LINGUIST List 10.244

Tue Feb 16 1999

Qs: R Maris Speech, L2 & Bilinguals, Disambiguation

Editor for this issue: Karen Milligan <karenlinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Linda Coleman, Roger Maris's speech
2. Erika Levy, Compounding in bilinguals
3. kostas, Word sense disambiguation tools

A writer friend, William Loizeaux, is working on a book on Roger Maris.
He has asked for assistance in describing Maris dialect and about the
likely perception of Maris speech habits by the (primarily) New York
press. His question is given below. Replies can be sent to him
directly at EL18umail.umd.edu, or to me for forwarding at
LC22umail.umd.edu.

 From William Loizeaux:

Here, I think, is what I'm after--and it's mostly an issue of
description. I'm wondering how, in very general terms, a linguist
would describe the way Maris would have spoken while growing up. (He
was born in Hibbing, MN in 1934; then moved to Grand Forks, ND in 1939;
then to Fargo, ND in 1946). Is this the sort of question I could pose
in "Consulting a Linguist"?

I'm interested in this because of an epiphany (a dull one, such as they
happen to me) when I was out in Fargo at the "Roger Maris Museum," which
is actually a trophy case in West Acres Shopping Mall, right next to
the Sears. While Roger was playing in New York in the early to middle
'60s, he had a difficult time with the press. Reporters found him
"boring," "impassive," "disengaged," "dull," etc. He drove them crazy,
and they drove him crazy. Anyway, while I was at the "Museum," I
pressed a button under a TV screen, and watched (and listened to) some
interviews with Roger--this while listening to the folks going into and
out of the Sears. Their voices--his and theirs--intermingled, and in
these surroundings, he didn't sound so boring, impassive, or
disengaged. What NY reporters construed as an issue of character (or
characterlessness) might be explained in part by Roger's manner of
speaking. To my terribly unsophisticated ear, he sounded pretty much
like anyone else who was spending a pleasant Sunday afternoon at the
West Acres Mall in Fargo. His voice had a certain flatness and
softness, and a certain little music at the ends of particular
sentences. But as you can see, I'm having a hard time describing it.
Is there a way that linguists describe it that we can all understand?
Into what categories might his dialect fall?

Thanks in advance,

Linda Coleman

Dear colleagues,
	Does anyone know of any work on compounding in bilinguals and/or
L2 acquirers?
	Please reply to me directly at elevyemail.gc.cuny.edu
	Many thanks. I will post a summary of responses.
	-Erika Levy

Could someone please point me to a list (does it exist?..) of sense
disambiguation tools available to researchers?
Thanking you in advance

Konstantinos Skartsiounis
Lernout & Hauspie