Speculative Grammarian

Speculative Grammarian is the premier scholarly journal featuring research in the neglected field of satirical linguistics. Check out The Speculative Grammarian Essential Guide to Linguistics—our book!

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The February 2026 Ultimate Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are very proud and a little melancholy to announce that the extra large ULTIMATE ISSUE of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including a mathmaticolinguistic breakthrough in the dimensionality of English prepositions, an evocative look at the evocative case, a nostalgic collection of punct rock classics, more obstreperous and abstruse musings from Artemus Zebulon Pratt, and an in-depth survey of retirement living options at SpecGram Estates—along with the usual collection of insightful advice, limericks and other poetry, one last letter from a reader, a massive book sale, linguistickish puzzles, other advertisements, and more…

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The November 2025 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are proud to announce that the Penultimate Issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including a case study in how to deal with, let’s say, “overly enthusiastic” linguists in table-top role-playing games, an exhilarating glimpse into the cosmological orthography of the Babelverse, and a formal investigation into SpecGram’s alleged instantiation of negative meaning—along with the usual collection of limericks, minute.DU mystery.PL stories, book announcements, linguistickish puzzles, and more…

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The September 2025 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are proud to announce that the Antepenultimate* Issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including the fascinatingly insightful palæominutes from a palæomeeting of a palæolinguistic palæosociety; some moderately useful advice on how to beat annoying pedants at their own game (rather than with a stick); some extremely out-of-date advice on how to write for your favorite satirical linguistics journal; and a newly discovered Historico-Linguo-Sherlockian tale, taking place in India in 1886—along with the usual collection of letters from our readers, limericks, minute.DU mystery.PL stories, serendipitous fieldwork, linguistickish puzzles, endnotes, and more…

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* This issue is 94.7% likely to be the actual Antepenultimate Issue. The previous issue was identified as such due to an off-by-one error committed by one or more accounting interns. Remedial flogging has been applied.

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The July 2025 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are pleased to announce that the Antepenultimate Issue issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including the slick bars of a fresh track about an up-and-coming rapper’s evening in the club, the revival of previously lost media plumbing the orthographic depths, an extended preview from Panini Press of a spiritual successor to Metaphors We Live By that inverts many of the dimensions of L&J’s foundational metaphorical lens, and a brave recognition that there is such a thing as a stupid question and a practical tool to deal with the unwanted arrival of such—along with the usual collection of insightful advice, breaking news, limericks, minute.DU mystery.PL stories, book announcements, linguistickish puzzles, advertisements, and more…

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The February 2025 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are pleased to announce that another issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including an historic “announcement” “from” the Editor-in-Chief concerning the rather foreshortened future of SpecGram, the first in a collection of minute.DU mystery.PL stories, and an exploration of matrifocal duodecimal narratology—along with the usual collection of letters from our readers, limericks and other poetry, serendipitous fieldwork, book announcements, linguistickish puzzles, announcements, and more…

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The October 2024 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are pleased to announce that another issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including our unprecedented endorsement for president, an informative enumeration of widely-held but unsubstantiated claims, and the revelation of a fairly screwed-up potential new linguistic (non-)universal—along with the usual collection of letters from our readers, breaking news, a Linguimerick Centenary, serendipitous fieldwork, linguistickish puzzles, and more…

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The July 2024 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are pleased to announce that another issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including an exciting announcement of a sesquidecennial refresh of our “Mad Libitum” templated linguistic humor, a compelling argument that PIE is, in fact, the only proto-language, and revealing insights into a linguistics department through the lens of recent meeting minutes—along with the usual collection of letters from our readers, insightful advice, breaking news, limericks, serendipitous fieldwork, book announcements, linguistickish puzzles—surprise! Norman Invasion!—and more…

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The April 2024 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are pleased to announce that another issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many exciting stories, including ways to unlock your linguistic potential, transform your pragmatic paradigm for success, c-command respect, build your vocabulary empire, codeswitch your way to prosperity, and more. Plus!—you won’t believe the shocking language rules you never knew, and you’ve never seen language fails like we have for you!

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The January 2024 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are pleased to announce that another issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including a look into the shallowly cute yet deeply unsavory nature of a well-known “educational” children’s song; a view of the future of linguistics as seen from the past (part, the first); and an excerpt on the Effolk dialect from the not-entirely-reliable Jimmypedia—along with the usual collection of letters from our readers, breaking news, limericks, serendipitous fieldwork, book announcements, linguistickish puzzles, and more...

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The October 2023 Issue of Speculative Grammarian

The editors and publishers of Speculative Grammarian are pleased to announce that another issue of our esteemed journal is now available. This issue offers many excellent articles, including some, uh, timely musings on large language models from our Editor-in-Chief, a wind-breaking... no, wait... breath-taking introduction to the explosively burgeoning field of Flatu-linguistics, and a happy little diversion for you at your next academic conference: a conference-themed treasure hunt!—along with the usual collection of letters from our readers, breaking news, limericks and other poetry, serendipitous fieldwork, linguistickish puzzles, and more...

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The Native American Origins of Jack and Jill: http://bit.ly/1oLjwkM

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Autodescriptive Linguistic Terms: Let us not mention apophasis.

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Maxims are like lawyers who must need to see but one side of the case. —Frank Gelett Burgess

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This Quarter in SpecGram—Previous Puzzle Solutions—The SpecGram Puzzle Elves™ https://bit.ly/45CZuxZ

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Student Pearls—“Hers book is red” is well formed as it is used and deemed acceptable by its speakers. Speakers of English know this.

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Books for Linguists: The Colorless Green Dwarf: A Tale in the Perfect Tense, by Charlotte Breathë; Vowel Heights, by Emily Breathë

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A man of maxims only is like a cyclops with one eye, and that in the back of his head. —Samuel Taylor Coleridge