Grammar Without Grammaticality: Growth and Limits of Grammatical Precision

Geoffrey Sampson; Anna Babarczy

Published by De Gruyter Mouton 2014

Grammar Without Grammaticality

Growth and Limits of Grammatical Precision

Geoffrey Sampson and Anna Babarczy

Volume 254 in the series Trends in Linguistics. Studies and Monographs [TiLSM]

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110290011

Overview
Contents

About this book

Linguists have standardly assumed that grammar is about identifying all and only the 'good' sentences of a language, which implies that there must be other, 'bad' sentences - but in practice most linguists know that it is hard to pin those down. The standard assumption is no more than an assumption. A century ago, grammarians did not think about their subject that way, and our book shows that the older idea was right: linguists can and should dispense with the concept 'starred sentence'. We draw on corpus data in order to support a different model of grammar, in which individuals refine positive grammatical habits to greater or lesser extents in diverse and unpredictable directions, but nothing is ever ruled out. Languages are not merely alternative methods of verbalizing universal logical forms. We use empirical evidence to shed light on the routes by which school-age children gradually expand their battery of grammatical resources, which turn out to be sometimes counter-intuitive. Our rejection of the 'starred sentence' concept has attracted considerable discussion, and we summarize the reactions and respond to our critics. The contrasting models of grammar described in this book entail contrasting pictures of human nature; our closing chapter shows that grammatical theory is not value-neutral but has an ethical dimension.

Author / Editor information

Geoffrey Sampson, University of South Africa and Sussex University; Anna Babarczy, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary.

Reviews

"Overall, this is an important work that all linguists should read (even/especially if they are generative grammarians)."
Helen Aristar-Dry in: LINGUIST List 25.4363

Supplementary Materials

Contents

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Preface Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	v
Acknowledgements Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	ix
Table of contents Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
List of figures Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	xvi
List of tables Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	xvii
Chapter 1. Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Chapter 2. The bounds of grammatical refinement Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	26
Chapter 3. Where should annotation stop? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	53
Chapter 40. Grammar without grammaticality Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	64
Chapter 5. Replies to our critics Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	95
Chapter 6. Grammatical description meets spontaneous speech Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	119
Chapter 7. Demographic correlates of speech complexity Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	136
Chapter 8. The structure of children’s writing Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	155
Chapter 9. Child writing and discourse organization Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	172
Chapter 10. Simple grammars and new grammars Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	184
Chapter 11. The case of the vanishing perfect Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	201
Chapter 12. Testing a metric for parse accuracy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	218
Chapter 13. Linguistics empirical and unempirical Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	237
Chapter 14. William Gladstone as linguist Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	269
Chapter 15. Minds in Uniform: How generative linguistics regiments culture, and why it shouldn’t Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	296
References Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	320
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	335

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter Mouton
Audience: Linguistics Academics and Advanced (Graduate and Final-Year Undergraduate) Students, Readers in all areas of Linguistic Specialization, and in adjacent subjects, particularly Psychology and Philosophy.
Pages
- Front matter: 17
- Main content: 341
Illustrations
- Tables: 18
Keywords: Grammar; Grammaticality; Grammar Acquisition; Cultural Imperialism; Syntax

eBook

Published: November 27, 2013
ISBN: 9783110290011

Hardcover

Published: December 12, 2013
ISBN: 9783110289770

Paperback

Published: June 20, 2016
ISBN: 9783110488067