LINGUIST List 5.302

Thu 17 Mar 1994

Disc: Mainstream Linguistics

Editor for this issue: <>

Directory

1. Steve Berman, 5.298 Mainstream Linguistics
2. John Nerbonne, Re: 5.298 Mainstream Linguistics Canada/US
3. Jon Aske, Repost re Mainstream Linguistics

Leo Connolly writes:

 because I agree with Karen Chung's comment that teaching language is
 more really linguistics because one is in direct contact with real
 language on a daily basis. Too much linguistic research since the
 Chomskyan revolution seems insipid because it is too far removed from
 the data.

Does someone hold a monopoly on "the data"? Has Connolly's language
teaching _per se_ led him to linguistic generalizations such as those
embodied in the Obligatory Contour Principle, the Head Movement Constraint,
or the conservativity of quantifiers?

 Try as I can to read and empathize with recent
 analyses of one phenomenon or another, I repeatedly have two responses:
 (1) positing yet another node, or another sort of XP (X = any upper-case
 letter not yet spoken for at a lower level), doesn't really explain
 anything, and certainly not why the rules of negation and/or inversion
 and/or subjectivization are different in this brand of Scandinavian than
 in that; and (2) the architects of such monstrosities are constructing a
 new set of trees that keep us from seeing the real flora and fauna that
 constitute the genuine forest.

If Connolly knows the "real explanation" and knows where and what the "real
flora and fauna", perhaps he would be so kind as to let us know.

 So I continue to work with
 real language, on the fringe of the civilized linguistic world (if that
 is not a contradiction in terms), trying to produce a better theory that
 will reveal rather than obscure, much as Chomsky's theories did before
 he got too fancy for his and our good.

Perhaps he would also tell us what our (let alone Chomsky's) good is?
--Steve

Message 2: Re: 5.298 Mainstream Linguistics Canada/US

Ian MacKay asks:

> What if:
> --well over one-third of ALL professors in all institutions across the
> entire United States were citizens of the same ONE foreign country (let
> us say Japan), AND
> ...
> Would Americans be sanguine and easy-going about such a situation?

Hmm. If the academic markets were perfectly fluid across countries,
then we'd expect to see the same proportion of nationalities on
faculties that we find in the population, or about 10:1 US/Canadian
(assuming that faculties are proportional in size to populations). If
the figures above are correct, then the Canadian situation has a
"fluidity" of 35% ("over one-third"). If the US is reciprocally
fluid, we'd expect to see Canadians on American faculties represented
at about 3.5% (= 0.35 X ~10%).

I bet we do (but I admit that I don't have any figures). Ian MacKay
mentions other statistics that may be analyzed similarly. (Let's ignore
the remarks about American "hysteria", etc.)

Two other remarks:

(1) Another question is whether we find this fluidity a good thing.
(Note that you could produce more extreme figures by looking at
selected areas within the US--say, the UC system--but no one minds
fluidity there.) Outside of fields with special obligations to local
culture, I find this fluidity a good thing. For one thing, "fairness"
ought to be applied to individuals, not nationalities. For another,
science and scholarship thrive on the confrontation of ideas, and even
in this age, there's nothing like a proponent in the flesh to make you
take ideas seriously. So human mobility is a benefit.

(2) Note how this reverses the old charge of American intellectual
imperialism ("brain drain"), which always began by noting how many
more foreign scientists et al. ended up in the US than reverse! Those
figures indeed indicated an imbalance, e.g. in the relation of most
European countries to the US (most of these are relatively closed to
foreigners if compared to the US). But whose research and education
benefited more?

The Canadian government may be doing as much service to its
intellectual consumers (students), as the American government does to
its consumers of cars. By forcing consumers to buy from a restricted
market, one expects to lower quality (or raise costs--where I
emphatically wish my Canadian colleagues success in alternative
channels, however).

--John Nerbonne

I think it's a pitty that just when Martin Haspelmath and others (5-255,
5-270) had began an insteresting line of discussion about the politics of
the field of linguistics, hiring practices, and so on, John Sowa (5-270)
had to come with his personal and quite outrageous attack on Chomsky which
seems to me to be quite irrelevant to the issues that had been raised.
And, of course, the defendants of the "establishment", who hadn't said a
word about Martin's interesting and thought provoking questions and
comments, had a perfect straw man to lash at and derail the budding debate
(5-272).

So, why don't we get back to the real questions, the real issues, and--as
Chomsky would say when talking about non-linguistic topics--the system,
not the individuals who manage it.


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Jon Aske
Anthropology Home address:
Bates College Jon Aske
Lewiston, Maine 04240, USA "Aritza Enea"
Phone: (207) 786-6472 12 Bardwell St.
Fax: (207) 786-6123 Lewiston, Maine 04240-6336
e-mail: jaskeabacus.bates.edu -Phone/Fax: (207) 786-0589
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