Grammar and System

Rob Freeman r.j.freeman at usa.net
Thu Apr 1 02:40:28 UTC 1999


Wolfgang Schulze wrote:

> Rob Freeman wrote:
>
> > Let's not all get so caught up in the artifacts or our art that we forget we > are all proposing systems. It's not system or not, it's one or another.
>
> Let me briefly ask you: Which kind of system to you talk about? Do you
> refer to the cognitive reality "linguistic knowledge 'system'" or to
> some kind of artefact that is established by the systematization of what
> is produced by this knowledge 'system'?

Both of those, I think. The first seems to me to identify with the 'God's Truth' of our discussions, and the second with the 'Hocus Pocus'. As I argued to
Syd Lamb I think that even 'God's Truth' is relative, and depends on the person looking at it. My touchstone, as I have said, is the 'usefulness' of a
theory (system?) 'for a given problem'.

If the discussion is about the nature of reality that is all I have to say. If it is about how to explain all the linguistic facts I think that analogy
provides a useful system, and I am curious to explore how it relates to the 'contrast' system of Systemic Functional Grammar.

Rob



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