"Generative" serves them right

[Ash Asudeh]

Hi everyone

I have to say that I haven't been fighting in the trenches for as long as
many people (including Carl, whose comments I address below) against the
cold shoulder of the "Chomskyan" camp, followed by wholesale appropriation
of ideas once spurned, BUT:

1. I'm going to be on the job market in a couple of years, so don't worry,
I'll get mine soon.

2. I would like to follow the advice of mothers everywhere: don't sink
down to their level.

With this in mind, I submit that we should tone things down a little.

>From Carl's email:
> How about "Chomkyan" (my preferred term)?  "Transformational grammar"
> is not quite right, because of nontransformational work like Koster's
> and Brody's.  What is criterial is that it follow, or profess to
> follow, in outline, at least, whatever Chomsky says is now the way to
> go

>From another one:
> Well, Sergio, this may sound a lot like things that were proposed in
> LFG and GPSG 22 years ago, but there is an important scientific
> difference.  They were not then proposed by Chomsky, and therefore
> incapable in principle of being taken REALLY seriously, to say nothing
> of being right. Now, from what you say, it sounds like the ideas may
> have become right, and if so then surely Chomsky get the credit.
> Surely Gerald Gazdar and Ron Kaplan shouldn't get any credit for
> having these ideas when they were wrong! What sense would that make?

This is, after all, a public forum and I don't think we'll convince any
graduate students like Liz Coppock who are curious about HPSG by acting
(perhaps justifiably) bitter and deriding Chomsky's less than impeccable
citation style, or by making too much of the idealogical and sociological
aspects of the field that are so unfortunate.


Although this is very hard for me to do personally (I'm a mouth), I vote
we lead by example. If we build it, they will come.

Best,
Ash

P.S. Isn't terminological stuff basically pretty boring? With respect to
Andrew Carnie's mail, as long as they call it P&P, why can't we? Sorry if
that sounds like a Wonder/McCartney song.