SpecGram Vol CLXXI, No 2 Contents Letters to the Editor

A Speculative Grammarian by Any Other Name...

A Letter from the Editor-in-Chief

At this point in time, it’s hard to imagine SpecGram being anything other than Speculative Grammarian—though we revealed a few years ago that SpecGram began life as Íslensk Tölvumálvísindi in 881. The current name only became attached in 1276, but after more than 700 years it’s pretty well entrenched. There have been many times, however, when some unscrupulous editor has sought to cash in on a passing fad, or—worse—some guileless editor has sought to pay unwarranted homage to a passing fad, and Speculative Grammarian has come perilously close to onomastic disaster. Other proposals were obviously politically or ideologically motivated, and a few seem to have been completely unmotivated (much like certain linguistic theories, alas). Below is a sample of the rejects from recent centuries. If some of these journal titles appear to have been reused by others, it is almost certainly entirely coincidental.

Robert Nicolaï (ed.), 2014, “Limits of Con­tact, Con­tact as its Limits” in Ques­tion­ing Lan­guage Con­tact. Leiden, Boston: Brill.

Chiasmus of the Month
October 2014

Letters to the Editor
SpecGram Vol CLXXI, No 2 Contents