[Lingtyp] How do typologists use examples in grammars?

[Peter Austin]

Tamsin Donaldson's grammar of Ngiyampaa (CUP, 1980) is exemplary in
providing this kind of sociocultural and utterance context. An oldie but a
goodie.

Best
Peter

On Wed, 16 Jun 2021, 17:17 Marianne Mithun, <mithun at linguistics.ucsb.edu>
wrote:

> Thanks Francoise and Lena! I heartily agree!
>
> (And now that we're not buying so much paper and ink, this really doesn't
> increase the cost so much.)
>
> Marianne
>
> On Wed, Jun 16, 2021 at 3:15 AM Françoise Rose <
> francoise.rose at univ-lyon2.fr> wrote:
>
>> Dear all,
>>
>>
>>
>> I will send my answers to Eline in a private message, but I would like to
>> share a recent experience regarding examples in grammars.
>>
>>
>>
>> I am presently reviewing Lena Terhart’s grammar of Paunaka (a PhD
>> thesis). The author gives this notice regarding how examples are introduced
>> in the grammar:
>>
>>
>>
>> “One peculiarity of this work is that most examples are introduced by
>> briefly providing
>>
>> the extralinguistic context. This is usually not done in grammatical
>> descriptions. I
>>
>> started with this at some point, when I felt that context was necessary
>> for understanding
>>
>> and then extended it further and further. Thus, the reader will not only
>> learn about
>>
>> Paunaka, but also gain knowledge about the narratives and personal life
>> stories of the
>>
>> speakers throughout this work. Whoever is irritated by this is kindly
>> asked to simply
>>
>> overlook it. »
>>
>>
>>
>> I generally appreciate a lot when authors add important information on
>> the context of the extract (usually in brackets before the free
>> translation). I was yet planning to be one of the readers who would just
>> overlook these example introductions because my sense was that these
>> introductions would be useful sometimes only (in my view, mainly in
>> sections concerning discourse issues). Actually, it turned out that I
>> appreciate this practice very much: knowing the context very often gives a
>> very clear interpretation to the sentence and strong indications on how the
>> linguistic features under scrutiny works. Also, this is a very strong
>> indication that the linguist perfectly understands what the sentence is
>> about. I can attest that, as a fieldworker on culturally very distinct
>> cultures from mine, I do not always understand the contribution of every
>> sentence to the conversation/narration. Finally, this gives also a sense of
>> familiarity with the culture involved in the grammar, which is extremely
>> pleasant.
>>
>>
>>
>> Here are two randomly-picked examples from the grammar:
>>
>>
>>
>> Consider (516), which is about making something fall, just like (510)
>> above. It also comes from a description of the frog story,
>>
>> but this sentence was produced by Miguel and referred to another picture,
>> the one on which the dog has made the beehive (or: wasp nest) fall.
>>
>>
>>
>> A similar example comes from María S. who had just stated that smoking
>> is bad
>>
>> and now provides the reason:
>>
>>
>>
>> Best to you all,
>>
>> Françoise
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *De :* Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> *De la part
>> de* Eline Visser
>> *Envoyé :* lundi 31 mai 2021 15:15
>> *À :* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
>> *Objet :* [Lingtyp] How do typologists use examples in grammars?
>>
>>
>>
>> Dear typologists,
>>
>>
>>
>> I’d like to learn more about how you use the examples given in grammars.
>> I have just finished a grammar myself, and will continue to do descriptive
>> work in the future, and this is a topic that fascinates me. I'm especially
>> interested in knowing if one can discern the traits of a good example (for
>> typological use). I’d be glad if some of you could take the time to answer
>> the questions below, either briefly or elaborately. You can email me the
>> answers. Also, if there’s is anything published on this topic please do let
>> me know.
>>
>>
>>
>> 1. In general, do you prefer short (let’s say <1 line) or longer (> 1
>> line) examples? Elaborate if you wish.
>>
>>
>>
>> 2. In general, do you have a preference for examples from a certain
>> genre? Which? You can interpret genre broadly or narrowly, in which ever
>> way you like: monologue, dialogue, anecdotes, recipes, hymns,
>> picture-matching tasks…
>>
>>
>>
>> 3. In general, do you have a dispreference for examples of a certain
>> genre?
>>
>>
>>
>> 4. Say you have two examples that illustrate your point equally well.
>> What could be a deciding factor for choosing one over another?
>>
>>
>>
>> 5. Say you can’t find an example that illustrates your point well. On a
>> scale from 1-5, how likely is it that you will go to the language’s corpus
>> or the attached texts in the grammar to find one yourself? (1= very
>> unlikely, 5 = very likely)
>>
>>
>>
>> 6. Anything else you’d like to share about examples in grammars? Feel
>> free to rant.
>>
>>
>>
>> Eline
>>
>>
>>
>> P.s. For those who ordered a Kalamang grammar hard copy - they’re in
>> Sweden, I’m in Norway, traveling isn’t as easy as I thought yet, so this
>> takes a bit longer than I thought, sorry!
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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