31.2960, Fun Facts: Into the Archives

Thu Oct 1 00:11:58 UTC 2020

LINGUIST List: Vol-31-2960. Wed Sep 30 2020. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 31.2960, Fun Facts: Into the Archives

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Editor for this issue: Everett Green <everett at linguistlist.org>
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Date: Wed, 30 Sep 2020 20:11:13
From: LINGUIST List [linguist at linguistlist.org]
Subject: Fun Facts: Into the Archives

Hello LINGUIST List Readers and Subscribers,

In the spirit of our Fund Drive's 30th anniversary theme, I dived into the
archives to learn more about how various linguistic theories have been
represented on LINGUIST List over the years. Since my main interest is in
syntax, I decided to focus my search on a few syntactic theories. The field of
syntax has come a long way in the past thirty years, and LINGUIST List has
been there through it all. It would have been interesting to do a thorough
timeline of each of these theories and their various developments over the
years; but considering time constraints and in the interest of appealing to as
many of our syntactician readers as possible, I'll do a bird's eye view of the
first and last mentions of several syntactic theories.

The first mention of the Minimalist Program on LINGUIST List was on 20 May,
1992, in Discussions, in a comment by Dr. Martin Haspelmath
(https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/3/3-417.html). Dr. Haspelmath mentioned
Chomsky's paper, "A minimalist program for linguistic theory," and we promptly
received several requests by readers wanting to know where they could access
it. When I searched for this paper, the official citation indicates that it
wasn't officially published by MIT Working Papers until 1993. The most recent
mention of Minimalism was 31 August, 2020, in Books, where we announced
Extraposition from NP in English by Edward Göbbel
(https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/31/31-2695.html).

The first mention of Cognitive Grammar (including Construction Grammar,
Functional Grammar, and Discourse-based Grammar) was 1 February, 1991 in
FYI's, announcing International Cognitive Linguistics Association's journal,
"Cognitive Linguistics" (https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/2/2-27.html).
Like LINGUIST List, "Cognitive Linguistics" is also celebrating its 30th
anniversary this year, having been founded in February 1990
(Congratulations!). The most recent mention of Cognitive Grammar was 24
September, 2020 in Supports, advertising a PhD student researcher position at
Ghent University (https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/31/31-2891.html).

Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar, of course, originated in the '80's, and
it was quick to appear on the LINGUIST List. The first mention of HPSG was on
4 February, 1991 in a Summer School announcement for the Third European Summer
School in Language, Logic and Information, specifically for a class on 'Topics
in Constraint-based syntactic theory' taught by Dr. Carl Pollard himself
(https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/2/2-30.html). The most recent mention of
HPSG was 20 April 2020 in Reviews, for a review written by Michael B. Maxwell
of the University of Maryland on Endangered Languages and New Technologies
(ed. Mari C. Jones) (https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/31/31-1411.html).

Lexical-Functional Grammar first appeared on LINGUIST List on 23 February,
1991 in Discussions, in a comment by Dr. Larry Gorbet, lamenting the
"prescriptive metametalinguistics" of those who would criticize names like
"Lexical-Functional Grammar"
(https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/2/2-49.html). Its most recent mention
came on 17 June, 2020 in Conferences, announcing the 25th International
Lexical-Functional Grammar Conference, which was hosted via Zoom because of
the pandemic (https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/31/31-1997.html).

As we saw from this brief overview, many different syntactic theories have
been represented on LINGUIST List over the years, and, in many cases, these
theories were being discussed on LINGUIST List extremely early on. We're very
proud of 30 years of helping linguists from all over the world connect for
discussion, collaboration, and employment. If this overview has made you
nostalgic, you can always go on our own trip down memory lane by visiting our
archives (https://old.linguistlist.org/issues/master.cfm). We'd also be
interested to hear from readers who were here during the 'first mentions' of
these theories – is there a theory or an idea that you remember hearing first
on LINGUIST List?

Thanks for reading,
- Lauren

********

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--the LL Team

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LINGUIST List: Vol-31-2960	
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