Bonus 84: Are thumbs fingers and which episode of Lingthusiasm are you? Survey results and a new personality quiz (Patreon)

In this bonus episode, Lauren and Gretchen get enthusiastic about two kinds of fun linguistic questionnaires! 

First: if you were a Lingthusiasm episode, which one would you be? We've made a tongue-in-cheek quiz that transforms your answers to questions like "You're about to start a massive Lingthusiasm listening marathon. You need to stay fortified and hydrated. Pick a beverage to sustain you" into a Highly Accurate Window Into Your Personality.  Gretchen and Lauren take the quiz on air and share our own results -- please let us know what you get and if this quiz helps you remember an older episode or figure out how to get a friend started on Lingthusiasm! 

Second: we have results from the Lingthusiasm survey that many of you took last year! Find out whether Lingthusiasm listeners consider the show more kiki or more bouba, and highlights from your very extensive comments on whether your sister's husband's sister is still your sister-in-law, whether the thumb is a finger, and more gestures that are rude in some places. A few survey results also appear in an academic paper that we wrote: "Communicating about linguistics using lingcomm-driven evidence: Lingthusiasm podcast as a case study" which was published in Language and Linguistics Compass (open access).

Finally, a few updates: For 2024, Gretchen is heading to the Societas Linguistica Europea conference in Helsinki in August and Lauren is heading back to full-time prof work, teaching syntax and turning gestures and Lingthusiasm research into papers. Plus: the LingComm Grants are running again for 2024. 

Read the transcript here.

Here are the links mentioned in this episode:

• Take the 'Which Lingthusiasm episode are you?' quiz!
• Lingthusiasm episode 'Schwa, the most versatile English vowel' 
• Bonus episode 'Lingthusiasm live show: The Listener Talks Back'
• Lingthusiasm episode 'Tea and skyscrapers - When words get borrowed across languages' 
• Bonus episode 'Forensic linguistics' 
• Lingthusiasm episodes sorted by topic 
• 2022 survey results academic paper - Communicating about linguistics using lingcomm-driven evidence: Lingthusiasm podcast as a case study by Lauren Gawne and Gretchen McCulloch 
• LingComm Grants 

You can listen to this episode on this page, via the Patreon RSS or download the mp3. A transcript of this episode is available as a Google Doc. Lingthusiasm is also on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and Mastodon. Email us at contact [at] lingthusiasm [dot] com or chat to us on the Patreon page. Gretchen is on Twitter as @GretchenAMcC and blogs at All Things Linguistic. Lauren is on Twitter as @superlinguo and blogs at Superlinguo.  To chat about this episode and other lingthusiastic topics with your fellow linguistics fans, join us on the Lingthusiasm Discord server.  Lingthusiasm is created by Gretchen McCulloch and Lauren Gawne. Our senior producer is Claire Gawne, our production editor is Sarah Dopierala, our production assistant is Martha Tsutsui Billins, and our editorial assistant is Jon Kruk. Our music is ‘Ancient City’ by The Triangles.