Today's variation, tomorrow's change

[Mohamed Diriye Abdullahi]

----------------------------Original message----------------------------


I remember correctly the statement or something similar belongs to T.
Givon. I was not able to locate the exact reference.

I hope that helps.

Mohamed Diriye Abdullahi


>At 10:13 AM 10/22/00 EDT, bwald wrote:
>----------------------------Original message----------------------------
>>I am currently away from home and most of my research sources, and I can't
>>remember where the statement, "Today's variation is tomorrow's change"
>>comes from (i.e., how to cite it). Any help?
>
>>Randall Gess
>
>I don't know who said it, but it sounds like a safe bet -- as long as it's
>about "tomorrow".  Eventually everything that's not universal in a language
>will change, and as far as I know, no particular variation is universal.
>So you'll collect on your bet -- tomorrow (no matter when you read or
>re-read this).
>
>Apart from that, not all variation is indicative of change in progress, or
>even imminent change.  There is stable variation.  For example, in most
>varieties of English -ing vs. -in' is stable variation influenced primarily
>by register, that is, by the speakers' social relationship to each other in
>the situation.  For a few varieties the variation has been resolved in
>various ways, e.g., in urban South Africa there is only -ing (for Anglos),
>in the South, but particularly in the Caribbean, -in' is dominant.
>