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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman">Dear LinguistList
colleagues, I wonder if many of linguists used the frequency of
prepositions in the text of different authors as the basis for determining
authorship. Our small group of computational linguists used some simple
statistical criterion, i.e. Chi-square, to juxtapose the use of some fuctional
words in the text of Bakhtin (it is more correctly to write his
name BAHTIN, to my mind!) and the controvercial work of Voloshinov
"MARKSIZM I FILOSOFIJA JAZYKA"(Marxism and the philosophy of language) which was
often ascribed to M. M. Bahtin. Could you give me some references to the
books and articles which proved or at least stated that the text in question,
that is, "MARKSIZM I FILOSOFIJA JAZYKA"(Marxism and the philosophy of language)
was really written by M.M. Bahtin, but was published under the name of
Voloshinov. I know that Wikipedia stated it, but no other articles
published under the exact names of linguists. It was surprising to find out
that some texts of I.V. Stalin were close enough to those of "MARKSIZM I
FILOSOFIJA JAZYKA"(Marxism and the philosophy of language). Was it because
Stalin wrote about Marxism? Was it fashinable to imitate Stalin's style?
Actually, I agree to some American linguists who think that d</FONT></FONT><FONT
face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman">uring the time, late 1920s and
early 1930s, V.I. Lenin's influence was waning and Stalin's was rising.
As Stalin became a dominant figure, those who wrote derivative material
emulated his phrasing and style--a kind of prestige and survival device, one
that was likely to be approved of and and that satisfied critics. In that
kind of political environment, any public discussion involving Marxism would
have to reflect the ascendant and dominant theoretical perspective, and style is
a significant component of that. It remains to be demonstrated that this
kind of unconscious but determined imitation is sufficient to produce a
statistical closeness of the kind we are discussing. So, it is still an enigma
who wrote "MARKSIZM I FILOSOFIJA JAZYKA"(Marxism and the philosophy of
language), or is it not? Do you know any references to the authorship of
"MARKSIZM I FILOSOFIJA JAZYKA"(Marxism and the philosophy of language)? Looking
forward to hearing from you soon to <A
href="http://mail.yandex.ru/classic/compose?mailto=mailto:yutamb@mail.ru">yutamb@mail.ru</A>
about this mystery "MARKSIZM I FILOSOFIJA JAZYKA"(Marxism and the philosophy of
language). Remain Yours sincerely Yuri Tambovtsev, Novosibirsk,
Russia<BR></FONT></FONT></DIV></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>