NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #3/NN_1993_3.iso/spool/sci/lang/9032

Text File | 1993-01-28 | 3.4 KB | 76 lines

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From: [e-mail] (Richard L. Goerwitz)
Subject: Re: Vowel systems of ....
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Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 03:51:51 GMT
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[e-mail] (Alan Prince) writes:
>[e-mail] writes:
>
>>Typically there is an early analysis by someone or other, done in a
>>framework no longer current.  Someone does a re-analysis in a more
>>current framework, which then gives rise to a whole slew of theory
>>papers, all of them resting on the original analysis, which their
>>authors may not even have read.  The work on theoretical implications
>>of nasality in Guarani has gone like this, for example;
>>also current work on metrical analyses of Winnebago accent.
>      ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>Actually, Bruce Hayes's analysis in his widely-circulated 1991 ms
>_Metrical Stress Theory_ is based on a thorough study of all available
>material on the language.  You may be referring to Halle & Vergnaud
>1987, which as interesting as it is has never garnered praise for
>depth of scholarship -- but isn't current either.

I hope you're not criticizing Bill for not having seen an unpublished
study circulated via informal channels.  Can you clarify one thing
here?  I'm curious whether you're saying that Halle & Vergnaud shows
great depth of scholarship, but was never praised, or that it shows
no depth of scholarship, and justifiably went un-praised.

>>Discussions with other linguists suggests the pattern is quite
>>general.
>
>Widespread, maybe, but certainly very much tied to individuals, their
>graduate students and associates, rather than to any principles of
>`doing theory'. Theorists like Bruce Hayes and John McCarthy, to cite
>only two, have a fullscale commitment to scholarship, which is visible
>in everything they do....

Re McCarthy:

That may be true, but just look at the example of your own disserta-
tion and how he used it in his.  You were using a somewhat outdated
notation (things get outdated in phonology in about a month :-)).  He
recognized this, but by his own admission largely adopted the frame-
work you set up, augmenting it in places, but not as far as I can see
with a greate deal of philological depth.  And in fact when we go to
the basic data for your dissertation, we find a Qimhian vowel system at
its core, seen through the filter of Gesenius-Kautsch-Cowley, Lamb-
din, et. al.

Halle & Vergnaud, incidentally, use a data base that hardly differs
from the framework people like McCarthy set up.  All that really dif-
fers is the theory.

Bill Poser is right on the money, I think.

You can, as you note, tell students to check the facts.  The trouble is
that checking the facts often involves a great deal of training that
theoreticians do not get.

Of course, us data guys are open to equally grave criticisms, so I'm
not trying to call the kettle black.  Or if I am, I admit that the pot
is pretty well singed as well....

--

   -Richard L. Goerwitz              [e-mail]
   [e-mail]          rutgers!oddjob!ellis!goer