On Chomsky

[Johanna Rubba]

In response to Dave Tuggy's query:

Autonomy of syntax certainly seems a most problematic aspect of
Chomsky's view of language for those of the
cognitive/functional/discourse analysis persuasion (not that I feel that
any of these three labels are necessarily mutually exclusive). These
lines of investigation seek motivation for syntactic structures in
various places -- discourse, typology, the nature of the
language-producing organism, history of languages and grammaticization,
and synchronic semantics. Seeking motivations other than the 'innate
universals in a syntax-specific module' posited by generativism seems to
be a defining characteristic of many non-generative approaches to language.

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Johanna Rubba   Assistant Professor, Linguistics
English Department, California Polytechnic State University
One Grand Avenue  • San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
Tel. (805)-756-2184  •  Fax: (805)-756-6374 • Dept. Phone.  756-259
• E-mail: jrubba at calpoly.edu •  Home page: http://www.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
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"Understanding is a lot like sex; it's got a practical purpose,
but that's not why people do it normally"  -            Frank  Oppenheimer
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