~ (UNCLASSIFIED)

[David Bowie]

From:    Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
> David Bowie wrote:
>> someone left unattributed wrote

>>> I've been a little curious in the time I've been on this list as
>>> to why so much effort is being spent in separating dialects, but
>>> not in looking at what unifies these dialects. Through corpus
>>> studies we have seen that there is a standard grammar defined by
>>> frequency of use. There hasn't been so much study yet though
>>> looking at pronunciation this way.

>> That's not the point of sociolinguistics or dialectology. You want
>> thetheoretical linguists--down the hall, room 12B.

> The above spoken like true academic boorishness.  Detention is room
> 12C. The best possible outcome of this forum in my opinion would be
> unification of dialects into one best possible for mass
> communication.

I may regret this, but are you actually saying that theoretical
linguists, dialectologists, and sociolinguists shouldn't specialize on
what they look at within language? The theoreticians (generally) look at
commonalities, while the sociolinguists and dialectologists (generally,
again) look at differences. This is done so that we're not all studying
from a fire hose, to mangle metaphors.

And the "room 12B" thing was a reference to the Monty Python argument
sketch. Even most of my undergrads get that one when i pull it out, but
it may have lost something in text, i suppose.

> We may have many visitors here looking for best USA dialect advice.
> And I hope we're prepared to give it to them.

Except that your advice is highly prescriptive, while linguistics (not
to mention history) has pretty much demonstrated that that approach
doesn't work.

--
David Bowie                               University of Central Florida
     Jeanne's Two Laws of Chocolate: If there is no chocolate in the
     house, there is too little; some must be purchased. If there is
     chocolate in the house, there is too much; it must be consumed.

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