Thankyou to everyone who responded to my questions about RT and other
theories, both on-list and off-list. I'm humbled by the way in which
my naive questions generated such gracious and enlightening responses.
I was also struck by the wide variety of positions taken by people who
align themselves in some way or other with RT. I had two primary
motivations in asking about RT and other theories. The first was to
generate some discussion on a topic that I think is interesting. The
second was to get some advice on where I should be directing my
researches when I finally get a chance to use a library again after 18
months at the Kenyan coast.
First of all, congratulations to my former colleague Billy Clark for
pointing out that Mental Models Theory correlates with Johnson-Laird
and not with Fodor (of Modularity of Mind fame - a confusion of 'M's
on my part). It was of course Johnson-Laird's theory which I
m-intended (and which features in a paper I intend posting on the
Cogprints website as soon as I return to the world of easy internet
access - thankyou Dan).
Andrea Rocci noted that on the one hand RT has stressed the importance
of inferential processes in meaning determination (pragmatics) at the
expense of linguistically encoded meaning (semantics), for example in
the case of enrichment; but on the other hand, the notion of
linguistically encoded procedural information functioning in
'non-peripheral' areas of 'grammar' (tense and aspect, pronominal
systems) reinforces the role of semantics as a constraining factor on
pragmatics. However, I do not see why this leads Andrea to feel that,
"the idea that a purely internal computational/representation system
should contain such units strikes me as utterly weird." So long as the
process of meaning determination is kept out of the picture, an
autonomous syntax dealing with configurational issues concerning
linguistic forms is still feasible. That said, maybe Andrea is correct
in prophecying a functionalist oriented future for RT.
In a similar vein, Christoph Unger stated that, "RT requires an
adequate syntactic theory to be one that doesn't try to put "pragmatic
functions" into the syntax." I agree, but I also think there are very
few syntactic theories where this would be disputed. Differences over
the division of labour between pragmatics and SEMANTICS may lead to
certain SYNTACTIC theories being misconstrued as allowing pragmatic
contamination where there is none.
Interstingly, two of my SIL colleagues, in off-list communication
(hence anonymity), presented very different views of RT vis-a-vis
functionalist vs autonomous syntax. One colleague asked me to explain
why I stated that, "Cognitive Grammar is obviously at odds with RT
over the scope of grammar, as are various other functional
approaches." This colleague continued, "When I teach courses in
linguistic theory I usually start by sketching a continuum between
"Autonomous theories of language" at one extreme, and "Inclusive
theories of communication" at the other. Both CG and RT fall close to
the latter extreme of the continuum (with CG even more extreme than
RT)." Well, I'm booked to attend a course on CG in July, and I promise
to keep an open mind. If I realise that I have been mistaken about CG
I will gladly put the record straight, but if not I will try to sketch
as precisely as I can the points of difference between RT and CG.
Another SIL colleague sang the praises of Minimalism. He finds it
extremely useful for practical descriptive analysis prior to getting
into discourse and pragmatics. On my limited experience of MP I found
this pretty incredible, but I respect him enough to believe that it is
so. He also added, "The idea that different languages differ basically
in parameter settings has given rise to a "new comparative syntax" with
a substantial literature." Comparative linguistics is a passion of
mine, so this gave me some encouragement. I'd like to know what this
substantial literature consists of.
Returning to the functionalist/autonomous divide, a robust challenge
to autonomous syntax from a RT perspective is provided by Marjolein
Groefsema's early work. (I hope Marjolein does not mind me ascribing
early and, by implication, late periods to her work, a la
Wittgenstein, so long before retirement age!) Thankyou to Begoqa
Vicente for reminding me of this. The on-line anticipatory hypotheses
that hearers use make autonomous syntax pretty well redundant. I was
very impressed with Marjolein's work in this area, and adopted much of
it in some of my own work in the late 90's. (It had many similarities
with the work of Hauner, of which I have heard very little of late.) I
don't know whether Marjolein has continued to develop this approach,
although I am aware that it was not 'mainstream RT' in the 90's.
Maybe, as Anne Bezuidenhout and J.L. Speranza suggested, Dynamic
Syntax is the theory to look out for. From the little I know, I
suspect it may be the kind of programme which Marjolein Groefsema
envisaged as an alternative to autonomous syntax. I hope that Ruth
Kempson and her colleagues will keep us all posted on the latest
developments, such as when the new book appears on the web. (By the
way, I'm familiar with some of Lutz Marten's work on Swahili, so I
trust that his input, and that of others at SOAS, will help to avoid
the Indo-European bias of most syntactic theories.)
Turning briefly to neo-Gricean pragmatics, Christoph Unger wrote:
"Again, I am not sure what you mean: in which way do think are the Q-,
I-, and M-principles more specific than the RT comprehension procedure
(which - I suppose - is what you compare the neo-Gricean principles
to)? There is one sense of course in which they are undoubtedly more
"specific": they are concerned only with Generalized Conversational
Implicatures in Levinson's (2000: Presumptive Meanings. MIT Press.)
sense. But is this "specificity" desirable? Not in my opinion."
I agree, and have said that a theory that does away with generalized
conversational implicatures (i.e. one that allows pragmatic aspects of
'what is said') has to be the way ahead. I suppose the question at
issue is what is preferable: a falsifiable but often falsified theory
(see articles and replies in JL and chapter 4 of Huang's "Anaphora"
for examples), or a non-falsifiable theory (which is how RT detractors
describe RT). In my mind the former is preferable, but the best option
is to either demonstrate that RT is, as it stands, falsifiable, or
develop RT (perhaps using insights from, dare I suggest, neo-Gricean
pragmatics) so that it is, and is seen to be, falsifiable (and not too
frequently falsified). In connection with this, I commend Andrea
Rocci's point that RT could benefit from interaction with theories of
discourse production as well as comprehension.
That's enough from me.
Steve Nicolle
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Temporary address from July-October 2002:
c/o 46 Athelstan Road,
harold Wood,
Romford,
Essex RM3 0QH,
U.K.
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