Functionality

[David Palfreyman]

Interesting discussion.  As someone recently steeped in the ideas of Geertz and Foucault among others, two things struck me as particularly interesting as I read through my last FUNKNET digest:

a) The interpretative dimension of "functionality" which seems to come into the later messages: e.g. Bill's idea of language users "tacitly or consciously *find[ing]* some advantage in" an innovation (my emphasis), as opposed to the innovation being *objectively* functional or not.

b) The emphasis in Bill's and Dick's messages on social groups rather than discourses.  To take the first loanword that comes to mind, I might use the term "passe'" rather than "old-fashioned" because it forms part of a discourse that I want to align myself with - or even to use ironically - rather than because it is associated with a social *group* (unless it's a social group defined just by those who use the word "passe'".  The same goes for choosing between "student" and "learner" in education...

Cheers,
David Palfreyman
Zayed University, Dubai

:-D