ambitious scrawlings

A friend asked me if I had any pointers on drawing dingle dongles and I may or may not have gotten totally carried away and drew out a bunch of stuff, heheh. Figured Id post it just in case any nsfw artists found it helpful at all~

Which is a shame, since spinning is really where the "resource provided by the earth" tangibly becomes "object with a use."

Aspects of spinning, such as the amount of twist and the length of the fibers, are impactful upon the thread or yarn created, but lots of fiber crafters don't get to directly play with those variables...

It is so strange how textile production is so utterly dominated by very few fibers, when so many are possible. Industry keeps coming up with new ways to transform bamboo or something into fibers, which is all well and good, but we have yet to run out of easily usable natural fibers that have worked for thousands of years.

For those especially I can't over-recommend the Fleece & Fiber Sourcebook or the Field Guide to Fleece (Deborah Robson and Carol Ekarius.) An awful lot of excellent fiber breeds and species are now unknown, under-used, and in danger of going extinct; Shave 'Em to Save 'Em and the Livestock Conservancy in general are good resources for finding local people working with those. There's a chiengora (dog wool) group on Ravelry that's great, too, and lots of easily searchable info on raising silkworms at home and spinning from hankies.

Fibershed did a spotlight on dogbane, nettle, and milkweed in comparison to hemp and flax. They talk specifically about Native American techniques and current cultivation of all three, particularly dogbane, and ways to spin yarn and make rope. They aren't super in-depth about processing the fibers, but it seems like it's because they have more tutorials/guides on other pages. Bast fibers all have a similar retting->drying->scutching->hackling->spinning (you also have to ripple flax at the beginning) process, generally speaking.

Of course, flax is a really accessible plant fiber to spin yourself! You can plant it yourself, buy unprocessed flax (locally or online), or buy processed but unspun flax. If you're interested in the whole process, this book is the flax bible: Linen: From Flax Seed to Woven Cloth by Linda Heinrich. There are a lot of youtubers who go through it all, too.

If you're interested in kudzu, then may I suggest Oigawa Kudzu-fu Studio! They're located in Japan, but they have helpfully created an English website, too, where they go over making kudzu-fu (Japanese name for the cloth from kudzu). And if you ever find yourself going to Japan, you can take a class from them.

On Oigawa Studio's info page, they also mention that they work with ramie (plant in the nettle family), linden tree (basswood), and wisteria, so do with that what you will. I assume a lot of those resources are in Japanese.

Respect the Spindle. Anyone looking for the how's & why's of hand spinning will find answers there. Interest in hand spinning has seen a steady growth in the past 15 yrs since this book's release.

The gist of it is that I'm writing a fanfiction set in a many-species sci-fi society, which, at a certain time, has a lingua-franca which is an in-universe constructed language designed around all or most species and disabilities within those species being able to speak it. The main way this is facilitated is having multiple alternate phonologies that transpose onto one another (for example if a species cannot make nasal consonants, those phonemes will simply be replaced in the phonology designed for their species). This language is not meant to be a utopian creation in-universe or out of it-- it is problematic for a number of reasons even as it is also extremely useful for a multitude of people-- however it is meant to be a language which has made its way into common use, and therefore one that is fairly well designed and practical.

The first thing I've been struggling to research is what the boundaries are for non SL speakers creating signs? I know sign names are off the table but I read in another post here that someone was advised just to do their research + hire a proofreader if making a fictional sign language. This language is not a sign language, it just has 2+ finger-spelling phonologies (one for hands, see below. one for tentacles). The language has a very limited number of syllables (18), so each sign corresponds to a syllable rather than a letter: for example the syllable "bi" is two sounds but just one sign. The signs are based on ones which I found had sign writing symbols or was already familiar with from ASL finger-spelling.

If it's better for me not to create the details of this hand-phonology at all, I can scrap my details and just establish its existence in-story and leave the details a black box either permanently or in the case I was able to consult an SL speaker properly on the project.

The second thing I could use a wider perspective on is about potential hand strain. As the picture shows, signs are all designed to be doable with just 2 Fingers and 1 thumb (due to the presence of people & species with less fingers). In experimenting myself I've found three possible options for people with 4 fingers + 1 thumb (eg. most humans), and I don't know which is best:

1. Keeping the ring and pinky fingers folded down and using the pointer and middle as the two Fingers, 2. Pairing the fingers in groups of two eg. pointer+middle as one Finger, ring and pinky as the other Finger, 3. Using the pointer as one Finger and group the other three as the other Finger.

I'm not sure if one of these (or something else?) sticks out as best to someone who speaks a sign language, or if multiple variations would be used based on preference/tradition (I think as long as a speaker keeps their own style consistent it should be clear to anyone which version they're using?). As I was experimenting I found (1) and (3) felt best and option (2) to be quite difficult for some of the signs, however a friend said (2) felt best, so I'm not sure if it's a lack of dexterity on my part or if my friend only tested out some of the signs.

I am also wondering if using the hand phonology would be likely to be a strain in general, since finger-spelling is much less efficient movement-wise than a sign language? This language is the first language of relatively few people and there are plenty of sign languages around, however this language is essentially the language of government, politics, & trade for much of the society, so extended use would be relevant to anyone involved in those sectors, and certainly relevant for Deaf people and people who can't speak an verbal language for whom the language is their first/only language.

Wow I didn't realize how much I'd written; I hope it's all clear. Thank you guys for this blog, I've learned a lot from reading your posts!

(P.S. I just realized I can also go imply the existence of a tactile phonology for DeafBlind people…much fun to be had!)

Hi!

It's fine for non-Deaf people to create signed conlangs. It's great to think about accessibility!

My main concern with the symbols themselves are "ki" and "qu" are too similar to each other. You could swap "ri" for a handshape that looks like ASL's U, then put "ri"s handshape in place of the one you designed for "ki"?

To adapt to more fingers, I think most phonemes are easiest to group as the thumb, pointer finger, and middle finger, while leaving the rest folded downwards. "mi", "nu", "pu", and "ku" would be best grouped as the thumb, pointer finger, and then all the other fingers as a single group. "pi" could go either way; I personally find it more comfortable to just use 3 fingers. The one phoneme that doesn't fit either of these patterns: "cu" would be best adapted as the thumb, all middle fingers together, and then the final finger, just like the ASL Y.

I don't know how you'd handle this for a species that doesn't have opposable thumbs--I think you'd have to design a completely new symbology.

Hand phonology would be more tiring than a sign language, and some abbreviations might be created for common words or phrases. Since there are so few syllables, I'm worried that words would become very long and therefore tiring to spell out. Hand phonology might end up becoming its own tool that most people know and can use to communicate non-vocally, alongside proper sign languages used by Deaf or otherwise non-verbal communities/species.

Yes! I do. I can tell you the ones that I was assigned (I'm afraid that the list skews extremely male and (especially) white).

Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)

Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men (1930) and Star Maker (1937) [You can probably add Odd John (1935) to this list]

Jules Verne, Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1864) and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870) [You can probably add From the Earth to the Moon (1865)]

H.G. Wells, The Time Machine (1895) and War of the Worlds (1897) [Though you can probably go ahead and add The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897) and The First Men in the Moon (1901)]

Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Herland (1915)

Catherine Burdekin (writing as Murray Constantine), Swastika Night (1937)

Karel Čapek, R.U.R. (1920)

Isaac Asimov, I, Robot (1950) [You can probably add the first three Foundation novels here as well]

Yevgeny Zamyatin, We (1921)

George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)

Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey (1967) and Rendezvous with Rama (1973) [Add: Childhood's End (1953) and The Fountains of Paradise (1979)

John Wyndham, Day of the Triffids (1951) [add: The Chrysalids (1955) and The Midwich Cuckoos (1957)]

H.P. Lovecraft, "The Call of Cthulhu" (1926) [add The Shadow over Innsmouth (1931)]

Richard Matheson, I Am Legend (1954)

Alfred Bester, The Stars My Destination (1956)

Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers (1959) [Probably Stranger in a Strange Land (1961) and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (1966) too, depending on, you know, how much of Heinlein's bullshit you can take]

J.G. Ballard, The Drowned World (1962) [Also, The Burning World (1964) and The Crystal World (1966)]

Phillip K. Dick, The Man in the High Castle (1962) [Also Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968) and several of his short stories]

Frank Herbert, Dune (1965)

Michael Moorcock, Behold the Man (1969)

Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-5 (1969)

Ursula Le Guin, The Dispossessed (1974) [Also The Lathe of Heaven (1971) and The Left Hand of Darkness (1969)]

Brian Aldiss, Supertoys series

William Gibson, Neuromancer (1984)

Kim Stanley Robinson, Red Mars (1992) [Also Green Mars and Blue Mars]

They also included Iain M. Banks's The Algebraist (2004), but I personally think you'd be better off reading some of his Culture novels

Other ones that I might add (not necessarily my favourite, just what I would consider the most influential):

Joe Haldeman, The Forever War (1974)

Matsamune Shiro, Ghost in the Shell (1989-91)

Katsuhiro Otomo, Akira (1982-1990)

Octavia Butler, Lilith's Brood (1987-89) and Parable of the Sower (1993)

Poul Anderson, Operation Chaos (1971)

Hector Garman Oesterheld & Francisco Solano Lopez, The Eternaut (1957-59)

Liu Cixin, The Three-Body Problem (2008)

Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, The Illuminatus! Trilogy (1975)

William Hope Hodgson, The House on the Borderland (1908)

Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash (1992)

Joanna Russ, The Female Man (1975)

Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game (1985) [Please take this one from a library]

Edgar Rice Burroughs, A Princess of Mars (1912)

Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale (1985) and Oryx and Crake (2003)

Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932)

Osamu Tezuka, Astro Boy (1952-68)

Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451 (1953)

Madeleine L'Engle, A Wrinkle in Time (1962)

Walter M. Miller, A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959)

Alexander Bogdanov, Red Star (1908)

Ray Bradbury, The Martian Chronicles (1950)

Stanisław Lem, Solaris (1961)

Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, Roadside Picnic (1971)

Harlan Ellison, A Boy and His Dog (1979)

Lois McMaster Bujold, The Vor Game (1990)

China Miéville, Perdido Street Station (2000), The City & The City (2009)

and comics by:

the Métal Hurlant gang (Moebius, Jodorowsky, Caza, Enki Bilal, Philippe Druillet)

François Schuiten & Benoît Peeters, Les Cités obscures series

P.S. I also consider important, though it's fucking infuriating from start to finish (it's inevitable for classics, by virtue of being old, to contain infuriating elements, but this is on another level altogether; uh, pun not intended) :

Lets be real here, they’re both her sugar babies and they know it. (Well, Vlad does. Nathan just doesn’t think about it)

If I go completely off the crackfic deep end, Vlad is the older, richer guy in his 40s trapped in a hateful relationship with his wife Elizabeth (man, you guys don’t know about her yet) who makes the scathing comment one night that Vlad couldn’t even PAY anyone to love him even if he tried, so in one of his drunken spiteful hazes he downloads an app and scrolls through all the people looking to be sugar babies and he’s just about to give up and throw his phone down cause this was a stupid idea, really, what was he thinking, hell what was he drinking….when he swipes one more time and oh, oh.

Except you can’t see the whole profile unless you match, so he hits the button and watches the bio unfold and Christ, Christ above, they’re a couple and they’re so beautiful it makes his heart hurt. It’s not even that they’re aesthetically pleasing (cause they are, they so are) but it’s the way they look at each other and their bio reads like a lonely hearts add, mid 20s, likes the colors red and green, don’t drink, don’t smoke, but with the added brutal addendum of “hey uh, we’re fucking broke but we’re kind of cute right?” 

And there’s an amazon wishlist and it’s just fucking college books man, it’s just books and fucking ramen noodles and he’s all alone in this giant fucking mansion with all this wealth he’ll never burn through even if he lives to be 200 years old so he just buys all of it, and leaves a message in the gift note area that says “pick something nice next time, ~V.” and moves on with his life, forgetting about it until he gets the thank you notification on his phone two days later after Nathan and Ursula wake up walled into their shitty apartment by all the amazon boxes on the doorstep. The doormat placed delicately on top. Cause I mean, what could go wrong, right?

And thus ensues a love affair through amazon prime. They don’t know who he is except that he has too much money to spend and doesn’t seem to want anything in return. And at first they’re like cool, fine, rich guy who doesn’t need anything from us, amazing, brilliant. Until one night when they’re lying in bed Ursula says,

“do you think he’s lonely, Mr. V?”

And Nathan is many things, many more things than he first realized thanks to dating Ursula (good bye pre-conceived notions of heterosexuality, hello realizing that gender is just a social construct and skittles had the right idea) and he’d never quite been comfortable with the whole Sugaring thing (Ursula is, it’s how she’s paid  for two degrees with no family help) he finds he doesn’t mind it if he knows what the other person is getting out of it. Except for “Mr. V” who as far as Nathan can tell gets nothing but a hefty monthly amazon bill and…yea, it’s been bothering him for a while…and

“I dunno…maybe? I mean…why else do that?”

“I dunno.” Ursula echoes back, chewing thoughtfully on her hair. “Do you think we should like, do something?”

“What, like hack into amazon and find out who he is?”

“I was thinking more posting an invitation to draw him out, see if he responds. But sure, we can do that too.”

Nathan’s nose wrinkles. “What kind of invitation.”

Ursula shrugs again, but her eyes already have that far off look that means she’s plotting. “He’s very formal, in his little notes…I bet he’d appreciate a proper invitation…”

Which is how Vlad, halfway through his lunch in his office (his only free time of the day where no one bothers him at all on pain of death) pauses midway through with a spoonful of tomato soup to his lips, mid scroll through the amazon app on his phone as he realizes their list has updated. It’s an “I want” note, the kind of thing you need to buy from somewhere else and have their address to send, except it’s not a thing. It’s…it’s…

Dear Mr. V.Thank you for all the lovely gifts, the amazon gift card last month was greatly appreciated. My partner and I were hoping to engage your interests for an evening, or two, just a little something to show how appreciate we are of your time an attention. If you would like to accept this

he scrolls down to the next item, to where the character limit continues,

invitation, please meet us at [link], and input the password. The phrase is your most recent purchase to us. If not then please disregard this note as a simple gesture of good faith. Hope to meet your acquaintance properly soon, kind regards and much enthusiasm, U & N x.”

I just read a book by one of my favorite authors whose plots are essentially airtight, but the MC was walking on a country road on a cold winter night and she was knocked down and fell into a drainage ditch covered in ice, broke through and got covered in icy mud and water.

Then she had a “miserable” 3 more miles to walk to the inn.