Re: OT: Whatever

On Dec 22, 2007 11:02 AM, Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...> wrote:

> Dirk:I dont think your lack of interest in YA*PT's is despite your
> phonological specialty, but because of it. Not only do you know this
> stuff, but youve internalized in a way that the rest of us cant, even
> though we may have read and may even own JCW's books.  To you, it's
> like a thread popping up every few weeks with another
> "newly-discovered" consequence of something trivial, like the earth's
> rotation.  "Hey, you mean it's LATER in Rightpondia?  Cool!".
> Followed a few weeks later by "Whoa, so, like, it's not dark there
> right now?  What color would you say your sky is, exactly?"
>
That may be part of it, although I am not as conversant with the facts of
English phonetics and phonology as I would like to be. But I find that even
in my professional reading, lists of facts concerning the pronunciation of
this or that language aren't especially interesting unless they're
accompanied by an analysis which tries to explain why the facts are that
way. It's the System that fascinates me; the particulars are the System
working itself out. Lists of particulars invite analysis, but analysis
doesn't usually happen on CONLANG (nor do I really expect it to since that
isn't the purpose of the list).

Dirk