Get real, George

Paul Deane PDeane at DATAWARE.COM
Tue Jan 7 14:31:00 UTC 1997


Whoa, folks!

Why do we have to get polarized here?

Call me naive if you like, but I didn't see George's post as denigrating
functional work.

And I certainly don't see putting words into his mouth as fair. He
specifically said what
things he would like to see. Granted, it's not what a lot of people on
FUNKNET want
to focus on, but does that turn it automatically into an attack? Do we
have to base our discussions on personalities?

More to the point, if people feel they have to take such a post as an
attack, it would help if the discussion were moved to a level that would
generate light and not heat.

I have a certain stake in the matter since I've written a book couched
in a "cognitive" framework (Grammar in Mind and Brain: Explorations in
Cognitive Syntax, Mouton de Gruyter 1993) in which I refer to and
attempt to incorporate practically everything on Tom Givon's list ...
aphasia ... experimental psycholinguistics .... cross-linguistic
typological hierarchies ... lots of things. I don't see a contradiction.
And I don't see the point of making this into a zero sum game.

I've seen enough flame discussions elsewhere. Please, let's not have one
here.



More information about the Funknet mailing list