Viva voce—“with living voice,” but also (and more commonly) the phenomenon of “word of mouth.” When incidents of speech, song, or shouting take place, it is the mouth that transforms private impulse into audible sound. Articulatory phonetics tells us that this physiological transubstantiation is little more than the aerodynamic energy of breath rendered into sound waves, or acoustic energy. Yet when do words become more than translations, and mouths more than translating machines?

How do words fare when adapted across different media? From censorship to speech impediments to tensions of class, race, ethnicity, and ability, failures to communicate by word of mouth manifest everywhere. Are these failures being remediated, and if so, by what means have words (and mouths) been altered to increase their accessibility and intelligibility? On the other end of the spectrum, how do we prevent our private words from becoming word of mouth in an age of precarious internet privacy and information circulation? Between social media and the ever- increasing digitization of the arts and humanities, do we still need mouths for our words, or words delivered in person? Tell us about phatic speech, about “walking the talk” in activism and academia, about speech and performance. What do we make of dirty mouths, dirty words, and the place of obscenities or vulgarities in the arts and humanities? Or, if one wishes to avoid such pollution, what are the ethics of taking words from another’s mouth via journalism, citation, or plagiarism? We have our ear to the ground for your rumours, avowals, suspicions, aphorisms, declarations, and slips of the tongue, and we seek submissions from all disciplines relating to the arts, culture, and the humanities.

Word Hoard is soliciting articles, essays, and interviews for our fourth issue (please find our previous issues at: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/wordhoard). We invite submissions between 3,000-5,000 words related to the provocation and concept of “Word of Mouth,” which will be due by 5 December 2014. Accepted submissions can expect online and print publication in the summer of 2015. All submissions will undergo a blind peer review from which all authors receive detailed and constructive feedback, and all accepted submissions will be responded to within our dialogic, multi-generic format.

Submissions should be formatted according to MLA guidelines, and should also include a brief biographical sketch of the author. Abstracts are appreciated, but not required. Submissions should not contain the author’s name or obvious identification marks to ensure an objective blind peer review process. To submit, or for more information, please contact us at wordhoard.editors@gmail.com.