Re: Sawilan Constructions

On Tue, 3 Aug 1999, Ed Heil wrote:

> Boudewijn, this is a very simple version of "construction grammar,"
> and I included the "based-on" relationships so you could be amused by
> seeing object orientation used in a grammatical description of a
> conlang. :)
Hmmm. I don't think I'm really convinced that this isn't merely
a notational variant after all ;-). I don't see any special constructions,
like inheritance (multiple or otherwise - Panini already had inheritance
of rules, if not of objects). Likewise, I have some trouble taking serious
a paper that thinks a certain theory is desirable because it is
natural (especially if the definition of naturalness includes
symbolic links - a clear influence from Unix ;-), conceptual unification
and theoretical austerity, instead of success in describing the variety
of languages found in the world, and explaining the coherence of each
language.

I could try to offer a more substantial and less flippant review, if I
were tempted to take it serious - but I really can't. Scott DeLancey
is at the outer boundaries of what I can take - and I seldom agree
with him (if only because I've found that he uses his data sometimes
in a slip-shod way). I agree with Langacker that grammar encodes meaning,
though, and I've enjoyed Wierzbicka's theoretical work to some extent,
but Ronald Langacker is not for me...

http://crl.ucsd.edu/newsletter/4-3/Article1.html

As for the language: more data, please!

Boudewijn Rempt  | http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt