[Corpora-List] 'Standard European English' ?

[Chris Tribble]

re Standard European English, I tend to agree with Piotr + I have the
feeling that perhaps there's been a degree of barking up a tree that isn't
there.  Isn't the issue more to do with expert performances (ideas that
Charles Bazerman was playing around with years ago)?

>>From where I stand, the interesting problem is not so much to do with a
"standard" anything, but with what are considered to be allowable
contributions by clearly delineated discourse communities...

In writing, there's nothing new here so far as I can see.  Whether you're
developing a text in your first or second language, you have to LEARN how to
write appropriately for specific audiences.  Native speakers have no real
advantages. Thus those who draft laws in the European Commission, practice
as neurosurgeons, become software engineers, or contribute to the corpora
list, will each need to build textual expertise relevant to the domains they
operate in.  These textual practices will be more or less standardised
(locally) depending on the needs of the communities in question.  A law, a
business plan, a software design commission, or a referred journal article
will have to be worded and structured in such a way that it meets the
expectations and needs of informed readers. A contribution to the corpora
list is likely to face more relaxed standards. It was ever thus.

Speaking's another ball game (as Halliday and those following - eg Biber et
al - have clearly demonstrated), and again, although descriptive
idealisations like RP still linger, the 99 dollar question around
pronunciation is to do with mutual comprehnsibility (see Jenkin's work on
International English).

>>From a corpus perspective, my research interest is in building text
resources which make it possible to begin to describe a range of expertise
across written texts which have been composed by people who do no have
English as a first language, who are not writing for first language
audiences, and who are having to deal with gate-keepers (editors, peer
reviewers etc) who are from similar backgrounds.

My general bet is that there will be little SYSTEMATIC contrast between the
texts these expert practitioners write and those written by NS analogues.
But that's an empirical question.

Whatever - it's a stimulating discussion!

Thanks

Chris
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