Re: Sapir-WhorFreakiness

Joe said:
> Mark P. Line wrote:
>
>>Alternatively, maybe there is an additional cultural constraint that
>>cannot, due to its nature, be discovered by outsiders: "Don't talk
>>straight with outsiders."
>>
>>
> <snip>
>
> Yes, but surely someone would notice after a while that, when they
> weren't aware that an outsider was nearby, they'd talk differently.

Perhaps. I guess it would depend a lot on how long the researchers were
around, how well they were integrated into the society and how soon the
researchers made up their mind about what the language was like.

(Like, a researcher who is convinced that passivization does not change
meaning will fail to see any change in meaning, at least for a while.)

-- Mark