David J. Peterson

Info

Namn
David J. Peterson
Född
20/1 1981

Information från Wikipedia

David Joshua Peterson (born January 20, 1981) is an American language creator. He came to prominence after creating the Dothraki and Valyrian languages for the television series Game of Thrones. He has subsequently worked on a number of other projects, including the films Dune and Dune: Part Two, for which he created the Chakobsa language. He has written a book on language construction entitled The Art of Language Invention.

Life

Early life

David Joshua Peterson was born in Long Beach, California, on January 20, 1981, to a father of German descent and a mother of Mexican descent. Studying at University of California, Berkeley (1999–2003), Peterson received BA degrees in English and in linguistics. He received an MA in linguistics from University of California, San Diego (2003–2006). He had his first contact with constructed languages while still at Berkeley, after attending an Esperanto class in 2000.

Language creation

In 2007, he co-founded the Language Creation Society with nine other language creators and served as its president (2011–2014).

In 2009, the television network HBO needed a fictional language (Dothraki) for the Game of Thrones television series and turned to the Language Creation Society for help. This resulted in a contest, which Peterson won.

He produced a number of videos on YouTube, in a series called The Art of Language Invention, and published a book of the same title in 2015. Peterson also worked as an executive producer on the 2017 documentary film, Conlanging: The Art of Crafting Tongues.

In 2019, Peterson created a free High Valyrian course on the Duolingo website/app and expanded the course in conjunction with the House of the Dragon series premiere in August 2022.

Personal life

Peterson was previously married to Erin Peterson, but the marriage ended in divorce. They had one daughter together. In 2023, Peterson became engaged to and subsequently married linguist and fellow conlanger Jessie Peterson (née Sams).

Languages created

Television

Films

Video games

Operas

Musicals

Books

Publications

Johnston, Susan; Battis, Jes (2015). Mastering the Game of Thrones: Essays on George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. McFarland & Company. ISBN 978-0-7864-9631-0.

Peterson, David J. (2014). Dothraki. Living Language. ISBN 978-0-8041-6086-5.

—— (2015). The Art of Language Invention. Penguin Books. ISBN 978-0-14-312646-1.

—— (2020). Create Your Own Secret Language: Invent Codes, Ciphers, Hidden Messages, and More. Odd Dot. ISBN 978-1250222329.

Post, Nina; Peterson, David J. (2014). The Zaanics Deceit (Cate Lyr) (Volume 1). Nina Post, LLC. ISBN 978-1-4954-6134-7.

Post, Nina; Peterson, David J. (2017). The Zaanics Pursuit (Cate Lyr) (Volume 2). Nina Post, LLC. ISBN 978-1-5376-4745-6.

Official website

Previous official website

David J. Peterson at IMDb