out this month – next month?

Lauren: In November.

Gretchen: Because it’s coming out in November. I read it and I was expecting – because you were talking about the language, like, “Oh, every other page is gonna have full paragraphs of this language! I’m gonna have to do a lot of decoding in order to do this," which I was excited about, but also a bit nervous about.

Lauren: I feel like I would say I’m sorry to disappoint you, but actually, the book is such a great romp that we didn’t need to be held down with linguistic puzzles on every other page.

Gretchen: I mean, I enjoyed the story a lot. Clearly, there’s gotta be a lot of work that you put in behind the scenes that you don’t actually get to see in the pages of the book.

Lauren: The glacier is always a good metaphor for this kind of work where there’s an incredibly large amount of figuring out the mechanics of the language that happen behind the scenes. We have a dictionary. I have the basics of the grammar. Then, you have this tiny bit at the top that you actually see come through in the book.

Gretchen: Can you tell us – because I think I speak for everybody here that your average Lingthusiasm listener is also gonna be more interested in the language aspects than the average reader might be – can you tell us more about what’s actually in this language that doesn’t necessarily appear in the pages?

Lauren: Sure. There’s a couple of translational tidbits in Volume 1 of Shadowscent. But I was interested in creating a language that was really true to the world that it was spoken in. Knowing about this work with Cha’palaa and Jahai, and these languages that have much more of a focus on scent than English does, I wanted to do justice to it. There are two schools of thought when you create a language. There’s the people who try and strive for natural languages that make as much sense within what we know about what human languages do. Then, there are people who make artificial languages that deliberately go against what we know human languages can do. For a lot of what I did with the language of Aramteskan, which is the language in the books, is a lot of it fits with what we know about human languages. It has a set of sounds that you would expect to see in a possible human language. It has a lot of grammatical features that are very exciting because I want it to be a bit more playful and create a language that doesn’t really exist when we look at what happens with smell in the world’s languages.

Gretchen: Oh, that’s so interesting! The sounds are pretty vanilla, to use a scent metaphor, but the words for smell – like when we talked about these other languages that have these rich inventories of words for smell – it’s got a lot of these. It also does some stuff that natural languages, as far as we know, don’t do?

Lauren: Yes. One thing is I just made sure that there were lots of verbs for “to smell.” Because in English was have – you can “smell,” you can “sniff,” but there’s not a really rich vocabulary.

Gretchen: You can “olfact.”

Lauren: “To olfact.” I created a whole bunch of different verbs. There’s only one verb for “to move.” You don’t “run.” You don’t “walk.” You don’t “stroll.” You just move. That’s not very exciting. But I have verbs for “to smell something slowly for a long time,” “to smell something by wafting it,” “to accidentally smell something and then discover that it’s disgusting and it’s too late,” which I feel like is a feeling we’ve all had before, “to smell something that you can remember but you can’t immediately place.”

Gretchen: Ooh! Like the tip of tongue phenomenon, but the tip of the nose phenomenon.

Lauren: Yeah. “To smell something with great enthusiasm.”

Gretchen: This is delightful.

Lauren: I’m always expanding. If there is any form of “to smell,” I can create a word for it.

Gretchen: Hmm, okay. I’ll have to put my thinking cap on.

Lauren: If you have any particular forms of smelling, I’m always – it’s one of those areas of vocabulary that I’m just adding to all the time.

Gretchen: What about “to smell something and you’re not sure if it’s disgusting or not”? You’re like, “Maybe that’s a good smell. Maybe that’s a bad smell.” You’re just kind of smelling it experimentally.

Lauren: Hmm, yeah. You know what? I’m gonna add that.

Gretchen: Because I was thinking about this from our list when we were looking through the things from other languages and some of the words really kind of bordered on “is this disgusting or not?”

Lauren: It’s one of those things where some people find the smell of durian or other really pungent fruit really pleasant and other people don’t. Some people have this moment of like, “Ugh! I don’t know!” That’s a really great one. I’m gonna add that to the language.

Gretchen: Excellent. I feel so proud I had a contribution.

Lauren: Then, one of the other things that I did is we talked a lot about how all of our words for smells are like, “It smells like burned hair,” or “It smells like an orange.” As many of the vocabulary items as I could in the language are “the smell.” The basic vocabulary item is “the smell of oranges.” Then, you have to change that word to come up with “the thing that smells like oranges.”

Gretchen: Oh, wow! Okay. That’s really interesting. If you wanna talk about actual oranges, you have to say, “the thing that smells like oranges.”

Lauren: Yes. Flipping the whole thing on its head.

Gretchen: That’s great! It’s like how some languages, their adjectives have the shapes of verbs. Whereas, in other languages their adjectives are a little more like nouns or something. This is like everything is scent-derived as much as possible. Do you want to talk about the scent evidential? In a previous episode, we talked about how languages have different strategies for introducing sources of knowledge. You can say, “I witnessed this myself,” “I heard it second-hand,” “I deduced it from the available evidence.” This seems like a really good place to introduce some sort of smell thing, right?

Lauren: You will be unsurprised to know, given that evidentiality is something I have worked on for a long time and thought about for a long time, I couldn’t resist putting grammatical evidentiality into this language.

Gretchen: For smell.

Lauren: But Aramteskan has an evidential system that does not exist, that we know of, in any human language.

Gretchen: Yes! Thank you for not disappointing me.

Lauren: A lot of human languages will have like, “I know because I sense this using any of my senses,” or “I know this because I saw it,” and then they might have another form that is used for all the other senses. In Aramteskan, we have “I know this because I smelt it,” or “I know this because I used one of my other senses, which aren’t as important or interesting.” This divide is definitely not – I mean, I don’t think there’s any language we’ve come across so far that has a specific grammatical evidential just for smell, let alone one that has one for smell and prioritises it over all the other senses.

Gretchen: This is delightful. Even though this is not actually in the pages of the book, you can kind of feel this additional attention to sense and smell kind of permeating the manuscript – or wafting from it.

Lauren: Yes. As well as the lovely wafting scent of printed books, if you buy the paper version.

Gretchen: That’s true. There is that smell. Maybe there’s a language that has a better word for that. Maybe they could print it with those smell marker Sniffin’ Sticks and then you could scratch and sniff the entire book. Have you thought about suggesting this to P. M. Freestone?

Lauren: Ah, it would be so amazing.

Gretchen: It would be really expensive, I’m sure. Pay €200, get this scratch-and-sniff version of Shadowscent. This is not available. I’m making this up. But maybe this is something you could get.

Lauren: It would be so lovely. Even if you have to DIY the smell environment, Shadowscent: The Darkest Bloom, as it’s known in the UK, is out there now. Shadowscent, as it’s known in the US, is out November 5. It has a lovely hardback and a map in it in the US edition. That’s gonna be super fancy. Book 2 will be out in 2020, I believe.

Gretchen: Cool. I’m looking forward to Book 2. Yeah, maybe I’ll just have to kind of DIY my own scent experience for the book.

[Music]

Lauren: For more Lingthusiasm, and links to all the things mentioned in this episode, go to lingthusiasm.com. You can listen to us on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, or wherever else you get your podcasts, and you can follow @Lingthusiasm on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Tumblr. You can get IPA scarves, IPA ties, and other Lingthusiasm merch at lingthusiasm.com/merch. I tweet and blog as Superlinguo.

Gretchen: I can be found as @GretchenAMcC on Twitter, my blog is AllThingsLinguistic.com. My book is called Because Internet. It makes a great gift for anybody who might be interested in internet language in your life. To listen to bonus episodes and help keep the show ad-free, go to patreon.com/lingthusiasm or follow the links from our website. Recent bonus topics include surnames, metaphors, and a Q&A with me about Because Internet, if you wanna know behind the scenes how it was to write. Can’t afford to pledge? That’s okay, too. We also really appreciate it if you can recommend Lingthusiasm to anyone who needs a little more linguistics in their life – especially this month, if you want to say something interesting that you enjoy sharing from a Lingthusiasm episode, and then we can share it with other people, and people can discover the podcast that way.

Lauren: Lingthusiasm is created and produced by Gretchen McCulloch and Lauren Gawne. Our audio producer is Claire Gawne, our editorial producer is Sarah Dopierala, and our editorial manager is Emily Gref, our theme music is “Ancient Cities” by The Triangles.

Gretchen: Stay lingthusiastic!

[Music]

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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