In Analogies^x, Grammar^x

'But don't dictionaries serve as a prescriptive tool according to this--to explicitly state the general usage ("rules")?' As I said earlier, what a native speaker looks more on is the meaning (which, if broadly defined, can be regarded as a 'rule'. After all, language as a whole can be...

O, I thought you were, as your quote is in Chinese. Yes, L(x) is a function indicating whether a language is 'native' or 'foreign' to a person. It is not restricted to Language Acquisition though, as it is widely used in such topics as Language Teaching (see for example, Eric Hawkin's...

Another kind of illegitimate argument is based on analogy between one area of grammar and another. consider yet another construction where there is variation between nominative and accusative forms of pronouns: , where the subject has the form of a coordination of pronouns. This shows us not...

MrPedantic, A farm hinges on racist debate and such, so let's switch the example to factory work. If you build a sweatshop, pack it full of workers, and then pay them half of some minimum wage you could be looked at as cheating the workers. Also, minimum wage by definition could indicate...

Hypercorrection is -a construction or pronunciation produced by mistaken analogy with standard usage out of a desire to be correct, as in the substitution of I for me in on behalf of my parents and I. -the production of such a construction or pronunciation. - a grammatical, usage or...

Mr Pedantic wrote: Grammar isn't everything, K. It's always worth considering the context of a phrase. In this instance, the context includes the fact that while perfectly grammatical, and commonly used, it will sound strange or flabby or sloppy to some people, since (as CJ has demonstrated)...

A slight misunderstanding, Korin: I was interested in the phenomenon of 'artificial encouragement', rather than 'artificial hindrance', by analogy with advertising. To take the usual example: we create an idea of 'body odour', and then sell people deodorants. Thus the shelves of the...

If I am speeding down Highway 101, I am violating the laws of California; I am not violating the laws of physics. That seems like a good analogy to me. There are some interesting problems for linguistic scientists: a) How to stand outside the system they're studying. b) How to extract...

People sometimes refer to the CGEL on this site. Conveniently, some sample chapters from this publication are now online at CGEL sample chapters The preliminary chapter includes the odd lapse of logic. This is one of the first. Apologies for the fairly lengthy quotation: Another kind of...

Let's start at the beginning. What's the difference between "prescriptive" and "descriptive"? If I am speeding down Highway 101, I am violating the laws of California; I am not violating the laws of physics. In this sentence the word "laws" occurs twice - first, meaning "prescriptive laws"...