Elvish Linguistic Fellowship

The Elvish Linguistic Fellowship (E. L. F.) is an international organization devoted to the scholarly study of the invented languages of J. R. R. Tolkien, headed by Carl F. Hostetter. It was founded by Jorge Quinóñez in 1988 as a Special Interest Group of the Mythopoeic Society. The E. L. F. publishes two print journals, Vinyar Tengwar, edited by Hostetter, and Parma Eldalamberon, edited by Christopher Gilson; an online journal, Tengwestië, edited by Hostetter and Patrick H. Wynne; and it also sponsors the Lambengolmor mailing list.

In 1992, Christopher Tolkien appointed an editorial group consisting of the chief editors and scholars of the E.L.F. to order, edit, and then publish his father's writings concerning his invented languages, working from photocopies of the materials sent to them over the course of the next decade and from notes taken by the group's members in the Bodleian and Marquette University Tolkien manuscript archives. It was agreed by all parties that the best way to do this was chronologically, as Tolkien's writings are often enough fully explicable only in light of his earlier writings, and often enough are dependent on those earlier writings for their context (both in internal and external terms). This main course of publication is being carried out in the journal Parma Eldalamberon. There are, however, some writings that are largely independent, and/or whose context has been sufficiently established by Christopher Tolkien's own chronological publication efforts in The History of Middle-earth, and so do not have to be presented in the normal chronological flow of the larger project. Such materials are being published in the journal Vinyar Tengwar.

The members of this editorial team are: Christopher Gilson, Carl F. Hostetter, Arden R. Smith, Bill Welden, and Patrick H. Wynne.