{"id":76475,"date":"2019-07-26T22:53:21","date_gmt":"2019-07-27T04:53:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=76475"},"modified":"2019-07-26T22:53:21","modified_gmt":"2019-07-27T04:53:21","slug":"comparing-phonemic-patterns-in-book-of-mormon-personal-names-with-fictional-and-authentic-sources","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2019\/07\/comparing-phonemic-patterns-in-book-of-mormon-personal-names-with-fictional-and-authentic-sources.html","title":{"rendered":"“Comparing Phonemic Patterns\u00a0in Book of Mormon Personal Names\u00a0with Fictional and Authentic Sources”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

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\"Spirit<\/a>
This morning \u2014 Friday morning \u2014 we took a boat out to precisely this spot on Maligne Lake, in Jasper National Park. The tree-covered quasi-island in the center of this Wikimedia Commons public domain photograph is called \u201cSpirit Island\u201d these days, although apparently nobody really knows the origin of that name. It is sacred to the local indigenous people and access to it is forbidden except at certain times of the year and to those who have been invited. (Our group today was not.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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I\u2019ve been on the road all day, so I\u2019m a bit late in calling attention to the fact that, once again, Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship<\/em> has published a new article:<\/p>\n

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Brad Wilcox<\/span><\/span>,\u00a0Bruce L. Brown<\/span><\/span>,\u00a0Wendy Baker-Smemoe<\/span><\/span>,\u00a0Sharon Black<\/span><\/span>\u00a0and\u00a0Dennis L. Eggett,\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span>\u201cComparing Phonemic Patterns\u00a0in Book of Mormon Personal Names\u00a0with Fictional and Authentic Sources:\u00a0An Exploratory Study\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

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Abstract:\u00a0<\/strong>In 2013 we published a\u00a0study examining names from Solomon Spalding\u2019s fictional manuscript, J. R. R. Tolkien\u2019s fictional works, and nineteenth-century US census records. Results showed names created by authors of fiction followed phonemic patterns that differed from those of authentic names from a\u00a0variety of cultural origins found in the US census. The current study used the same methodology to compare Book\u00a0of\u00a0Mormon names to the three name sources in the original study and found that Book\u00a0of\u00a0Mormon names seem to have more in common with the patterns found in authentic names than they do with those from fictional works. This is not to say that Book\u00a0of\u00a0Mormon names are similar to nineteenth-\u200acentury names, but rather that they both showed similar patterns when phonotactic probabilities were the common measure. Of course, many more invented names and words from a\u00a0variety of authors and time periods will need to be analyzed along with many more authentic names across multiple time periods before any reliable conclusions can be drawn. This study was exploratory in nature and conducted to determine if this new line of research merits further study. We concluded it does.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

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The article represents Interpreter\u2019s<\/em> 366th consecutive week of publication; the Interpreter Foundation has existed for 367.5 weeks.<\/p>\n

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***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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The 21 July 2019 episode of the Interpreter Radio Show is now accessible online (at no charge and minus commercial breaks). \u00a0In it, Steve Densley and Mike Parker discuss the Book of Abraham and the upcoming\u00a0Come, Follow Me<\/em>\u00a0lesson #31:<\/p>\n

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Interpreter Radio Show \u2014 July 21, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n