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Seandor Szeles

Seandor Szeles

Development Associate, Secret Life Team

Seandor Szeles works as a development associate and office manager at Seftel Productions, the company behind “Secret Life.” He was born to an aggressive pack of Central Pennsylvanians known for their gibberish sounds and capacity to attack without notice. Afraid they might turn on him, he fled to Philadelphia, where he earned a degree in English Literature from Saint Joseph’s University. After moving to New York, he worked on the documentary film “Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead.” There, he developed the ability to pretend he knows about science. While “Secret Life” has convinced him that science is interesting and fun, what really excites him about the show is learning random trivia about strangers. He frequently reads online bios and some day, hopes to write professionally for Wikipedia.

Seandor's Secret Life Posts

Seandor Szeles

Jean Berko Gleason Goes Hollywood!

Posted by Seandor Szeles | 17 March 2012

Dreaming up languages… What does our good friend and Secret Lifer Jean Berko Gleason have to do with Disney’s big-budget fantasy “John Carter”? The invention of fake languages, of course! This TIME magazine article shows how her famous “wug” experiments informed the work of those inventing Thark, the imaginary language used on Mars in “John Carter” and Na’vi, the language used by the inhabitants of Pandora in “Avatar.” In lieu of residuals, we say “oe irayo si ngaru” (Na’vi for “I give thanks to you”) to Jean for helping Hollywood discover the beauty of imaginary languages!

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Seandor Szeles

Make Room on the Mantle!

Posted by Seandor Szeles | 10 November 2011

“The Secret Life of Scientists and Engineers” has scooped up another exciting award. The American Association for the Advancement of Science has selected “Secret Life” for the 2011 AAAS Kavli Science Journalism Award in the Online Category.

We’d like to thank the Academy–er, the Association–for recognizing us with his award. It is very prestigious and we are grateful.

While we love patting our own backs, we must tip our hats to three of our most beloved subjects, whose profiles were selected for the award: Jean Berko-Gleason, Andre Fenton and Steffie Tomson.

Back pats all around!

And oh yeah, in other news, we are finally starting to ramp up for our third season. Subjects are being chosen and shoots being planned. You and every other human on the planet will definitely want to be a part of it.

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Seandor Szeles

Ugga Da Bugga

Posted by Seandor Szeles | 30 November 2010

My favorite part of the Jean Berko Gleason videos was when she recalled letting loose on her parents with some good old-fashioned gibberish. ”It must mean something in some language,” was her response when they told her it meant nothing.

I hear ya, Jean.

“Ugga da bugga” may not be in the dictionary yet, but don’t count it out. Unlike some of our more rigid counterparts (cough, French Academy), we English-speakers update our language as much as we do our social networking sites. There are currently 1,007,711 words in the English language, and a Perhaps Ugga Da Bugga is something in horse-speak? new word is created every 98 minutes. That adds up to 14.7 words per day (according to the Global Language Monitor, which–full disclosure–is a bit more lenient than Mr. Webster). Some are the results of new technology. Others are cultural hybrids that fuse two languages. Each year, new words like “locavore,” “interweb,” and “frenemy” make the transition from crazy talk to real, live word. But each one got started somewhere.

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Seandor Szeles

Mollie, Subways, and Secrets

Posted by Seandor Szeles | 29 September 2010

These people all have secrets… trust us, they really do If Mollie and I have one thing in common, it’s that we both have trouble keeping cool on the subway.

There’s something about the unspoken code of silence on the subway that makes me want to bust out laughing at that lingering patch of shaving cream on some dude’s ear. And I think it’s the same reason that people laugh at church and in classrooms: because you’re not supposed to.

Hearing about Mollie’s awesome mouse-brain secret on the subway reminded me of the first time I caught someone else struggling to keep it together in transit. Before then, I thought all other NYC subway passengers (mariachi bands aside) were heartless commuting machines: efficient and unyielding, all just waiting for the sucker from Pennsylvania (me) to unwittingly block the door so they could revoke his subway privileges.

Seeing someone else lose their cool reminded me that we’ve all got our weird stuff. Maybe that girl is holding in a secret about mouse brains. That Wall Street guy looks uncomfortable; maybe he’s suppressing something else. That’s what makes train rides interesting. We’ve all got our secrets, and it’s always fun when someone lets one slip.

You’ve got a cool secret, Mollie. Not every smart girl is willing to stake her reputation in the lab by wearing a sweet cheerleading jacket. If your lab friends give you flack for your secret spunk, just tell them to keep their thoughts in their “meat computers” (as per Mollie’s “Only I Knew” video).

You are pulling both jobs off.

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