Linguistics & UKLO
Linguistics & UKLO
Linguistics Olympiad (LO) problems (which, when taken together under exam conditions form an Olympiad) are specific, and yet very varied, type of puzzle based around natural language(s). They primarily test linguistic reasoning, not prior knowledge in the field, making them almost purely logic puzzles, though with a very different flavour to Sudoku's. Some of mine that I think you might enjoy (in increasing order of difficulty):
Adinkra Symbols (2024);
Tariana Detectives (2024, with Babette Verhoeven);
Ngkolmpu Numerals (2021);
Cherokee Verbs (2025, with Ethan Chi);
Kickapoo Whistle Speech (2025, with Evan Hochstein).
I wear a lot of hats within UKLO, but the main ones are Vice-Chair and Leader of Test Development. This means that I spent a lot of time writing and testing linguistics problems (see above), but I also coach the team for the International Linguistics Olympiad (IOL). Since taking over this role in 2023, the UK has won the award for the Highest Average Score twice, and won 12 medals (6G 4S 2B).
If you're interested in competing, get your school to register! If you're interested in helping out in other ways, email me! We always need more markers and problem authors.
I'm not a linguist by training, but spend a lot of my time thinking about linguistics and language. Particular interests include linguistics education at a high-school level, and how to incorporate linguistics-as-a-science and knowledge-about-language into the curriculum; and linguistic reasoning, both in humans and large language models.
Email: simeon.[lastname]@glasgow.ac.uk