Towards a theory of linguistic curiosity: applying linguistic frameworks to lingcomm and scicomm

Abstract Linguistics communication (lingcomm) is uniquely placed as a branch of science communication (scicomm), as lingcomm practitioners can reflexively draw on our own discipline of linguistics to further our understanding of effective communication practices with broader audiences. In this article we cut across various sub-disciplines of linguistics to look at syntactic, semantic, and discourse practices that make for compelling communication. We refer to this as the way a text incites curiosity, or the value of “curiosity”, by analogy with “grammaticality” and “felicity” as linguistic concepts. We look at an example text with high curiosity in scicomm, before highlighting key linguistic features of curiosity. We also show how we implement these in our own lingcomm work, and discuss the implications for effective lingcomm. We conclude with potential avenues for exploring curiosity in scicomm and lingcomm, and the importance of linguists contributing to public understanding of language.