13.2195, Media: Re: Lehrer News Hour 8/27/02

[LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List:  Vol-13-2195. Thu Aug 29 2002. ISSN: 1068-4875.

Subject: 13.2195, Media: Re: Lehrer News Hour 8/27/02

Moderators: Anthony Aristar, Wayne State U.<aristar at linguistlist.org>
            Helen Dry, Eastern Michigan U. <hdry at linguistlist.org>

Reviews (reviews at linguistlist.org):
	Simin Karimi, U. of Arizona
	Terence Langendoen, U. of Arizona

Consulting Editor:
        Andrew Carnie, U. of Arizona <carnie at linguistlist.org>

Editors (linguist at linguistlist.org):
	Karen Milligan, WSU 		Naomi Ogasawara, EMU
	James Yuells, EMU		Marie Klopfenstein, WSU
	Michael Appleby, EMU		Heather Taylor, EMU
	Ljuba Veselinova, Stockholm U.	Richard John Harvey, EMU
	Dina Kapetangianni, EMU		Renee Galvis, WSU
	Karolina Owczarzak, EMU		Anita Wang, EMU

Software: John Remmers, E. Michigan U. <remmers at emunix.emich.edu>
          Gayathri Sriram, E. Michigan U. <gayatri at linguistlist.org>
          Zhenwei Chen, E. Michigan U. <zhenwei at linguistlist.org>

Home Page:  http://linguistlist.org/

The LINGUIST List is funded by Eastern Michigan University, Wayne
State University, and donations from subscribers and publishers.



Editor for this issue: Karen Milligan <karen at linguistlist.org>

=================================Directory=================================

1)
Date:  Wed, 28 Aug 2002 08:34:30 -0500
From:  ocls at madisoncounty.net (Suzette Haden Elgin)
Subject:  Media; Lehrer News Hour 8/27/02

-------------------------------- Message 1 -------------------------------

Date:  Wed, 28 Aug 2002 08:34:30 -0500
From:  ocls at madisoncounty.net (Suzette Haden Elgin)
Subject:  Media; Lehrer News Hour 8/27/02

August 28, 2002

I watched with dismay last night as a complete segment ran on PBS's
"Lehrer News Hour" on the topic of the current news-reporter register
for American English. Over and over again, examples of sentences
"without verbs" were presented and discussed, despite the fact that
they had verbs galore. It was clear from the beginning that the
phenomenon for discussion was sentences without _copulas_, not
sentences without verbs, but everyone participating went on and on
about the way all the "verbs" were being left out.

If the level of scientific accuracy for this segment is typical for
the show -- something I would not have expected -- then viewers need
to be very dubious about segments on physics and astronomy and all the
rest.

Suzette Haden Elgin

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
LINGUIST List: Vol-13-2195