20.3270, Disc: Interest in Dependency Grammar

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LINGUIST List: Vol-20-3270. Sun Sep 27 2009. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 20.3270, Disc: Interest in Dependency Grammar

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1)
Date: 24-Sep-2009
From: Maxwell Daniel < dan.n.maxwell at gmail.com >
Subject: Interest in Dependency Grammar
 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 2009 10:08:55
From: Maxwell Daniel [dan.n.maxwell at gmail.com]
Subject: Interest in Dependency Grammar

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There seems to be a lot of interest in Dependency Grammar or Dependency
Syntax (these two names are often used synonymously), although compared to
other frameworks like Head Driven Phrase Structure Grammar and Lexical
Functional Grammar they are seldom mentioned on linguist list. 

I thought it would be interesting to see how prominent these different
topics were on the internet and Linguist List. The below table shows the
number of hits I got for these different topics:
                                        Linguist List        Internet
Head-Driven Phrase              206                 726,000
Structure Grammar
                                   
Lexical Functional Grammar    222               119,000

Dependency                            114            2,2,000,000
Grammar/Syntax                               

The totals for Dependency Grammar/Syntax are the totals found for
'Dependency Grammar' and 'Dependency Syntax' separately.

It seems that the internet count gets rounded off to the nearest thousand.
Of course these two lists access everything - articles, announcements,
discussions, just bare mentions, etc. 

To summarize, the first two are dominant on Linguist List, whereas the
latter is dominant on the internet.

Linguist List is the list aiming primarily at linguists, whereas the
internet has topics for everybody. Why should the interest in dependency
grammar/syntax be greater than in HPSG or LFG  in the latter  list, but not
the former? Could it have something to do with the fact that for the  most
part only HPSG and LFG are taught at universities?  And if that is true,
why should it be true, given the interest shown in dependency
grammar/syntax on the broader list?

Dan Maxwell 


Linguistic Field(s): Discipline of Linguistics
                     Syntax




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