From the Archives!—Satirical Linguist’s Hat—The SpecGram Archive Elves™ SpecGram Vol CLXXI, No 2 Contents

Word Ladder 二

by Learned Hand and Benighted Foot
O̊ṗṗo̊ṡi̊ṫůṡ Ḁṭṭṛḁc̣ṭi̥c̣u̥ṣ Ūñīṽēr̃s̃īt̃ūs̃, 上海

Sample Word Ladder
1-2Pike’s phonetic vowel.
2-3Far from the speaker.
3-4The voice box.
1 V O
C O
I D 2
T S
3 L A
R Y
N X 4
VOCOID and LARYNX read left to right, while DISTAL reads right to left.

To complete this second Word Ladder, fill in six-letter words based on the clues provided. Note that some words will run from left to right, while alternating words will run from right to left. Also, the last two letters of each word will overlap with the first two letters of the next word—though they will be read in the opposite direction.

To illustrate the basic concept, a completed sample Word Ladder is provided.

If you think you’ve figured out the answer, submit your solution to the editors of SpecGram by October 15, 2014, and you could win a prize.* Bonus points may be awarded for determining the relationship between the first and second Word Ladder puzzles. Solutions and winners will be announced in the November issue.


Word Ladder 二
1-2  UK lecturer who hasn’t quite made professor.
2-3  The mood of that which is.
3-4  Like, y’know, a metaphor.
4-5  Encour­age inform­ants to rat out their lan­guage.
5-6  The distinctive tone quality of a sound.
6-7  Where one’s mistakes are put on display for posterity.
7-8  Lacking lexical or gram­matical pitch distinc­tions.
8-9  A formal seman­ticist’s favorite calculus.
9-10  Shigudo’s favorite part of speech.
10-11  The other Esperanto diacritics.
1  
   
  2
   
3  
   
  4
   
5  
   
  6
   
7  
   
  8
   
9  
   
  10
   
11  




* Note that SpecGram Anti-Hoarding Guidelines stipulate that puzzle-related prizes cannot be won by anyone who has won a puzzle-related prize in the last three months—though honor, fame, and glory may still be seized† on the metaphorical field of puzzle-related battle.

† Except where taxed, prohibited by law, or otherwise restricted, constrained, limited, regulated, controlled, hindered, impeded, hampered, obstructed, checked, curbed, shackled, confined, or otherwise subject to thesaural interference.


From the Archives!—Satirical Linguist’s Hat—The SpecGram Archive Elves™
SpecGram Vol CLXXI, No 2 Contents