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 ''Game of Thrones'' is an American Fantasy television, fantasy Drama (film and television), drama television series created by David Benioff and for HBO. It is an adaptation of ''A Song of Ice and Fire'', a series of high fantasy novels by ...

''. He has subsequently worked on a number of other projects, including the films ''

Dune A dune is a landform composed of wind- or water-driven sand. It typically takes the form of a mound, ridge, or hill. An area with dunes is called a dune system or a dune complex. A large dune complex is called a dune field, while broad, flat ...

'' 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 Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...

, on January 20, 1981, to a father of German descent and a mother of Mexican descent. Studying at

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

(1999–2003), Peterson received BA degrees in English and in linguistics. He received an MA in linguistics from

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego in communications material, formerly and colloquially UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California, United States. Es ...

(2003–2006). He had his first contact with constructed languages while still at Berkeley, after attending an

Esperanto Esperanto (, ) is the world's most widely spoken Constructed language, constructed international auxiliary language. Created by L. L. Zamenhof in 1887 to be 'the International Language' (), it is intended to be a universal second language for ...

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 ''

'' 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 YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

, 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. Peterson has also worked on the films ''

'' (2021) and '' Dune: Part Two'' (2024).

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

* * * * * *

References

External links

*
Previous official website
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Peterson, David J. 1981 births American people of German descent American people of Mexican descent Constructed language creators Living people People from Long Beach, California University of California, Berkeley alumni University of California, San Diego alumni