language querry

[Danko Sipka]

R.M.Cleminson wrote:

> If one has any sense, one doesn't attempt to use the category of
> prostorechie at all.

This rests on two propositions neither of which should,
as far as I am concerned, lead to such conclusion:

Proposition A:

> It is a peculiarly East Slavonic concept

Yes, but it means only that one should use it when referring to that
linguistic material and/or scholarly tradition.

Proposition B:

> It has certainly been used to refer to all of these, but there is no
> consensus at to whether it covers all of them, and if not, which.

Most terms used in linguistics or social sciences are like that. I
think that this quote from Lipka's "An Outline of English Lexicology",
Niemeyer, 1992, p. 5 makes it clear:

"...both terms, lexicon and dictionary, have been used as technical
terms in the literature, and there is no single "correct" use
of lexicon or dictionary. To take up the last point first, I claim
that such words are "notational terms". I here follow Enkvist (1973:17),
who points out that style "is a notational term rather than a linguistic
prime" and can be defined differently in different frameworks."

Or take the term 'attitude' in psychology. William McGuire made an
extensive search of the literature on attitude change, and reported
(in 1985) that more than 500 definitions of attitude have been used by
social psychologists in their research on the subject.

So, if we follow your suggestion, we should resign from most of the
terms we use.

> For scholarly purposes, therefore, it is best avoided, though of
> course one is aware that it exists and covers some form(s) of non-
> standard Russian.  Inache govorja, termin "prostorechie" mozhet
> upotrebljat'sja v kachestve jazykovedcheskogo prostorechija, no ne
> dolzhen vchodit' v normu uchenogo jazyka.

This is not only wrong, but also offensive to such works of excellence
as Zaliznjak's Grammaticheskij slovar' russkogo jazyka, Russkij jazyk,
M., 1987(3), who uses 'prostorech.' as one of the labels.
In the footnote 3 on the page 9, he explains it:

"Iskljuchenie sostavljajut formy, pomechennye kak prostorechnye. Pometa
<<prostorech.>> wystupaet v takix sluchajax v roli predupreditel'noj.
Zaliznjak is anything but "jazykovedcheskoe prostorechie".

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Danko Sipka, Visiting Professor
Slavic Department, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan
Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences
Translation Experts Poland
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Web: http://www.amu.edu.pl/~sipkdan/ja.htm
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I think where I am not, therefore I am where I do not think

                                                    Jacques Lacan
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